September/October 2010 Featured Stories
Where Heaven and Earth Meet: The Barn Dance
By James F. Twyman
James Twyman
We all want to believe that there's a place between heaven and Earth where the magic never ends, but how many of us ever get the chance to visit that sacred ground?
In the summer of 2009, I had the opportunity to spend several days in the space "in between," and the result was the book 
The Barn Dance. The story may begin in sorrow, but it concludes with the hope that life doesn't end with death. It's just the beginning.
Three days after Thanksgiving in 2005, the woman I married when I was 23, raised a child with and considered my best friend, was murdered in her apartment outside Chicago. Linda was the type of woman you couldn't help but love, and I wasn't the only person who felt that way. I always said that if you didn't like her, then there's something wrong with you, not her. In many ways she was the example of how to live a loving, service-oriented life. Her senseless death was more than a blow, it was the type of shock I was afraid I would never recover from.
"You'll never get over this, but there will come a day when it's no longer over you." Those were the words spoken by my friend Neale Donald Walsch who flew to Chicago the day after the tragedy to stand at my side.
A Conversation with James Twyman
The Barn Dance is James Twyman's most personal book yet. Though known internationally as the peace troubadour and the author of many bestselling books including Emissary of Light and The Moses Code, national new reports of the murder of Twyman's former wife outside of Chicago brought him into greater public awareness. Nearly five years later, Twyman is releasing a book that not only chronicles the tragedy, but delves into the mystery of life after death, and direct communication with loved ones on the other side.
Q. It must have been a difficult story to tell. Clearly Linda meant a great deal to you.
A. Linda did mean a tremendous amount to me. She was my first love and I never stopped trying to win her back. She was actually considering moving out to Oregon to be with our daughter and me when she was killed. I wrote this book because I knew that everyone would be able to relate to it, regardless of whether they've suffered a similar type of loss or not. We've all had to say goodbye to loved ones, and we've all had to experience grief in our lives. But the idea that there really is a magical place in between heaven and Earth is very deep in our subconscious. We all would love to meet someone we've lost, someone who is on the other side of the veil.
I wanted to write a book that would honor the woman who changed my life and taught me about love and how to be a good father. I also hope that it will continue to bring attention to a case that is still very much unsolved. That's one of the reasons I'm very interested in getting The Barn Dance into every bookstore in Chicago, as well as around the world.
Q. The story really develops when you find out that someone has been arrested for her murder. Is that true?
A. Yes, it's very true. And yet at the same time, the police are being very careful, which we all understand. One of the things I was really impressed with was how personally the police and detectives were taking this case. It was almost as if Linda was their sister, as if the same thing could have happened to someone they love.
Q. How much of this story is actually true? Is it fact or fiction?
A. That's a hard question to answer since the story takes place at different times and on different dimensions. To me it's completely true, and I'm never going to back down from that. What I can say for sure is that every detail about Linda and my life with her is unexaggerated, and as far as the barn goes, that's something people are going to be asking about for a very long time.
— Ira Streitfeld
Three and a half years after Linda's death, I realized he was right. The clouds seemed to be parting, and even though I still missed her, the profound sadness seemed to have lifted. The fact that this realization only lasted a matter of hours surprised me, though, because then an email arrived with news I didn't expect: "Someone just confessed to Linda's murder." I went from feeling healed to diving back into the thick of despair.
The story centers around an experience my daughter and I had when we were traveling from Chicago back to Oregon immediately after Linda’s funeral. While driving along a small highway in Nevada that hugged the side of a terrifying cliff, we found ourselves caught in a blizzard and nearly went over the edge.
Several years later, when I first heard that someone was in custody for Linda’s murder, I felt compelled to return to that cliff, and though the thought seemed alien and strange, I decided to follow. I drove five hours to the remote highway and hiked to the bottom where I ultimately discovered a remarkable barn, a place where dreams came true.
Imagine finding a place where the barriers separating the physical and spiritual dimensions begin to blur, and you suddenly find yourself dancing in a barn with people who are not meant for this world. And imagine if in the midst of that amazing gathering you meet the one person you thought you would never see again, the person who held the key to the greatest lesson of your life. This is what I encountered in the wilderness of Nevada, and though it will seem impossible to some, to many more it will be the answer to a prayer.
Since then I’ve tried to find ways to help others make similar connections with their loved ones. In a recent scientific test called DreamDancing, more than 50 percent of the people involved had at least one connection with a loved one on the other side of the veil, an actual face-to-face conversation that they were able to verify at a later time. More than 300 people participated in the study, and I believe we’ve begun laying the groundwork for a whole new exciting field. In the past we thought we needed mediums or psychics to help us make contact with the other side, but now it seems to be possible for almost anyone (learn more at www.dream-dancing.com).
The magical adventure I experienced is something everyone can relate to because we've all lost people we love, tragically or otherwise. The experience of grief is the same, and so is the hope that comes when we realize our loved ones never have left at all, but are still with us in a way that is intimate and real. That was what I learned from Linda, and now it's the only thing I want to share.
I believe that there really is a barn in the middle of a secluded forest where heaven and Earth meet, and where we really can stand side-by-side with our loved ones on the other side of the veil. I should know because I've been there.
James F. Twyman is the New York Times bestselling author of 13 books, the president of The Beloved Community and the founder of The Seminary of Spiritual Peacemaking. Visit www.jamestwyman.com.
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