Debra Basham

Living and Loving

Tag: encouragement

  • Monet Double-Sided Puzzle

    They were visiting with friends and family who all live in Michigan, while wintering in Florida. They had gotten together because their sister-in-law had come for a short visit — the first time of her being in the RV park where she and her husband had wintered together for many years.

    The conversation got around to doing jigsaw puzzles. She said, “A friend sent a Monet double-sided puzzle to us.”

    The puzzle had been sent as a gift following her husband’s heart surgery. The friend who sent it assumed he did puzzles with her because every puzzle was finished by him placing the last piece and posing for a photo.

    When he asked to be reminded which of there friends had sent the puzzle, she replied, “Sue Spitler.”

    “Sue Spitler?!?” their sister-in-law blurted out before continuing to share that Sue had made a donation to the church in memorial of her husband. Not recognizing the donor’s name, she had flagged the donation and when she came upon it again she had searched on line, found numbers for several people named “Sue Spitler” then called the one in Indiana, thinking perhaps it had been a customer of her husband. She felt such a strong desire to know from whom the gift had come.

    Speaking to Sue Spitler, their sister-in-law had discovered Sue was not a customer, and had not known her late husband at all. The donation had been made because Sue wanted to honor the brother of her dear friend.

    Interestingly, although that donation has been made 16 months earlier, their sister-in-law had come across the notation of the mystery donor and had done the internet search and made the call to identify “Sue Spitler” as the donor just three weeks ago …

      Death Is Nothing At All
      by Henry Scott-Holland

      Death is nothing at all.
      It does not count.
      I have only slipped away into the next room.
      Nothing has happened.

      Everything remains exactly as it was.
      I am I, and you are you,
      and the old life that we lived so fondly together is untouched, unchanged.
      Whatever we were to each other, that we are still.

      Call me by the old familiar name.
      Speak of me in the easy way which you always used.
      Put no difference into your tone.
      Wear no forced air of solemnity or sorrow.

      Laugh as we always laughed at the little jokes that we enjoyed together.
      Play, smile, think of me, pray for me.
      Let my name be ever the household word that it always was.
      Let it be spoken without an effort, without the ghost of a shadow upon it.

      Life means all that it ever meant.
      It is the same as it ever was.
      There is absolute and unbroken continuity.
      What is this death but a negligible accident?

      Why should I be out of mind because I am out of sight?
      I am but waiting for you, for an interval,
      somewhere very near,
      just round the corner.

      All is well.
      Nothing is hurt; nothing is lost.
      One brief moment and all will be as it was before.
      How we shall laugh at the trouble of parting when we meet again!

  • Too Deep For Words

    When God Winks: How the Power of Coincidence Guides Your Life is the title of a book but it certainly can also become a way of life.

    An amazing response from a dear friend to my Happy Birthday Haiku blog post was an immediate offer to purchase a stove for the family still without one four months after Hurricane Ian ripped away the fabric of everyday life here in Southwest Florida.

    Words fall short to describe my heart’s joy at that kindness.

    Today when the generous benefactor’s teammate sent a text message related to her handling the purchase and making arrangements for delivery, I was again made aware of the magnificent magic of the fabric of this universe.

    This is close to my heart. My family has been vacationing on Sanibel Island for the last 47 years. My mom and I were actually supposed to be on Sanibel in our timeshare condo during the week that Hurricane Ian hit. Unfortunately, as you know, Sanibel was devastated and our condo community was destroyed. I thought many times of coming down and trying to assist an area that is so beloved to me. This is making me very happy that I’m able to help in a small way with getting this family a new oven. ❤️

    Claudia, beloved friend and wife of Wayne who transitioned in August, is coming to visit one of her grade-school friends. That friend recently bought a home here in Southwest Florida.

    John had a doctor’s appointment in Naples so we scheduled to have lunch with our friend, Pat, who has lived in Naples for many years. We try to get together while we are here for the season. After we made the lunch date with Pat, we got an earlier date for John’s appointment, and then we were bummed to discover Pat could not meet us on that day. The morning of his appointment, however, we were notified the doctor would be at the hospital all day and could not see John. His rescheduled rescheduled appointment now is during Claudia’s visit, so we plan to have lunch with Pat. Incidentally, we all met Pat through Wayne while she was living in Michigan….

    Also during Claudia’s visit with us, Wayne’s dear friend Bob, and Bob’s wife, Sarah, will be less than ten minutes from where we are staying, so we are planning a time we can all have dinner together….

    It certainly is a small world after all. I guess I am just short on words today. I am exceedingly grateful the Holy Spirit intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words. Grateful when God winks.

  • Birds in Their Homes

    Each winter when this snow bird flies south she takes a huge box of jigsaw puzzles. Her husband always puts the last piece in and she takes a photo.

    Imagine her surprise and delight when she saw a post on Facebook showing that her god-daughter and family had just finished the same puzzle over 1,200 miles away back in Michigan!

    The comment on the photo in Facebook speaks volumes: “… one of our prettiest puzzles yet – and we didn’t lose any pieces! Our puzzle time is such a bonding time.”

    I guess humans are birds in their homes too!!!!

    Faith is the bird that feels the light and sings when the dawn is still dark. ~ Rabindranath Tagore

  • Philippine Pre-school

    They had both been born in the Philippines, but they met through a dating app in Los Angles, where they currently lived.

    Soon they discovered a powerful coincidence: They had attended the same preschool!

    The incidence might not seem like a big deal unless you know the Philippines consist of over 7,600 islands and over 2,000 of those are inhabited.

    Needless to say, they got happily married….

  • Already Is

    A friend wrote this week asking me, “So tell me your blog experience. How did you get into doing that? How many people follow you? Is it hard to get it up and going technically?”

    It took a bit of thinking time to respond, and, still, I had to start with the easiest aspects first. Here is my response to her:

      Not very many people follow me. In fact, most of the people who know me well and love me are among those who do not read my blog regularly. I have a few very loyal readers. I have come to the conclusion if it is true that ‘We read to know we are not alone,’ – the character of C.S. Lewis says this line in William Nicholson’s play, Shadowlands, I write to know that we are all one. I would write if no one would ever see what is written. If it means something to someone else, that is just a bonus.

      That said, I first set up a blog on Blogspot. It was super easy and you can read over 180 posts from December 24, 2011 to July 26, 2016 made on this platform. https://dbasham.blogspot.com/

      Then my blog was set up on Word Press by our webmaster. I “think” there is a way to know who follows you, but I have not paid attention to any of that, especially now that I am in the business of not maintaining a professional business. My grandson is working to dismantle the online persona of Debra Basham of SCS-Matters, the professional partnership I had for 20 years with Joel P. Bowman.

      The Word Press blog is called Yellow Brick Road. https://scs-matters.com/YellowBrickRoad/

      I do not allow comments. It is a full time job that I am not interested in: cleaning out spam, phishing, and obscene stuff. People who know me and are touched by something I write and share have legitimate ways of reaching out to me.

      It may be worth some insight about what you want to give (and/or receive) by creating a blog.

      Willing to muse about this more if something is helpful! Love, D

    As I was out for a bike ride yesterday I was musing about Aaron’s Daily Quote.

    How can a third density human co-create a fourth or fifth density Earth? You can plant seeds. But for it fully to happen you need to come into the fourth density, fifth density aspect of yourself. Imagine you are a fourth or fifth density being. How would that feel? What would it be like? There would be joy and sadness; those are experiences for fourth density also. But there would not be suffering, loneliness or separation. There would not be fear or hatred. What would it be like to be a fourth or fifth density being co-creating a fourth or fifth density Earth by sharing that energy and light that you are? ~ Aaron

    That sent me into the Deep Spring archives where I read a bit more about what Aaron calls densities. I think of them as stages of consciousness but not in a linear way, more like the mighty oak tree that is already within the acorn, or the butterfly that is already within the caterpillar.

    Simply put, Fourth Density is about learning compassion, and Fifth Density is about deepening wisdom. Think about these as already being within in that same way. Just as a bird needs two wings to fly, to be wholly wholesome compassion and wisdom must be used together. Unwholesome compassion commands us to sell all you have and give it to the poor without the wisdom (spoken by Richard Bandler) that understands clearly the best way to help the poor is to not be poor.

    Densities remind me of the chakras. The fourth chakra is the heart chakra. The fifth chakra is the throat chakra. The heart chakra is associated with unconditional love, compassion, and joy. It is the source of deep and profound truths that cannot be expressed in words. The throat chakra is about hearing and being heard, where you find your voice, where we speak our truth without blame or shame. From the Deep Spring archive: Fourth Density is beyond the dictates of the emotional body that would lead you to feel shame or pride.

    Awake VERY early this morning I was grateful to sit in the silence feeling the night sky. Now past dawn, the busyness of the day will likely soon push the stillness out of my awareness.

    Perhaps that fourth or fifth density earth already is in the same way the butterfly already is within the cocoon and the oak tree already is within the acorn.

    As Adyashanti said, “The more okay we are when we are not okay, the more okay we are.”

    ALL ready….

  • Everything is Possible

    “You do not need to know precisely what is happening, or exactly where it is all going. What you need is to recognize the possibilities and challenges offered by the present moment, and to embrace them with courage, faith and hope.” ~ Thomas Merton

    Last night after a rousing game of Hand and Foot, John announced that there was a LOT of water under the kitchen sink. Larry and I sprung into action. I got things mopped up and he was able to finger tighten the elbow joints on the drain that had come completely disconnected. We had a leak previously and insisted the homeowner get a repairman to tend to it. This morning I was writing in my journal:

    D: What would you have me know about this house?

    V: We know you are feeling that the owner has been rather dismissive and you are wondering about whether or not you want to come back here next season.

    D: Yes… these things cross my mind.

    V: If you did one of Linda’s spread sheets what might you notice?

    D: There are some pros and some cons, and a subtle contraction of not having a place or having something EVEN worse. A fear of loss.

    V: It is a heavy feeling in your sacral chakra, and a sinking feeling in your gut?

    D: Yes.

    V: And can you feel it in your friend who is awaiting results on Wednesday of a breast biopsy she had done on Monday?

    D: Yes.

    V: Can you feel it in your dear friend who is now on hospice care, or in his beloved wife?

    D: No. Not any more.

    V: That feeling is impermanent. That feeling is a part of a process.

    D: Yes.

    V: Read some of the poems your friend, Janice, shared with you on your birthday.

    OMG… I begin to read from A Hundred Falling Veils: There’s a Poem in Every Day, by Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer.


    from “Getting Out”
    January 9, 2023

    we are made of—
    more energy than matter,
    more nothing than something,
    more everything than we ever dreamed.

    from “Everything is Changed”
    January 11, 2023

    …everything is possible, sweetheart, everything.

    Moments later, I open to these words from Neale Donald Walsch for today and read …its not only possible, it is indeed the truth!

  • Happy Birthday Haiku

    “Our inner lives are every bit as astonishing,
    baffling, and mysterious
    as the infinite vastness of the cosmos.”
    ~ Adyashanti

    Adyashanti’s words speak volumes to me as I am in the pondering process related to culling everything SCS-Matters in preparation for a new DebraBasham.com website. What to keep, what to save. What to repackage or repurpose. What to give away, what to sell; what to forget and what to savor. Timely for my birthday today.

    I wake up this morning having turned 73. While some dread aging, I experience each day of aging as grace. It seems having had birth trauma, and medical trauma at age 5, and a near-death experience at age 12 prepared me for LIFE.

    Again today a mocking bird was sitting on the fence directly outside of the kitchen window of the house we are sharing with Linda and Larry this winter. The title of To Kill a Mockingbird has very little literal connection to the plot, but it carries a great deal of symbolic weight in the book. In this story of innocents destroyed by evil, the “mockingbird” comes to represent the idea of innocence. Some of the key characteristics and attributes of Mockingbird Animal Spirit include inventiveness, keen-mindedness, happiness, playfulness, protection, thankfulness, security, and, most of all, communication.

    For sure, the Imagine Healing process is something I want to have available to the world. It is such gift to see in every surgery or injury or experience myriad opportunities. Why just go through whatever it is on the surface level. Let that bruise be an evidence procedure of healing of memories, beliefs, behaviors, or attitudes that lessen the amazement of living. Every moment of every day we are meeting life on infinite levels and awareness provides a HUGE happening from the most mundane. I don’t even just brush my teeth!!!

    When Joel Bowman and I were actively training folks in the Imagine Healing process we always did mock surgery as a role-play and students experienced an ectomy (removal of something they and others in the world would be better off without) and implant (something beneficial they and others in the world had not been able to have previously). Imagine a fear ectomy and a joy implant….

    January 22 is a birthday I share with my friend Wayne Kaiser. This is the first year since we have been friends that I am in body and Wayne is in spirit. I do not think of Wayne as dead. In fact, I cannot comprehend death as different from birth, and this week I listened to an amazing account of Rabbi Stephen Robbins (who has had 8 near-death-experiences!!!) and, as my birthday ritual, will share some of his beautiful comments about life.

    “Every soul is formed to do one of three things. One is to take something out of the world which no longer belongs — either a treatment or a system of genetics which don’t belong in the world anymore or a spiritual quality that can be stopped. The other is to bring something new into the world of knowledge or experience — an insight that has not been there before. And the third is to synergize both of them so that what comes in is the sense of what it means to live a life for service and for purpose rather than for our own gain.”

    “So that in our leaving this world and realizing there is no death, we change the genetic out-pour that will stop the repetition of the destructiveness like drug addiction, child abuse, violent acquisition — and at the same time will add a sense of insight and understanding which will lead beyond living with a sense of the limitation in this life.” (Rabbi Stephen Robbins 8 Near Death Experiences)

    If in our daily life we can smile, if we can be peaceful and happy, not only we, but everyone will profit from it. This is the most basic kind of peace work. ~ Thich Nhat Hanh

    Yesterday Linda and I spent our day busy in the kitchen. She roasted a turkey and we have made a dinner for friends out on Pine Island that are living in (while doing rehab) after Hurricane Ian filled their manufactured home with four feet of floodwater. Four months later they do not yet have a stove. Mind you, theirs is a three-generational family including their adult daughter and their 4-year old grandson. Today we will deliver turkey, mashed potatoes, gravy, carrots, two-corn casserole, and brownies. These can be warmed in the microwave oven they do have. I told Linda that this is my best birthday dinner ever.

    After the delivery, we will attend a matinee of “The Sound of Music” at the Cultural Park Theater in Cape Coral, before meeting Nancy Green for dinner at Miceli’s in Matlacha. In 2013 John and I went there for my birthday dinner and discovered they give you a free entree plus desert ON YOUR BIRTHDAY. We have gone back every year since. It is bittersweet to go this year after soooo much of what was familiar and special about our beloved Florida community was damaged, devastated, or destroyed.

    Even in the midst of loss there is gift….

      A Happy Birthday Haiku

      I am young no more
      Neither am I old
      I am timeless like the wind

      I do change a lot
      No longer the same
      I’m here and there however

      Here and there am I
      Not one single place
      Ever moving, always free

    Happy Birthday, Wayne Kaiser. Happy Birthday, Debra Basham.

    And many happy returns.

    He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the human heart. – Ecclesiastes 3:11

    Don’t Go Back to Sleep
    by Rumi

    The breeze at dawn has secrets to tell you.
    Don’t go back to sleep.

    You must ask for what you really want.
    Don’t go back to sleep.

    People are going back and forth
    across the doorsill
    where the two worlds touch.

    The door is round and open.
    Don’t go back to sleep.

  • Booking Error Looking Like a Blessing

    When they arrived at their destination in Hawaii, there was an error in their booking dates (December 22 and 24).

    Then as they were preparing to fly back to Canada, all the flights were cancelled….

    “If you are unable to get out, just come back, you can stay here. I will leave a key for you,” they were told.

    They enjoyed two extra days in the sun and warm.

    That “booking error” was looking like a blessing!


  • Tarpon Technology Solutions

    Having been displaced in her snowbird home by Hurricane Ian, she spent almost a month with family on her way to a home-away-from her normal away-from home. She had some laptop computer challenges earlier while staying with their daughter in Tennessee, but when she got to Florida her laptop would not boot up.

    She logged onto Zoom with her iPhone to be with her Florida meditation group and overheard some conversation. “Have you heard anything from Adam since the hurricane?”

    “No, I have not,” the teacher replied.

    So many she knows have been affected, her compassion was right at the surface. Then the conversation took an interesting turn as the student continued, “Adam is the only person I would trust my computer to….”

    Excitedly excusing herself for intruding, she said she needed to have Adam’s contact information because she had been unable to log on to her computer since she had left Tennessee!


    It will come to pass that before they call,
    I will answer;
    and while they are still speaking,
    I will hear.
    ~ Isaiah 65:24

  • Drawn to the Desert

    Sacred Stories

    She was feeling such disappointment, hurt, and anger. Her husband had essentially told her he could not support her plans to go to Morocco. Her daughter felt the same way, “You are too old. That ship has sailed….”

    Pouring out her heart about all of this the following day, her sister listened and expressed compassion, then asked her to speak of what the idea of the trip meant to her. “Almost like a vision quest. Out of my comfort zone. Wanting to prove to myself I am capable. Learning a lot about fear. I have a heart connection with the friend I have met online and I would like to meet her. I want to go to the desert.”

    Her sister looked up ‘desert spiritual meaning’ and read out loud to her essentially all her heart had just spoken!

    The desert symbolizes survival, creativity, clarity, revelations, loneliness, and overcoming life’s greatest obstacles.

    Metaphorically, the desert is a place of testing and transformation, of being divested of empire and ego. In the desert experience, the dreams, goals, and visions of the false self can be seen clearly, sometimes for the first time. The desert symbolizes the terrain in which we unlearn empire spirituality.

    Wow….

    “You have a clear sense of what it is for you,” her sister said, fully understanding the feelings of disappointment and anger. “It might be helpful to be clear on that intention and be open to multiple ways to integrate all of this in your life. It seems that thinking there is only one way something can happen is the ego and the empire spirituality the symbolism is describing.”

    Even with the feelings still present, she could see truth in that.

    The following morning her sister’s supposedly-randomly-selected screen saver was a desert scene, and this message from the book The Language of Letting Go: Daily Meditations on Codependency shared by a friend spoke so succinctly of the situation:

    Too often, we try to gain a clear perspective before it is time. That will make us crazy. We do not always know why things are happening the way they are….

    Today, I will let things happen without trying to figure everything out. If clarity is not available to me today, I will trust it to come later, in retrospect. I will put simple trust in the truth that all is well, events are unfolding as they should, and all will work out for good in my life—better than I can imagine.