Debra Basham

Living and Loving

Sacred Stories

  • 555

    Sacred Stories

    Two days earlier he had awoken at 5:55 am.

    Notification of a message from a dear friend (in an earlier time zone) came through to his phone this morning at 5:55 am.

    His friend’s message said: We are being asked to love the virus (a sentient being) and say to it, “Thank you, Teacher, for bringing all the planet together. We have made a vow to do no harm. You may not harm us without harming yourself. If you killed us all off, you would destroy yourself. Soften…. release… make this healthy for all.”

    His friend’s message had included a link for Kathy Mattea’s singing, “Come From the Heart.”

    He knows “angel numbers” have meaning. He had listened to a broadcast on Tuesday evening in which the significance of three fives had been mentioned in another context.

    An online source says 3 fives means that you are going through, or will be going through, a positive change in your life. … It’s a triple number, indicating that number five’s vibrations are also tripled. It usually symbolizes a really big change, so better get ready for it.

  • How the $%^#

    Sacred Stories

    It had been seven weeks since her husband’s passing.

    As she settled onto her mat to teach the yoga class she heard herself speaking truthfully about how challenging it was becoming to have people keep asking her, “How are you doing?”

    She immediately felt remorse, hoping not to seem ungrateful for the support and care. She truly valued that.

    After class she overheard one of the students mention having just watched a movie, Wild Oats, about a recent widow. Eva, played by Shirley MacLaine, had blurted out, “How the $%^# do you think I am doing, my husband just died!”

    On her way home from yoga class, she stopped to drop off tax information. The receptionist said, “So, are you tired of people asking you how you are doing?”

    That woman, too, had been a widow.

    She told her about the line in Wild Oats and they shared a good laugh.

    It feels soooooo good to be understood….

  • Surprise!

    Sacred Stories

    He traveled to spend the holiday and meet the family of the woman he had started dating. He knew a good friend of his brother had married a woman from that town.

    Driving around, he saw the restaurant where that couple had met and where the guy had proposed to his wife.

    Driving back by the restaurant again later, he took a photo and sent it to the guy, saying he was in that town for the holiday.


    He got a text right back from the guy telling him to look closely at the photo, “I am in that photo! I was walking across the parking lot at that exact moment!”

    The timing of events of our lives are not random. We witness sacred connections….

  • Heraclitis

    Sacred Stories

    During a two-day continuing education training, a couple of times the instructor mentioned Heraclitis, a philosopher born in the Persian empire.

    A couple of days later, about three pages into the book he bought to read while waiting for his flight to Florida to visit his grandparents, he saw the exact quotation his instructor had been referencing:

    Heraclitus, a philosopher born in the Persian Empire back in the fifth century BC, had it right when he wrote about men on the battlefield. “Out of every 100 men,” he wrote, “ten shouldn’t even be there, 80 are just targets, nine are the real fighters, and we are lucky to have them, for they make the battle. Ah, but the one, one is a warrior… “

    It is important to notice when things happen.

  • 49 Days

    Sacred Stories

    Chanting GATE GATE PARAGATE PARASAMGATE BODHI SVAHA from the heart sutra for 49 days to-the-day of transition is a significant act of love in the Buddhist tradition. PARASAMGATE means completely gone to the further shore. The prefix SAM is intensive in meaning: completely, thoroughly, altogether.

    She had been chanting for the husband of a close friend.

    “Saturday is the 49th day,” she told her friend.

    “Saturday? Saturday is March 7. March 7 is his birthday!” her friend exclaimed.

    They were both brought to silent awe realizing the perfection of the date of his transition positioning the 49th day of chanting to be on his birthday.

    Completely gone to perfection.

    Thoroughly blessed.

    Altogether in love.

  • Stacey and Courtney

    Sacred Stories

    She had traveled a distance, while wintering in Florida, to be evaluated for an intervention for relief from chronic back pain.

    She sent her friend an update via text message: “We made an appointment for the treatment tomorrow! And it just happens that Stacey and Courtney helped us out with the schedule.”

    FYI – Stacey is the name of the daughter of her friend, and Courtney is the name of Stacey’s daughter.

    She recognized the significance of the coincidence. Omens are everywhere….

    But God has blessed you, because your eyes can see and your ears can hear! Matthew 13:16

  • Glass Globe

    Sacred Stories

    Her husband had recently transitioned. The friend she was talking to on the phone asked if she had noticed communications from him. Initially she said she had not noticed anything, then she remembered something that might be!

    “Last week when I was down with the flu, I was lying on the sofa with the dog. Something happened that has never happened before or since. That blown glass globe hanging from a cord in the living room started moving. It just started swinging back and forth and I had a thought, ‘I wonder if that is him.’”

    Even though she was curious what could have set the globe in motion, she was not feeling well and she did not give it another thought until her friend asked her about her experiences of her husband’s visiting.

    “That globe is a substantial object—and the cord is no flimsy thing either. I made that cord…” she continued.

    All of a sudden, she burst out, “It’s swinging again!”

    Her friend exclaimed, “Hello! Thank you for visiting! We love you!”

    She was so excited. “I am going to hang up and take a video of it swinging. I will send it to you so you can see it too. I want to keep this to remind me….”

    Soon after, a video was received in which you can clearly see the beautiful globe swinging back and forth. Here is a still shot from the video of the swinging globe:

  • Scorpion

    Sacred Stories

    Her husband was going through some health challenges. He was scheduled to go to Mayo Clinic.

    She was so stressed about all of this.

    When her husband came home, he made three scorpion wire sculptures.

    Curious, she looked up scorpion totem meaning.

    Holy Cow, this was insightful.

    The article described her husband’s best traits and his worst traits.

    The page that had caught her attention was “Totems of a Scorpio”.

    Her husband is a Scorpio!

    This was a direct message from the universe for her through him.

  • Chicken Soup

    Sacred Stories

    A text message titled “Ailing” came to the yoga group:

    … “I woke up yesterday with a dry cough; made it though Thursday’s yoga class. Today this is a full-blown, achy, stuffy ailment. So sorry, (sad face) but I need to cancel our Saturday morning yoga.”

    One of the students who attends Saturday’s class by phoning in while out of state wrote: “Sending cyber Chicken Soup for the Body and Soul….”

    “Ailing” responded:

    … “I have chicken noodle soup in the refrigerator ready for later. Thank you for your good thoughts.”

    Having noticed the teacher’s under-the-weather voice, about to walk out of the door, one of the Thursday students felt guided to offer to make the teacher some chicken soup. The offer was graciously received and the soup was made and delivered later that day.

    In Sunday School children are told God has no hands but ours. Compassion and love produced a strong intention of that offer of chicken soup. The healing soup was lovingly prepared, delivered, and received by God’s hands.

    LOVE ignited is not limited by proximity, and it is not limited to chicken soup….

  • Closer to Fine

    Sacred Stories

    She posted a long entry on Facebook, “My sweet dad passed away two days ago.”

    Her dad had been diagnosed with cancer about 8 months earlier. He was SO strong and resilient and yet so gentle and kind in spite of the pain he was experiencing. He wanted to survive and live, but cancer is so brutal and finally there was nothing more they could do.

    “I am eternally grateful that I was able to see him several times a day for the last few months, but I hoped for 20 more years…” she wrote.

    Some of his last words were to her step-mom, “Everything is fine. Everything is going to be OK.” Soon after he said this, he went into a deep state of transition.

    Shortly, as she was leaving the hospital briefly to check on her kids, she was thinking about how she felt she’d received some messages from her little brother after he died a few years ago. She wondered if her dad would reach out to let them know he was OK. She wondered if her brother would meet her dad to help him on the path. And she wondered if she would notice if there was a message from her brother or her dad. Or maybe something meaningful from both of them to let her know they were both “fine.”

    So she let these thoughts go and did what she needed to do at home.

    She got in her truck to drive back to be with her dad. The radio was on and NPR’s “A Prairie Home Companion” was wrapping up with a live song.

    Tears flowed. She immediately began to record a video driving along the road to share with her other brother later.

    She hadn’t heard this song in years. Her dad had taught this song to her and her two brothers as they were learning to play guitar in the 90’s when they were young, early college-aged kids!

    The Indigo Girls song was a family favorite—a feel-good song at the time.

    She was blown away feeling so grateful for this message. The title of the song is “Closer to Fine”….

    To top it off, as she pulled to the stop sign at the top of the hill, and pointed the video toward her dad’s old wood shop he built years ago (now for sale) the chorus rang out:

    There’s more than one answer to these questions
    Pointing me in a crooked line
    And the less I seek my source for some definitive
    The closer I am to fine
    The closer I am to fine
    The closer I am to fine, yeah

    This moment was a much needed respite from the grief she was feeling.

    She shared the video and this image, and says, “I think this was my brother’s saying all is fine with him, but maybe my dad’s saying that too, since he was beginning to make his way home about this time.”




    She concluded her post, “I don’t know what happens exactly when we leave this plane and move to the next, but I feel like my dad deserves the best of it…. ‘and all the trees of the fields will clap their hands.’”