Debra Basham

Living and Loving

Tag: life after death

  • 10:10

    She spent significant time in prayer as her her mother was coming to live with her due to debilitating rheumatoid arthritis. The Lord gave her assurance in John 10:10 which says, “I have come that they might have life, and that they may have it more abundantly.”

    She shared this beautiful message with her mother before framing the promise and placing it in a prominent place in her mother’s room. There it stayed until her mother went into a health and rehabilitation facility.


    The morning her mother died — only as she was speaking out loud to a friend that her mother had just gone home to the Lord — the immense power and grace of this verse took on an even greater significance.

    Her mother’s time of death was 10:10….

  • Believe in Yourself

    While she is in Florida, her older sister in Michigan is nearing transition in Michigan where her niece is sitting bedside vigil. Her niece offered to share a few intimate photos.


    Seeing the words on her sister’s shirt, tears of sacredness formed in her eyes. She shot a text message back to her niece, “Believe in yourself is on my yoga mat!!! I will take a picture and send it. The funniest thing is when I bought the mat it was rolled up in a bag and I had no idea it had words on it.”

    The letters in the phrase that spell out BE YOU are highlighted in hot pink on her yoga mat and that message had come to mean so much to her…. something her sister had consistently demonstrated throughout her life.

  • Lokah Samastah Sukhino Bhavantu

    Today is my birthday.

    As my birthday ritual I did an audio Mudita meditation with John Orr from an online retreat day April 11, 2021. Mudita is a Sanskrit and Pali word that means “sympathetic joy” or “appreciative pleasure”. It’s a Buddhist concept that involves feeling joy for the good fortune of others.

    The first person you choose is someone you can feel a genuine sense of happiness for their good fortune and happiness. Today I chose my older grandson, Bradley. Currently I am sharing substantial time with him as he his helping me get DebraBasham.com set up. It will be the new home to Yellow Brick Road and Sacred Stories and many of the resources that have been located on SCS-Matters.com.

    The second person is often called The Benefactor — someone who has been loving and supportive for you at some time or times in your life. I chose Reverend Betty Lue Lieber, who founded Reunion with her husband, Robert Waldon. This is the the program I was ordained through in 1997.

    The third person is a neutral person. It may not even be someone you know personally, but it is someone who is feeling happiness and good fortune with a recent accomplishment, something that likely brings that person joy. I chose Donald Trump. You are instructed in the meditation to notice any old mind states like jealousy or envy. Right there with those feelings say, “May joy infuse your life. May it continue all of your days. May you truly be happy. May you truly be free. May all of this grow. May it infuse your heart.”

    The fourth person is sometimes called The Enemy but it is just a challenging person (a person you are having a challenge with). You are encouraged to notice all of the happiness in that person’s life — loving family and friends and relationships, meaningful work. “May you be truly happy and well.” You are invited to be genuinely grateful for all that you have learned from this person.

    After the guided meditation ended I played a recording of the chant “Lokah Samastah Sukhino Bhavantu” from a residential retreat day October 10, 2019. Lokah Samastah Sukhino Bhavantu is a Sanskrit phrase that translates to “May all beings everywhere be happy and free”. It is a prayer for global well-being and peace, and a perfect chant to support the Mudita Meditation.

    When I finished I looked at a list of others I know share a January 22 birthday:
    1. Wayne Kaiser
    2. Emily Warner
    3. Phillip Largay
    4. Joyce Zerbe
    5. Aaron (Linda Gunter’s son)
    6. Allen Mumper
    7. Emily’s husband’s cousin
    8. PT at Borgess
    9. George Ross
    10. Izzie (granddaughter Courtney’s friend)
    11. Carrie Startcher (daughter Stacey’s friend in Clarksville)
    12. Sivia’s mother

    I like to also contemplate the day’s messages that come on this day from sources I value and follow.

    Daily Reflection from Deep Spring

    In a moment of darkness, you are wont to ask, “Why this darkness?” You have a sense that if you could but understand the darkness, you could protect yourself from it. Such thinking only further strengthens the illusion of the self. Can you sit there in that darkness and simply know, “Here I sit in darkness and I will wait. I need not fight with the darkness. I need not try to push it away. I need not grasp, even at faith.”

    Just faith: faith expressed as the willingness to sit in darkness, if darkness is what is there, without a need to grasp at the light but with the willingness to open the doors and allow in the light. ~ Aaron

    On this day of your life Debra, I believe God wants you to know that not everything has to turn out exactly the way you planned in order for you to call it a success. Sometimes all God wants you to do is to “get the ball rolling.” Then, She’ll take it from there.

    So when things turn out other than the way you wanted them to, don’t be so quick to say, “Bummer!”

    Many a Bummer is a Blessing in disguise. Consider the possibility that life is magic…and that there’s a rabbit in that hat.

    Love, your Friend, Neale Donald Walsch

    From Gratefulness.org

    You must live life with the full knowledge that your actions will remain. We are creatures of consequence. ~ Zadie Smith

    From The Daily Tejaniya

    When you are truly aware you aren’t focusing, yet you are
    aware of objects. You are aware of thoughts of the mind, sensations
    of the body, and perceptions (sights,sounds, etc.) of the world.

    By practicing in this way, the mind stays fresh.

    It may not be usual to be happier for someone else’s birth than your own on your birthday, but today I truly feel greater joy that Stacey was born than that I was born. I get that she could not have been born unless I had been, but emotions don’t always make sense. In fact, they are often very distorted. That is just how it is. So at three quarters of a century I am grateful for the wonderful woman who came in as a teenage pregnancy and those that came in from her.

    RIP Wayne Kaiser and Allen Mumper.

    May all beings everywhere be happy and free. Lokah Samastah Sukhino Bhavantu….

  • It All Matters

    While statistics are not people, and people are not statistics, it is staggering to hear numbers related to losses. A few days ago the updates on the California fires included: 40,300 acres burned; more than 12,000 structures destroyed; at least 24 people have died; over 100,000 people have had to evacuate.

    As the fires raged in California, the people behind the numbers became more real to me when learning that our great niece and her husband woke to blazes as the space they called home was destroyed by a fire in the second story of the home in which they rented a main floor apartment.

    I was awake at 4:00 am today. That is early, but actually I had been sleeping since 10 pm. While we were in the thick of remediation from a German cockroach infestation the past month I would go to sleep at 10 and be awake and inspecting the kitchen about 12, 2, and 4. Grateful to say “Howard” has helped us be sighting-free for almost 2 weeks with one exception (which likely was a juvenile Palmetto bug who just wandered in late Sunday evening). They say you are probably clear when you go 7 days without a sighting.

    Lying in this morning’s pre-dawn, praying for all who are navigating unfathomable difficulties right now, as I reach for my phone I see a post by our niece writing poignantly about the loss of home and possessions our great niece is going through.

      This not only relates to people in California right now, but to people like our daughter and son-in-law in-law, who just lost their home and most of their belongings in a fire last week in Opelika, Alabama.

      It’s a given that the most important thing is the survival of humans and pets – hands down. I think we tend to say things like, “Everybody got out, and that’s all that matters.” But, while that matters THE MOST, it’s not ALL that matters. It matters to lose the home you loved. It matters to lose all of your favorite clothes. It matters to lose things you held dear – stuffed animals you’ve had since you were a kid, little hand-written cards and letters and pieces of paper written by people you love. It matters to lose the guitar you’ve had and played for years. It matters to lose the collection of vinyls you’ve collected along the way, including ones that belonged to you late grandpa. It matters to lose the plants you nurtured for a long time. it matters to lose even the smallest things – the catch-all dish where you dropped your keys and your loose change when you got home from work, the dishes you bought for your dog, your favorite mug, the artwork you loved on the walls. And it matters that you’ve lost your happy place, your safe place, the place where you could be just the two (or however many) of you. It matters to lose neighbors because you can’t move back into the house you lived in next to them. It matters to lose the route where you walked your dog every evening, and the route you took from your door to work, or from your driveway to your closest friends’ house. It matters to lose the sights and the sounds that were unique to your little spot of the world. It all matters.💔

    This past Friday we visited our former community and saw people who are our friends, some former neighbors, out on Pine Island. Folks there continue to navigate the damage and losses not only from Hurricane Ian in 2022 which displaced us from our former winter home, but also Hurricane Helene exactly two years later and then Hurricane Milton mere days on the heels of Helene.

    Taoism holds that compassion is first among virtues.

    Jesus modeled compassion through actions and words, and taught others how to be compassionate as well. He instructed those about to stone to death a woman caught in adultery, “Let he who is without sin cast the first stone.” This is just one of the powerful examples of compassion in the bible.

    Nietzsche’s criticism of the emotion of compassion included a distinction between “our compassion” and “your compassion” dovetailing with the caution to abandon what is called othering in Buddhism.

    This photo was posted by our great niece on Instagram after the fire last week. She is holding this brass horse statue, one of very few possessions that survived a catastrophic barn fire at her home when she was just 11 years old. Her dad had taken a trip to Ecuador and brought the statue back to her. She says she has kept it with her for twenty years “as a small token of hope — a reminder that life persists even in the face of death and tragedy.” She says it still holds hope, even after facing a similar catastrophic fire taking so much from them now.

    Friends who have family and friends in California have shared with me the odd feelings of relief as they learn of the safety of life and property for some and an overwhelming compassion learning of the loss of those precious aspects for so many others both those known personally and those not.

    Perhaps the wisdom of compassion resides simply in the words of our niece, “It all matters….”

  • Perfect Timing

    She asked her husband to grab a sleeper for their newborn baby girl.

    He did not consciously realize it was the sleeper their daughter’s older brother had worn on this exact day three years ago.

    Perfect timing….

  • Sunshine, Sidewalks and Cul de sacs

    One of the most wonderful things about being a snowbird is winter biking — New Year’s Day riding in low wind with clear skies is heavenly. Thankful for sidewalks. Especially thankful for all of the benefits of being either in a canal community or an intentional residential community designed where there are cul de sacs.

    Yes, it’s a little harder on the knees and quite a bit slower riding a route with so many tight turns, but the ride becomes more like walking a labyrinth. There’s something so freeing about knowing that you can’t get lost!

    You can’t make a wrong turn. You can’t get injured or injure another by being somewhere that you shouldn’t be. There is a soft, easy, simple serenity to not having to think. You can just put one foot in front of the other or, as in my case this morning, just keeping my butt centered on the seat and the wheels turning round and round.

    It is wonderful to be in an area with so many places where all I have to do is keep making right turns. This New Years Day route has so many streets I barely recognize any of the street names even thought I’ve probably ridden here half dozen or 10 times during last season and this year so far. I realized how wonderful it is to not feel the need to be vigilant with absolutely no sense of needing to know what street I’ve come from, what street I am now on nor what street might be coming up. I do not need to watch for a turn that might be coming up, or worry what might happen next. I have no sense at all I could be someplace I don’t know where I am, or anyplace other than right where I want to be. This is the freedom of right turns in the world of cul de sacs.

    I’m riding with this wonderful feeling in my body I have felt over several decades of walking in a labyrinth. It’s total freedom from fear of doing something wrong. Somatic freedom.

    Maybe it’s freedom from guilt.

    It also feels like freedom from grief.

    I certainly have been feeling a lot of both of those emotions over this recent past.

    Last evening we were watching “Society of Snow,” based on the true story (1972) of a plane carrying members of a rugby team from Uruguay to Chile crashing in the Andes. A group of survivors lived through the plane crash, only to face the frigid cold and snow of the mountains, avalanches and, most famously, a lack of food. It is a very intense movie.

    Not light viewing, intimately seeing how those who survived the crash and lived 72 days did so by cannibalizing those that did not. At a pivotal ending point I received a text message from Michigan friend, Doris, sharing a photo of one of her granddaughters in the foot massager that had been owned by Michigan friend, Linda, who died in July.

    After Linda died and Fred was dispersing her worldly possessions, the foot massager is something I agreed to find a suitable home for. The first time I really felt how important it is to find loving homes for things that are left after a person’s worldly life ends was when John’s mom died. She was a lover of things and we took to heart finding others that would love the things she had loved. It was VERY meaningful….

    With the taste of the film in my mouth, I saw the photo and read the text, “Everyone has been enjoying Linda’s foot massager. Much appreciation and gratitude,” and burst into tears.

    I didn’t anticipate how hard it would be here in Florida without her. It’s complicated because her parting words for me were to take care of Fred so bicycle riding therapy became a significant lifeline for him and me in those weeks following Linda’s death. Then, quite quickly Fred partnered with their mutual friend. She seems to be good for him so I’m not begrudging that at all. I’m also not denying that I’ve not only lost Linda but I’ve now also lost Fred as a riding partner. It takes me back to other losses (especially those ongoing losses).

    I found myself singing in my head the classic song “There’s a Hole in the Bucket.” The first stanza has Henry saying there is a hole in the bucket and Liza begins to coach him in how to fix it, including at the last part when Liza is telling Henry to use the bucket to carry the water! In the final stanza Henry responds: “But there’s a hole in the bucket, dear Liza, dear Liza. There’s a hole in the bucket, dear Liza, a hole.”

    I heard myself singing inside my head, “There’s a whole in my heart, dear Linda, dear Linda. There’s a whole in my heart, dear Linda, a hole….”

    As the days turned into weeks and months, those companions who knew they were nearing death began giving their blessings for their companions to eat them after they died. One young man even left a written note quoting John 15:13: ” Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.” Touching and timely.

    It is considered by many important to remember hearts only break in one direction: open.

  • Shame: One Hell of an Emotion

    An early morning phone call with a friend focused on shame. Her shocking statement was about being sick of feeling shame and the decision to not look at it, work with it, but to just be done with it. She decided to just say F&@K it…. if you know what she means.

    I mentioned The Drama Triangle Revisited which is still available as a free download on the SCS-Matters website. The Drama Triangle was developed by Dr. Steve Karpman in 1968 (“Fairy Tales and Script Drama Analysis.” Transactional Analysis Bulletin, 7:26, 39-43), and it is vital to be aware because these roles are the raw fabric of our conditioned minds. Inescapable…. grateful awareness does offer release.

    I did an internet search. Shame is not guilt. Guilt is about our having done something wrong. Shame arises from a core belief that there is something wrong with you. Shame is feeling you simply ARE not good enough. Shame is a hell of an emotion.

    After our brief sharing, I listened to a Q & A session from a retreat at Plum Village. Interestingly, the feeling of core shame is intrinsic in Western culture, but not so much in Eastern. Perhaps this is the emphasis on being “born in sin” or “basic goodness” found in those world views. Here are a few nuggets from that Q & A session:

    1. Being critical of shame is still being critical. The road of transforming “conditioned” habits is the path of recognizing the way thoughts lead to emotions and emotions form beliefs.

    2. Notice criticism as it arises in thought. “Why are they doing that?” “Why are they wearing that?” “Why can’t I (you fill in the blank)?” Think of something opposite using the Metta Meditation: May you be safe. May you be happy. May you be healthy. May you be peaceful. Say these phrases over and over, breathing in and out, until you feel some compassion in your heart.

    3. The tendency is to focus only on the difficult memory and the situation that has caused the deepest wound. We punish ourselves each time we keep repeating, reminding ourselves of that situation. Even in the pain, remember there is so much beauty in life. So much wonder. So much joy.

    Our dance with the cockroaches continues…. I will spare the details but say only that last evening — while we had guests — I discovered the need to clean under the stove.

    It is imperative to take a good look at our conditioned habits.

    These are such timely reminders. All will benefit from deep cleaning!

  • Stand Wherever I am to be Blessed

    Sometimes I need only to stand wherever I am to be blessed.
    ~ Mary Oliver

    As we have nights with no cockroach sightings we began the conversation about how we will know when it is safe for us to stop the vigilant lifestyle of keeping everything in snap tight storage bins or Ziplock bags. As the end feels more possible, sightings that do occur produce more of a sense of contraction and a needing to fix — to get rid of — the problem. As I kill a cockroach I feel some sadness in my heart. I am finding it more challenging to stay in the present moment.

    We had a lovely Christmas dinner with the owners of this home. Their own home has been rife with renovation since early June. They fired the contractor the end of last week. So, even though they do not have a kitchen, they brought a smoked prime rib. It was delicious food and delightful company. The Christmas tree they gifted us with has been decorated with the Christmas cards we have received.


    I have been enjoying bird encounters on my bike rides, including some excellent Red Shouldered Hawk sightings, a pair of Florida Scrub Jays, and more than once I have seen a Limpkin. One bird I watched had a very unusual flight pattern. It moved in a rolling up and down action, reminding me of the way a dolphin plays in the wake as it follows a boat.

    Biking and birding provides me with great meditative moments. This undulating action of the bird I had been watching (Woodpeckers, Finches, and some song birds undulate) stayed in my mind for days, resulting in a gift of great peace.

    During a phone conversation, a friend asked me how I really am. I took that to mean what might be worrisome for me. I spoke briefly of the religious (literal) view of the Bible and the belief that Christians are the only humans a judging God is going to “save.” It is not that I have no experience with this world view. I see clearly having held that view and then having my faith deepen until I no longer hold that view. What has been baffling to me is seeing someone who had been free from dogma choose to go into it.

    Seeing in my mind’s eye that bird moving smoothly up and down, feeling the motion of its rolling rising and falling brought to mind Ken Wilber’s stages of consciousness. The first tier stages move away from the stage that came before it; forward motion resulting from an away-from action. They are all associated with a sense of lack and needing the world to be different to how it is. We can see intolerance of others races, colors, sexes, or creeds; thinking is absolutist before we can take the perspective of all human beings. (Or, perhaps the perspective of a cockroach.)

    The friend who had asked me how I really am shared a fun gift she and one daughter received from her other daughter. It is a pair of hand-holding socks. (If you cannot see the image of them here, please search for hand-holding socks so you can see them for yourself.) They are adorable. If a simple pair of socks can do it, so can we.

    Oh, yes, Mary Oliver, sometimes I need only to stand wherever I am to be blessed….

  • A Timely Visit

    She was sorry to have to say she could not come to sit with her husband’s cousin because she had an appointment the following morning, but during the night she received a message that her appointment had to be rescheduled.

    Seeing that news, she traveled to offer her support. Their cousin was receiving hospice care at home, was not actively conscious, nearing the end of her life.

    While she was there, she recalled how hearing is thought to be the last sense to remain, she read aloud to her the lovely Christmas card which had been received.

    When she noticed no chest rising and falling she called for hospice to come. Their cousin was pronounced dead. May she rest in peace.

    What profound gratitude came with the awareness of the changes outside of her human control that allowed her the privilege of being there that day. That awareness gently spread to other situations in her life which could bring forth concern.

    “The world is held by unseen helping hands….”

    History of Christmas cards*

      Many of the Christmas traditions we celebrate today, like trees and crackers, all started in the Victorian era. The idea of sending Christmas cards become popular after the first commercially produced Christmas card was created by Sir Henry Cole in 1843. Early Christmas cards were expensive to produce.

    May we rest in peace while we still have breath, rather than think we have to wait until we lay down these earth suits.

  • Steel Tongue Drum

    Steel Tongue Drum

    Enjoying time with life-long special music friends as we traveled to our seasonal home in Florida, a dear friend of theirs asked about my not having my SnareCraft drum with me. “It is buried in the van,” I responded, continuing, “I will have it with me the next time we get together. But I do have another new musical toy. It is a six-inch 8-note steel tongue drum.”

    “Oh, my gosh! I have wanted one of those for years!” She excitedly went on, “I heard one in Shipshewana, but you know how it is. My money went to things for the kids.”

    “I have one for you in the van. When I ordered mine I placed the order twice by mistake. I told John I must have gotten one for someone else but I just did not yet know for whom. Now I know. It is for you!”

    The following day, her friend sent a text message: “Oh, it was so good to see you yesterday. I so enjoyed the music and the great conversation. When Patrick picked me up for dinner he said I was gleaming…. like a kid with a new toy…. I have been wanting a drum for so long and I am thrilled with it. Even trying a few easy songs. What a beautiful day…. thank you again.”

    She is pure gift of love and support for our beloved friends. I can imagine their hearts having pushed that “place order button” the second time ordering the drum for her in gratitude for all she does for them. For sure, in the space where all is already known, it was known all along what special person the second steel tongue drum was for.