S2E23: It’s Never Too Late | Talk Tracks

Today, we have Betsy Hicks Russ and her son, Joe,

“who just started to learn spelling at the age of 30.”

And around that time is also when Truth Around to Lepathy. And probably my competence and everything came out. Joe's gonna be up and down in and out as he feels comfortable. And I'm so excited to share your story today. (upbeat music)

Hi, everyone, I'm Kai Dickens and I'm thrilled to welcome you to the Talk Tracks. In this series, we'll dive deeper into the revelations, challenges, and unexpected truths from the Slap of the Tapes. We'll feature conversations with groundbreaking researchers,

thinkers, non-speakers, and experiences who illuminate the extraordinary connections that may defy explanation today, but won't for long. If the Slap of the Tapes change, the way you see your non-speaking child,

but left you wondering what to do next. We made a show just for you. The Slap of the Tapes Now What is a new companion series hosted by two parents of non-speakers who've been there. They offer guidance, resources, and real conversations

about how to move forward once you know your child is truly in there. You don't have to figure this out alone. Find Now What on the Slap of the Tapes YouTube channel, and wherever you listen to your podcasts.

Today we have an incredible mother and son, Betsy and Joe,

so why don't we start by introducing yourselves? Hi, I'm Betsy Hicks Russ, and I'm the mother of Joe, who's 32 years old. We live in the state of Washington, and we have a lot of fun being very, very active,

cycling hiking, and we bring the world around with us as we do it.

“And Joe, do you want to start by weighing in on anything at all?”

Min-in! H-I-I, and I get there, get there, K. I know. There you go, K-I-K. And, is that it?

There you go. Yeah, that's it, there we go. I'm so excited to hear it here. There we go. There's a lot of enthusiasm.

Yeah. You want to start by kind of giving your backstory, and what's that you want this couch today? I'd love to do the backstory, 'cause it's really interesting how it all unfolded.

So, Joe's 32, and I was in the autism industry through my late husband who was a pediatrician, and so we worked with a lot of autism, and I did that for 16 years, he passed away 10 years ago, and I really thought all I knew all there was to know,

and I had resigned. Yeah, he's not in there.

I'm never going to communicate with him.

He doesn't understand.

“And how old was Joe when you were feeling now in that way?”

We're talking sadly like three years ago. We're not talking a long time ago. We're talking of an entire, like, almost 30 years of me thinking that my son did not understand anything, or very little, and really resigning to severe autism.

And all the words that they use, you know, I just thought he had IDD, intellectual, developmental disability. I just didn't think he had any abilities. And one day, I made a post on social media, which still haunts me, that I said,

somebody asked me, how much do you think Joe knows? And I'm like, you know, I think it's like a foreign language, where you understand some of the words, and you don't understand the rest. And somebody reached out and said to me,

you know, I thought that about my son too, and now we have spelling. And I had heard about it before, but I just didn't know how accessible it would be for us to be able to get somewhere we lived in not a huge city.

So I looked into it, and it was a five hours to get to a practitioner. And we started to go, and you just like every parent, you hope that first one is gonna be like,

"Hi mom, you know, there's here to say something really incredible."

And he fell asleep during the first one, and probably the second one, and probably the first five after that, no indication that he understood. And I was kind of laughing at my commitment to it,

like, why am I even doing this? But I did it, and I just kept going until one day, the practitioners said to me, "Hey, I'm moving to Belle and Ham, where I live." And I'm like, "Well, that's a sign."

So we started going every week. And I could see that he was now starting to understand the lessons, and he was still falling asleep, and he was still having meltdowns, and he still would only attend for like 10 minutes.

And the reason I'm saying all of this is because Joe's biggest message is he wants people to know that it takes time and to not put a timeline on it. - Yeah. - So after about a year of going every single week, one day, we were in a session,

and it was a picture of the desert at night. And there was white, like a white powder on the ground,

So do you think it's snow, like, you know,

or is it sand, what do you think? And he spelled, "It's salt."

“(laughs) and he knew that that was a salt plane.”

And I think it's somewhere in Utah. (buzzer) And that's when I just collapsed, and just couldn't believe it that he was aware of that. What's progressed from that in the last two years

of him being now an open speller is this understanding that is so hard for people to shift from, of being able to think, that being told that they're not in there, that they don't understand,

to understanding now that he's way more intelligent and grasp things much faster than I ever could. And so it's a strange journey to take. - So Joe was only even spelling for about three years. - Yeah. - Openly about two.

- Yeah. - Wow. - Joe, maybe if you wanna spell a little, I'm curious to know, other non-speakers all over are still locked inside without having access to spelling. And is there anything you want to tell parents?

I mean, some parents think my kid is too old.

“Early intervention is the only way to go,”

and I've heard some parents say, oh, well, they'll look at the telepathy tapes so these parents are some non-speakers who really worked on regulating their body

and they'll say, "My child will never be able to do it."

- Right. - And what's your advice, Joe, around spelling? (laughs) - I, N, T, and S, it's N, and keep going, keep going, keep going, keep going, E, and all the way.

Where are you going? V, and, and keep going, E, and it's never, T, O, two, okay, keep going, buddy. - Oh, oh. - L, and A, and what's next, T? - It's never, two, L, A, T, and E.

- It's never, two, L, T. - No, no, I know. It's very exciting, good job. Do you want to get up for a little bit? - Yeah, go hang out with your dad. You come back, Joe, you can just,

this is your place. So, for those of us going through it, who have, or, you know, a non-speaker, or some of the praxia, or, you know, labels of really autistic, or whatever it is, what were some of the things

that were the most surprising to learn about him? - Funny, he's so funny.

He has this incredible sense of humor.

Like one day, we were asking permission if we could film, and he spelled, do manage to get my good side. (laughs) And he wanted to be a Q-tip for Halloween. (laughs)

He wanted the big fluffy top and a bottom, he wanted to be dressed as a Q-tip, and he just says the funniest things about his life. So, that's been really fun to get to know him about. He says he's really interested in the origin of words.

He's very big, but advocacy, he's trying to encourage people not to give up, and so yeah, he's a lot of fun to be with, and it's a whole different world for us. I mean, our whole relationship,

everybody in the family has changed because of it. - How is that a change with your, like, if you can't say what you want for dinner, or that your stomach hurts, I would imagine the amount of anger and frustration outburst coming from Joe

would have been huge, huge. I mean, has behavior changed at all. - It has, but it's also the part of the behavior change has strongly been because he gives me the reasons for his meltdowns now,

and now that I'm understanding more about a praxia and just this complete lack of control for his body, the things sometimes the body does things that he doesn't mean to, and where I used to go into a meltdown mode of,

what did I do wrong, and what do I need to do to fix it? Like, that was my mode every single time, and he's just like, it's not about you,

“it's about me and my body, and you need to leave me alone.”

And just that alone has changed everything, the meltdowns have gone from like our long to five minutes, because he just needs to be left alone to get it out. - Yeah, and why did you make Libby? Like, how did that come about?

- Okay, so that's a great story. - Okay, for people who, Libby was featured in Season One of the 12th year, John Paul's Mother, and you and Libby have become friends. - Yes, we have.

- And how did you meet Libby? - It's so fun, so the telepathy tapes comes out, and I, like, I literally at one point, I was on episode four, I pull over the car, and I'd bring out the letterboard, a numberboard, actually,

and I go, I'm thinking of a number of, you know, of a number, what number is it, and all four digits, Joe hits it perfectly. And I sat there, and I just couldn't move, and that's where I said, now what?

Now what, like, when was was to do with this information? So I didn't know what to do, that same week, I reached out to Libby, we were like, let's just all gather at my place,

It ended up being 32 people, and we all got together,

and it was like we were all family.

“The need for community in our situation is so intense right now,”

because the spellers methods don't wanna talk about telepathy, you know, and there's only so many people we can talk to telepathy about, and we are getting all this information, and we just don't know what to do with it all. So it's been, it's been having the support system,

having Libby, and all these other friends of mine that I've now met to be able to make sense of it all. - Well, I guess two questions around the telepathy kind of reveal. I mean, you first asked him to think of the number, or actually spelled the number that was in your head.

Had you ever experienced anything previous to that, that made you think that this was possible, or was this just like a company? - This was totally out of my, everything, everything with Joe was one of those things with me where I believed it,

I just didn't believe it was for Joe. Joe was too severe. Joe was too, you know, he wasn't gonna comply.

That was always my, I argued constantly for my limitations.

And I mean, to the point where it shook me so much, I did this huge post on social media just saying, I was wrong.

“And I just, it was just a general apology”

to everything that I where I may have misled people, but also I want people to be humbled in this experience to know that it's okay if we're wrong, that they're not holding resentment, they just want us to move forward.

They want us to be able to, you know, when I asked, I said, please forgive me for all that I've said in front of you and done in front of you, he's like, forgiven, it's over, it's the past. Let's move on, this is exciting.

Let's not waste energy on being upset about it all. So no, I was clueless, so I was dealing literally with Joe becoming an open speller and telepathy with it about a three, three-month period of time. Like it was all happening all at once.

And I was just, it was, it was so much to go through.

And the problem is like nobody believed me.

Like that was, that was another part of it. Is that, you know, it was always, that my daughter's had the head nod. That's nice mom, you know, and it was all of that. So then I, to then you really don't even know

who to talk to about it. - Now, do your daughters and your husband like, are they all on board with spelling and have they seen and witnessed the telepathy? - Yeah. - Like where do they all stand now

and how did that progress happen? - Yeah, that's an interesting one. Well, the spelling happens when they actually see it in person. That, that really was big for all of them. My daughter, Joe got to tell his sister,

he loved her for the first time. Joe has two sisters. One who's way more on board with it than the other. She, because she's in the, she's a social worker and a little more clinical about the whole situation.

But the telepathy thing was interesting over Thanksgiving break. We did the number of things. I always joke to Joe. I go, we got to do the party trick.

We got to do the party trick, Joe. And he just smiles at me and goes in the other room and we did the whole thing with the number. - Joe would be another room and they'd show you a number. - Yeah.

And she, she's the one who'd gave me the number which she knew Joe wasn't there. She came back out. I don't think she was expecting it. She, 'cause she fell to the floor and started to cry.

She couldn't believe it. I mean, she, she knew I was talking about it but she was seeing it herself and having done her own, which she felt was a correct study. Maybe, it made it a lot more real to her.

So since that's been the case, you know, she can't wait every single day to hear what a Joe spelled it at you know, she's just really excited about it. - That's so interesting and maybe,

“I mean, I think like there has almost been this bullying”

around science and understanding and if you're on the wrong side or right side and what's fringe and not fringe and in a way, it's like, I think the paradigm in which we live which this materialism really wants people to doubt

and dismiss things that aren't easily measured or validated. And I think that spelling is at the edge of what we can understand because I think that, obviously these people are,

it not because you know, authoring their own thoughts. But I think to get there to have that motor control, it requires this like grounding and love and utter attention of another human being and what can be connected in that moment

is it's like how a mother can lift a car if you love the person who can underneath it? I mean, love makes us do unbelievable things and I think the love and attention of someone sitting with someone with a praxis can help them overcome

whatever is going on and it's really hard for science to be like, well it's not independent spelling, you know? - Right and then let's even take into the role too of this like martyrdom that moms are supposed to kind of, and I'm not saying dads because I'm trying to leave them out

But it's also this kind of, you need to do all this, but there's nothing for you and this. And this is something that Joe Spelled really, really early on is how much he wants me to love and care for myself because how much that, I learned over time

that that affects him so dramatically that he needs me to be joyful and happy and be able to be regulated myself. It's such a co-creative process, co-regulation, but it's co-creative as well.

It's both, we're creating this life together, we're regulating each other, we're moving forward together and it is the ultimate dance, really, is what it is. - Yeah, I love how you said that, it's so beautiful

“just how important it is for parents to know what they're feeling”

so they can regulate it and take care of it. Because if a parent is not together and not grounded and not feeling great, it's going to impact their child with a heightened sensitivity. - So much and I get it, I know what it's like.

And being taking care of yourself doesn't mean going to get your nails done. I mean, you can, great, go get your nails done. That you like that, go do that, but it's like that's the, that's not what we're talking about.

We're talking about taking care of yourself by taking a few deep breaths, stretching your body, eating well. - Mm-hmm. - I'm a big proponent about these beautiful energetic bodies

and need beautiful energetic food. Like, so give them the healthiest they can be, but that doesn't mean just give your child the healthy food. It means take care of yourself too. We have to recognize that the more that we're all

uplifting ourselves as a family unit, the greater experience, we are all going to have. This isn't just about giving your child the best possible life. It's about you having the best possible life as well too. - Yeah.

- And do you think that they want to be responsible for your unhappiness? Like, they don't want to look at you and have you say, "I had to give up my life for my son." Or, "I can't do that because of my son."

Like, do you know how big guilt they feel over that? So they want, when we're laughing and joyful

“and silly, that's what feeds them the most.”

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“these spell that has really, maybe, wow, do you or your family?”

I love what we ask some what slogan on a t-shirt would he want? And he said, "No, what happens when you presume competence? You don't make an ass of you and me." Which I thought was great. I think this is important.

We asked, "How do you feel about not being able to communicate for so long?" And he spelled, "In my mind, that was the hand I had been dealt." Doesn't do me any good to wallow over things that can't be changed.

At least, my loved ones understood what they could of me. - There's something very poetic about that. - Yeah, very much so. - Yeah. - Oh, this was really good because he loved the episode you did

with Paul Stamets, because we had listened to Michael Poland's book, how to change your mind on audio, but that's another big change with Joe is how much he loves audio books and he loves learning.

“He just wants to keep learning and learning.”

- So, he thinks psilocybin is amazing.

He's said, "He needs something to help his trauma response, because it's both emotionally and physically charged." He says, "I feel memories vividly. It's hard to know what is reality." - And has he tried like microdocian psilocybin?

- No, no, we haven't. - But Joe has spelled, he's interested. That's fascinating. - Yeah, I know. - I was told, I could literally go to jail if I give Joey psilocybin right now,

because legally speaking, we don't have consent. His testimony in court holds no value. Even though he wants to do it, he can't legally advocate for himself by being a speller. That's what's a big problem right now,

which is why we all have to be working so hard to get this accepted more understandably.

“- Yeah, because I know he has tremendous trauma.”

He's 30 years, and he's lived in a group home for a year that I know was a horrible situation and his dad and I divorced when he was young and his stepfather died. And so he spelled trauma is real.

And I will acknowledge it when I've had time to enjoy this time of communicating openly and having my words genuinely listened to.

I wanna soak up every last second of goodness

while I can. So he knows he's gotta go there, but he's just not really ready to go there yet. I have a nonprofit called Autism Autists and we asked him what he filled in Autists he was.

And he says, "It test the synopsis of nonfiction by taking you through an eventful expedition." Let me say that was not on my mission statement. - I did not even think of something bad and I didn't know. - Wow.

(laughing) I don't even think I could have produced that one. (laughing) So one of his first poems he wrote. It was about hiking and he wrote,

eager feet slip into shoes. No longer does he feel the blues. The sun is warm on his face.

He feels like he's one first place.

Moving his body only makes sense here. Moving his body makes everything clear. The part that I think it's interesting with poetry is not being able to write that down first and make it make sense before you are able to spell it.

Word after word is a pretty challenging. - Yeah, I love poetry as well. And when you sit and write, there's something that happens when your pen hits a thing. - Yeah, see how it's flowing and there is.

And to imagine something right upon my pointing to letters, it would feel so difficult. - Yeah, pretty, right to just just go, especially. So we didn't know he liked poetry in one day his practitioner asked, "What would you like to do today?"

And he says, "May I have a shot at writing poetry?" And we're like absolutely anything in particular. He says, "I'd like to try a high coup." Which this goes into the fact that we were not at all influencing him

because neither his practitioner nor I knew how many syllables. We knew that had something to do with syllables but we had no idea how many syllables was each.

And he wrote, "When my feet hit trail, sensations tickle my soul, peak joy, I'm alive." - It's beautiful. - Yeah, so being outside can be profoundly impactful and so great for regulating the body.

What happens with Joe's body, his sensations, maybe even his control over motor movements when he is outside in the forest or on a hike? - So it's either hiking or cycling, either one.

And I almost always let him lead.

I try to always follow him so that this is one part of his life that he gets to lead. It's his spirituality. It's where he connects. When we ask him, "What are your thoughts on spirituality?"

He says, "I can remember thoughts of experiencing God in nature and in the kindness of others. I notice light around any kind of loving energy. It could be God, could be nothing more than love. When he's hiking, he is connected

in the greatest way imaginable. I really enjoy just following behind him and just watching him navigate and have his conversations he'll put his arms up or whatever it is he might be doing. - And so, he knows it's funny because so many parents

are so interested about the hill.

“And I think the hill is fascinating and I know Joe calls them”

when we asked him about the hill. He said he likes the lights off at night so that he can connect to his silent amigos. He says, "They tell stories of their days and I tell jokes."

And I think that's a beautiful, I like the way that Susie Miller puts it, chat room. She calls them, it's like in the hill, like they go to their different chat rooms. But I think we sometimes forget the fact

that it's more than the hill. It is a connection to all things. It's a shared consciousness moment of all that's in this world. And I think that that's where we discount a lot of their meltdowns is being self-induced because there's something really horrible

going on, but they're also bringing in a lot of energy all the time and they can connect to whatever they need to connect to. So the nature makes sense that it could be a grounded place because all those trees, all that earth, they want to take in whatever we want to let go.

They're there for us. They're there to help us breathe better and to help us stand grounded and to hold us up.

“And we have to remember that when these individuals”

are not allowed to be outside, they're literally being kept from the very thing that could be healing them. And I say healing is a very loose term. I don't mean healing from autism. I mean healing from pain.

Yeah. Suffering. It's so beautiful you just said that because I was thinking about different stories parents have told me where they went to look at what are options out there if I ever had to put my kid

in an institution or a send them to school for you or whatever. And every parent that I'm actually so far has been like these places are awful. Yeah. Like cold floors and feels like a prison and the exact opposite is what's restorative.

I mean for all of us. But I think especially for people with a praxia where I mean I've just I've watched I'm sure you watch it every day like where if you take someone with a praxia who is a difficult time managing their body being out in the woods is like a game changer.

And it can be your backyard. Just let them take off their shoes, let them touch the earth. And then just being out in any form of nature and nearby part whatever it takes let them have those experiences. But yeah, you're right.

It's it. So what else is on this? Oh, this is funny. We asked, do you struggle with physical issues? And he spelled my stomach is like a living entity that is moody.

That was good.

“We asked, why do you need to connect with nature?”

And he spelled, this is the techno demise period, a time when technology killed the innate need to connect with nature. We sent some questions from listeners. Yes. So you had asked the question, I'd love to hear from other spellers what advice they would

give parents of young kids who have just started this journey. So Josie answer is, for young kids, stick with the things they truly react positively to, trust their instincts, you will know when it's not worth it.

And then we asked, what do you have to say when someone has a less than ideal first session

with spelling, for example, give yourself a number, no less than 10, then reassess how you feel after I bet there is a change. Jos is very, very big about reassessing. Everything that we do these days, he says, let's check back in in three weeks. Let's do this and then check back in in three weeks.

He likes to give things an opportunity to work.

Let's just reassess. Okay.

Next question was, I have observed that some non-speakers appear to demonstrate a form

of knowing that goes beyond typical intuition. In certain cases, they seem able to anticipate future events or outcomes with notable consistency.

“From your perception, she asks, how should this phenomenon be understood?”

So Jos says, I think that intuition is something that most people overlook or discount as luck or chance. The non-speakers simply get messages without having to name it. That was a really big thing when I heard that because we're so big about are you a savant?

Can you do this? What are we going to call this? Is this telepathy? Is it shared consciousness? Is it this?

And it's just like the non-speakers don't have a desire to name it. It just is. I love that. What was that line again? The non-speakers simply get messages without having to name it.

And then he says, I don't really consider myself a savant, but I will say, my curiosity runs deep. You love that. Okay.

“The next question is, are all non-speakers able to communicate telepathically?”

He said, they think and learn differently.

They strive towards connection, but they never lose their ability.

Non-speakers telepathically listen for those who are ready to connect. So I think this is a question that comes up quite a bit. This, I was actually just talking to Libby about this this morning, is that a lot of people have the question of, I don't want them hearing my thoughts. I don't want them knowing what I'm thinking.

And what he's been trying to explain is that the non-speakers look for who wants to be connected to. They're not just simply going around reading thoughts. They're looking for those who want to connect. I do think there is this privacy too, where it's like if you're tuning into them in a moment

of wanting to really connect, I think there is sometimes an openness that transpires. And I think with parents, or people that are really close to sometimes it feels like that is way more open, a rogue or fluid, like he might be in your mind a bit more. 100% 100% and the, of course, none of us can deny that. We're living it every day.

We know that they know what's going on. We don't have to, we don't have to speak, that they understand what's happening. But it's really interesting though because though now, because remember, I got into presuming competence spelling into lepathy all within a matter of three weeks. So I'm like, now, you know, I did, I had, like the presumed competence part of me says,

tell him your schedule for the day, write it down so he can see it so he understands what it is that we're doing for the day. And the spelling part of me is asking the questions, but then the telepathy side of me is, like, do I have to really do any of this? I can, can I just put it out there?

“And so I think we're still trying to find our way with a lot of this as well.”

Yeah, it really is amazing.

The transformation, I think. Well, it more just like presuming competence, write it up until three years ago, I will say, Joe, I felt I got the short end of the deal. I got the short stick, I got the, I got the tough card. And now, I have a front row seat.

I have a front row seat to one of the most exciting times in history. And the joy I feel every single day is like nothing else. It's beautiful. Is there anything any advice or anything that Joe has said that you really would like to have people know?

I think what we're in for right now is, we're hearing it from all of the great virtual teachers. They're all saying the same thing. Like, this huge awakening is happening, everybody, like, the systems are breaking down. It's everything is shifting.

And it's the non-speakers who have zero skin in the game. They don't have a course to sell, they don't have a lecture to attend. They're all giving this beautiful message of this love and that we just need to love each other and they don't seem to have any fear with us. They're not holding on to the fear.

So it seems to me that if they're so tapped in and I know he's tapped in because I see him the way that he connects with his world is that if they're not afraid, if they know that the message is all about love, then we all just need to calm down a little bit. And I keep going back to this and not try to put it in a box, like let it be whatever it's supposed to be.

We're also so concerned with controlling what's next.

when it happens.

“As opposed to just being like, well, what if it happens in our favor?”

What if something good is happening?

And if this is exactly what needs to happen because what Joe has explained to me before two is that it's all because of contrast. And if you look at think of a trampoline and you take like little teeny bumps on that trampoline, you don't do much. I went really far down.

I was so far down on that trampoline. My husband died. I went through bankruptcy. I had a son who didn't speak and hit his head all the time. I went through the lowest of that trampoline sinking as far as those springs would take it.

And it catapulted me up so freaking high that now I just, I just, I'm so in love with life. And that's what happens with contrast.

So when we have these negative things that happen, instead of being so angry that things

happen to us, bless them because they're giving us direction as to where we want to go.

“Well, I definitely don't want to go there again.”

So I'm going to do it. And then what my big message to so many parents is is that the resiliency that us parents build, like there is no demographic. You want to mess with less than us moms who have been through the ringer with our kids. And the school district and the social systems and all the things that we have to go through.

We've been through it all. And we have this kind of like, you know, mom and bear attitude now that is infallible because we know we've been in worse situations and we've gotten out of them. So we know we're going to get through whatever comes next. And that's a glorious attribute to hold on to to be able to believe that no matter what

happens, you'll find a way out. And then I think you're coming back in. Come on in. You're going to close the door? Close.

Okay. Oh. I'm curious about Joe's thoughts around that, you know, you said that you feel like you have a front seat to a very exciting time in history for what's happening next. And does Joe think that we're going through a shift in consciousness or some for awakening

and what might be coming for all of us? Yeah. Why that's happening. All right. I talked about it before.

I was myself, just like I'm sorry. Yeah. I was going to get together. Yeah. He talked about that before.

I was like, and talk about this. So you're feeling emotional. Tell me why. What's going on? So much joy.

And it's just such, you imagine, nearly 30 years, 30 years, I can look at it as 30 years wasted, or I could look at it as, oh, one of them, or I could look at it as, this is the most miraculous thing that's ever happened to me in my life. Yeah. So that's where I'm going.

I'm not going to look at the wasting part of it. No. So I'm sorry, your question. Apologies. Well, you were talking about having a front seat.

Yeah. Very. What feels like a seismic shift. And I wanted to see what Joe has to say about that.

“Does he think that we're on the brink of some shift in consciousness or a paradigm shift?”

And if so, why or what is it, what will the new paradigm look like? Right. And, oh, and the love, this is the time of universal love. So is there anything that I haven't asked you that you think is really important for people to understand about this journey?

I like to tell parents that they need to spend more time trusting their own intuition and teaching their children to trust their intuition as well.

What I, when I first went public about the fact that Joey was a spell or on social media

and then followed it up just a few months later with my support of the telepathy tapes. The amount of criticisms and pushback that I got from certain individuals, if I had not been so strong in my convictions, would have been really hard for me to go through. And they would like insult spelling or the whole, it's, you know, the spelling. So those of us who post about spelling often, we are constantly getting messages from

And just super quick for anyone who doesn't know, ASHA is the American Speech Language

“Hearing Association and they're like a professional scientific and credentialing association”

and they will not endorse typing as a valid form of communication and therefore it's not taught or really embraced by schools. Right. And if people were able to do that, they would get to what they want so much faster. It should be the most exciting time of our life as we're like our children are openly

spelling and then we have this large group of people trying to squelch us and to put the whole thing down. There's lived experience which means more in my opinion than data. Yeah. And you know, I was talking to a child psychologist this morning actually and one of the things

that he said, he was talking about something completely different but he was like the most important thing is to listen to parents because so often parents come in and, you know, people will try to like pathologize their child or say this or see that which is like why aren't we listening to people that know your kid, you know the child the most.

“And I think with that regard, I have not met a parent who child is smelling, who hasn't”

been like this is transformative.

They are saying things that I would never, would never come up with, they're clearly

their own words. They have capabilities in this, you know, on this front, like, whether it's poetry or math or something. And to not trust the parents, I mean, I don't understand, you know, what's going on there.

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Or I shouldn't maybe vicious as two, but like do you understand why? They're pretty aggressive. They're pretty aggressive, and so needlessly, so they have an industry. They have an industry. They have a very large industry that they have a very large industry that's been wrong.

And that is going to be really hard to reconcile. And it's going to be so tough to reconcile.

And when you think of when this is finally fully understood, it's not dozens of SLPs that

will be working for the school system. It's going to be communication partners that are going to be working for the system. And so there's a lot of jobs at stake. Now the coolest LPs, the ones that I'm really loving right now, that have truly become, they're one of my heroes and my friends.

And again, people listening, and SLP is a speech language pathologist. And the speech language pathologist, accreditation group, which is called Asha, are the people that have taken the strongest stance against spelling and won't validate it. Right. So I just wanted to give clarity for anyone.

Yeah. Thank you. So the really, the really cool ones are making the switch now. They know, they see it, they know, they understand it. And they're, they'd rather, they want to be a part of the party.

They don't want to be loved in the dust, which is what's going to happen. Because it's only a matter of time. These spellers and these non-speaking individuals, whether or not their spellers are not. Because even if they're not spellers yet, they're 100% still aware of all that's happening. Who do you think is going to win?

The people who are creating more rules, fighting, belittling, making parents feel bad, or the non-speakers who have total direct line to God or the universe or whatever you want to call it. Like, at some point, no matter whether it's a religion or just a basic faith in the

on that bounce.

They've been on this trampoline where they bounce down very, very low.

And if I had to put my bet on an industry or on the non-speakers, I'll go 100% of my bet with the non-speakers. Yeah. They're going to prevail. And final question, because you kind of mentioned it about the pipeline to God, you

know, sometimes because I've said they go somewhere and study at night or they've talked

“to people on the other side, has Joe shocked you with anything like that yet?”

He does a lot of laughter at night, so I definitely believe he's telling jokes. There's just so much laughter. No, he's very quiet and secretive about it, and I respect that. I feel I'm super excited to learn more about the Hill, and I'm excited to talk to Susie Miller about it and things such as that, and I am interested to learn it, but I also feel that

this is a private place for him, and it doesn't, I don't need to be a part of it and I understand every little thing about it. I love that, then.

I'm so glad that you said that, because we always, we kind of have a joke, I mean, we

mean it really seriously, but like, we don't want the Hill to get dunterified. Yeah. Because people trying to go there and now, and enough non-speakers have assured me, like it's a sacred place, it's divinely protected, only like the truest pure spirit are let in.

“If people think they're going there and they're posting that they're going there, they're”

going somewhere else, they're not going to our Hill, and so I do believe it is protected, but, you know, but what do we need to know? Why do we need to know? Why do we need to know? Yeah, why?

It's cool. It's interesting.

It's something to understand a little bit, but I don't need to know where he goes, I mean.

If he, if he was a speaker, I wouldn't, at 32, he wouldn't be telling where he went at night. So, I can guarantee he doesn't need to tell me about the Hill either. Yeah, I love it. So one thing that's really exciting is Betsy and Libby and Grum, John Paul's mother from

season one, have teamed up to create a new show for, really, for parents regarding what to do next. Now that they have all the information around non-speakers and competence in being in there and spelling in the spiritual gifts, so that parents don't have to navigate this unknown territory on their own.

It's a crazy story. I was traveling with Joe. We were visiting his twin sister in Oregon, and I had a bit of a lucid dream with him. He, he came and he told me what needs to happen. He said there needs to be a show, and, and mind you, I had no idea that Libby was like

new, you was like, I knew she was in telepathy tapes and I'm just getting to know Libby at this point. I didn't know she had you on her speed dial, I didn't know any of that and Joe, so Joe comes to me and, excuse me, all this, this huge download and I get up in the morning and I write it all down and I send it to Libby and I just said Libby, you know, I don't

know if there's a way that you can get this to Ky, but we need to have a show for the parents. These parents are struggling so so much because one of the things that I like about my role with social media and that I take very seriously is between all my platforms, I have a couple hundred thousand followers, but I read just about every single comment.

And I do so because every now and then there's those one comments where they are struggling so much and I just don't want to leave them hanging. And so by doing that, I have such a connection to what they're all challenged with and they're scared and they don't know what to do and nobody's answering their questions because nobody's comfortable to talk about it and because it's also very new for us.

So it was just the strong feeling that we need to do the show and I should say, a strong feeling that a show needs to be done on that topic and then turns out it's me. How often has that happen to your show comes to you on dream? I think it must happen more than I think because I wake up in the morning with intense downloads.

Like I wake up in the morning just ready to write and I just just write, write, write, write. No, it's really interesting, it goes back into that labeling thing that he was talking about is like we kind of get into this piece of, so are these his words?

“Is it coming from it and it's a shared consciousness and that's what shared consciousness”

is about. It's about kind of that expansion of ideas and having co-creators to create it with, when someone

it. So somebody is being delivered the answer, so that's the shared consciousness that we're all shooting for and that we all, as we connect into it more, we won't have, I don't think we're going to find the need to label it so much in the future.

“I mean do you think that's what happens with, you know, everyone's just labeled to”

let it be. Like do you think it is more of a shared consciousness where you too, because of, just sure, probably deep relationship you're just merged in some way. Yeah, I do feel it's a shared consciousness, I think that's really what it comes down to. And I know science wants to define it, but I am just so sure of things and that

pieceness comes from not needing to know all the answers, the piece of the peacefulness and life comes from, we don't have to label it, we don't have to know the answers, we don't know how it's going to play out, we're just going to get a phone call one day and say hey, you want to host a podcast, like that's how it's supposed to happen.

And we act like those are the things in life that are just like these incredible moments

of, wow, this happens, like no, like when I talk to Joe, I don't have this on his actual right in at this, but when I had spelled with Joe before about why this telepathy tape is so powerful right now, he's like because it's the time in our universe, in our consciousness that it's meant to happen, this is the time that we're all awake for it. This is the time that we can all accept it and we can hear it.

We couldn't hear it before, we would have swapped it. Now we can hear it and that's a really exciting time to be alive, we are, we are about ready to embark, I feel in one of the most exciting times in history. It's exciting that you and Libby will be really leading the way on these questions. It will be and it's going to be light and fun because you can't not have fun with Libby.

No, she is so fun. We laugh a lot, we have a lot of fun so it's going to be and we're going to really be listening to the questions. We're going to be having a question of the day at the end of every show to be able to make sure that we're asking answering all these questions that people have.

I love it, that's perfect. This was your initial email to us, can I read it? Yeah, yeah. Okay, dear Kai, as your shaping seats in three, I felt a nudge to introduce myself directly, like many parents, when I first listened to this floppy-to-tape season one, there was

an immediate irreversible shift, one of those moments where you know there's no going back. You said some very nice stuff, which I felt too sheepish to read, but then you wrote, "I'm

“writing because I believe the next evolution of this work is not just about showing the”

telepathy exists, but about helping parents integrate what it means to live alongside it." And I love this.

You said, "Here's what I'm witnessing, the parents believe you, they believe in the

telepathy, they feel the truth of it, and they yet they are also a drift. They're bobbing between on grief, between spiritual recognition and the very human anger that comes from years of perceived suffering, self-induced behavior, medicalized narratives, and relentless push-back from the institutions that feel threatened by anything they cannot measure or control.

The science world is loud, religion often doesn't know where to place this, and parents are left holding extraordinary children with no map for how to walk forward without collapsing into blame of themselves, of systems or their child's body." And I love that. So that email became the impetus for the new show that you and Libby are, and that, me writing

that was Joey kind of downloading it to me overnight.

“And I think that's an important story to share, that Joe came to you in the Lucidream to”

say, "You must make a show about this." Yeah. Well, it wasn't even me. It just says, "Tell Kai, she needs to make a show, and then you ask me to do it." So love it.

You want it? That's so wild. Okay. And then, I want to just get some of these questions that you talked about, that you got from Joe, like, "What's an autism best?

And why does he wear one?" Joe was a cyclist, and I used to ride with him on the streets of San Francisco all the time. And he's a great cyclist, but he, his apraxia makes it harder, hard for him to be what some would deem as courteous. He doesn't go to the side the way he's supposed to.

He sometimes gets close to the cars, and we were constantly being yelled at every single time that we were cycling. And it made for a very unsettling type of activity. So one day in frustration, I got very, I decided to make a vest. I went and bought a orange safety vest, and I put on their autistic be kind.

And our whole life changed overnight. It was thumbs up. Please go ahead. It was an entirely different experience. And it, we was going so well, and I just kept getting a nudge.

You need to make these, and I never thought I would be doing this, I'm like somebody else can

Yep. There we go.

The males can do it, and so I did it.

“I contracted them out with a company, and I have these vest that I sell.”

I started a non-profit. We don't make any money from it. It goes 100%, the vest are only $20, and that's pretty much what they cost us. We sell these through an autism Odyssey. And the thing that people, when people had said to me in the past, but you're labeling,

and like, first of all, Joe chooses to wear it.

Secondly, but is it a bad label? Like if somebody were deaf, and you didn't know that they were deaf, you could do things that might scare them or frighten them, and so sometimes it's labeling is about communication. Sometimes labeling, putting a name on it, is more about how can we help give this person special considerations so that they have an easier time at it.

Does he wear it everywhere? No, but when we're traveling, we're about to go on an airplane, whatever it might be, they're incredibly valuable because he can be spontaneous, and he can grab somebody's cell phone when least expect it, and he was one time thrown in the streets in San Francisco for doing

“something spontaneous, and so that's why I created the vest.”

It's cool. I mean, it helps you to meet someone where they're at, and if someone is able to communicate, they can say whether or not they want to wear it. Yeah, exactly. Thank you for being here.

And I'm so excited about your new show with Libby. Thank you for giving us the opportunity. I'm looking forward to it so much. Oh, that's a great. That's it for this episode of The Talk Tracks.

But new episodes will be released every Wednesday, so stay tuned, as we work to unravel all the threads, even the veiled ones that knit together our reality.

“And please remember to stay kind, stay curious, and that being a true skeptic requires an open mind.”

Thank you to my amazing collaborators.

Producer's Katherine Ellis and Selena Kennedy, technical directing audio mix and finishing by Jeremy Cole, opening and closing music by Liz with PW, and original logo and cover art by Ben Condor Design. I'm Kai Dickens, your executive producer, writer, and host.