My swim in the pool was not spooky at all. I was actually in a very happy frame of mind and stayed there for ages by myself.

You hit the nail on the head when you mentioned that people neeed to let go of 'conventional thinking', once you can do that, things start to flow and fear of the unknown starts to dissipate quite rapidly.

Once the flow is initiated then any blockages, such as fear are washed away and the truth can be revealed.