Starr was a wonderful dog. Starr lived with Linda and Tim, and their children, Billy and Christie. Starr loved each of them, and the family was blessed to have her with them for seventeen years.
Starr began having really bad health problems. It was painful for the family to watch.
One day, as she was being bathed, Starr’s beautiful black fur began coming out in clumps.
Starr could barely move, so Tim took her to the vet. When the vet recommended putting Starr to sleep, Tim went back home to get Linda. The vet administered a shot, allowing Starr to pass peacefully in Linda’s arms in just a few seconds.
Oh, how Linda cried!
But Linda says she remembers well what happened next, “As I left the room, I went out into the lobby where a woman unsuccessfully tried to keep her dog from jumping all over me. I went down on my knees, hugging and petting that dog. I told the owner how much I needed that then. It was a beautiful experience that can still move me to tears all these years later.”
It has been three years since I first watched the film Cloud Atlas, yet, after watching it again this week my fingers move over the keys trying to create an outlet for my unspeakable emotions. I confess that the watching did not cause my emotions, but it has amplified feelings long buried within my psyche.
If you, like me, need a refresher about the film, you can access that September 2013 blog post:”Answer the Call.”
The timing of this watching (and the depth of emotions) might be amplified by current events. One friend is dancing on the edge of duress anticipating a double mastectomy on Tuesday. Another friend has just received a diagnosis of leukemia for her young son.
A few days ago when I opened The 50 Miracle Principles of A Course in Miracles, by Kenneth Wapnick, Ph.D., I read these words: Just as the body cannot be healed because the body was never sick, the body cannot rise from the dead because the body never died.
If you are new to the Course, it is important to understand that a core premise is that the world as we experience it is a delusion of the mind. In Indian teachings, this is called illusion, or Māyā. A simple way to think about it is to notice how a state of impermanence permeates everything in our experience. According to Wikipedia, “that which exists, but is constantly changing and thus is spiritually unreal.”
Martin L. Rossman, M.D., addresses faith healing, placebo effects, and imagery in Healing Yourself: A Step-by-Step Program for Better Health Through Imagery. Rossman writes of meeting Edna, who had been refusing medical treatment, saying that Jesus was going to heal her. He asked her how she communicated with Jesus, and then suggested she ask Jesus to heal her in the next six weeks, agreeing to tests at that time, and to treatment, if necessary.
Six weeks later she returned. The examination and the tests showed nothing abnormal!
Whatever it is that allows some people to regain health after encountering a serious diagnosis, it is undeniable: our mind, body, spirit, and emotions are interwoven.
I sent my friend this dentist skit where Tim Conway is the would-be dentist and Harvey Korman is the patient. Every time I watch it, I laugh so hard my stomach aches.
I also sent Red Skelton and Carol Burnett, and suggested she search for “Babies laughing at dogs.” I told her to watch and laugh for half an hour, then go to bed with her sweet puppy dog. It feels wonderful to laugh. We probably all need to laugh more. And pets are sooooo healing! These are important things to remember.
And it is vitally important to know we have help. My friend/colleague Dr. Douglas Busby just released his new book Spiritual Healing: Help from the Spirit World. Doug will be signing books at a talk on Sunday, November 13, 2016, at 3:30 pm, here in St. Joseph. Let me know if you are interested in attending.
For sure, it helps to remember nothing lasts forever, and what’s more, everything is nothing, including you and me.
We live in an illusion and the appearance of things.
There is a reality. You are that reality.
When you understand this, you see that you are nothing,
and being nothing, you are everything. That is all.
~ Kalu Rinpoche
Separated from her husband, adjusting to parenting her son alone, nervous about finances, especially now missing the support of her mother, she went for a hypnotherapy session.
“Do you have a piece of jewelry from your mom?” the therapist asked.
She told the therapist, “Strange you should ask. I have my mom’s turquoise ring, but in the recent chaos of life, I have not been able to find it.”
During the session, a memory related to the ring surfaced. She had been suffering with a ligament issue in her thumb. It was not healing. She put her mother’s ring on, and within one day, her thumb was healed. She knew the ring would show up and everything would be OK…
Later that evening, she sent a photo to the therapist, with this message, “Look what I found!”
Working on a yoga video with my friend Kathy Zerler, is a labor of love. We took a shot of her in a great Downward Facing Dog, only to find ourselves critical of the way the back of her shirt was bunched up on the nape of her neck.
Sending the photo to my brother-in-love, Larry, I asked, “Are you able to fix this?”
Here is the improved version!
I told Larry how much I appreciated the additional details he attended to. He fixed the place where her shirt was hiked up on her back, removed a seam in the wall, straightened the corner, took out some wrinkles on her behind, tightened the little sag in her tummy area, and softened a few wrinkles in her feet and hands. He warmed the tone some, too, because the light in that room gives off a cool hue. Amazing….
As I write this, my heart is still processing the tender joys of officiating at the wedding of my elder grandson, Brad, and his beautiful bride, Christina. That same attention to detail went into everything about the wedding and reception. So many people contributed to the perfection of their event. From the homemade ravioli, sweet treats, savory pretzels, pulled pork with all the fixin’s. Giving of our best was the theme.
I will probably dedicate another post to what all of that wedding meant to me. For now, I am just noticing what happens when we have an eye for details and an intention to do whatever we can to create even more beauty than was initially there. Thank you, Larry, for the artwork, and the lesson!
Larry is an amazing artist. His business name is Britton Artworks. Let me know if you would like his contact information…
Her heart was heavy as she was driving to her parents’ house with her infant son. Her first family photos were going to be without her husband and her daughter.
She had given birth to twins a few months earlier, but her daughter had only lived three-and-a-half days.
Current family tension resulted in her husband’s not attending the wedding of her brother.
She was thinking about what it would be like to have all four of them in the car on the way to—anywhere.
She suddenly realized that Bob Marley’s Three Little Birds had come on the radio. That is the song they had all four of their heartbeats put to….
Don’t worry about a thing
‘Cause every little thing gonna be alright
Singing’ don’t worry about a thing
‘Cause every little thing gonna be alright
No doubt you have heard the phrase be careful what you ask for. The idea is that you will get it. This truth has so clearly come to me this week, I see myself as an unwitting mystic, and I am mostly grateful. (LOL)
I have a family member who has not demonstrated good money managing skills. He recently inherited a sum of money rather large for his standard of life. Within a couple of weeks, many thousands of dollars were gone. Mostly, he was able to justify the spending choices he made, such as paying delinquent debts. However, undeniably still financially vulnerable moving forward, he agreed to go to a financial counselor at a local bank to create a workable life plan. I offered to go with him. That happened. I left the bank with three hundred dollars (cash) to hang on to for him for an upcoming trip.
Three days later, he called asking me for some of that money.
“What do you need the money for?” I asked. I agreed what he was asking funds for was a legitimate expense, but based on the meeting at the bank, I also knew he had earned some money two days previously. “You did a job two days ago. Where is that money?”
“I bought an exercise bike. I have wanted one for a long time.” His response set off a reaction in me. I was launched into a conditioned pattern: I expressed my disappointment in his choice and clarified what he had agreed to. He also launched into a conditioned pattern: He justified his behavior and claimed his freedom to choose.
The light went on!
This interaction was perfect given my soul’s intention: I choose to trust life. I choose to see others as capable. I choose to remember we learn by what works and by what does not work. I choose to love, forgive, and enhance my awareness. The conditioned life is not Divine Love!
The previous night I had heard Mary Reed, author of Unwitting Mystic, speak about the history of our conditioned life. We have all lived in fear. We have all tried to control other people’s behavior under the guise of protecting them. Mary lifts up the true nature of unconditional love. She said the most significant question each of us makes is whether or not we are willing to move beyond the conditioning so we can enjoy that.
It cannot be that one individual can become enlightened and nothing else be changed. I know we are all a part of the collective. My consciousness matters. A few hours before his phone call asking for the money, I had written in my journal about my own willingness to release conditioning and live unconditional love.
This encounter with him about the money worked perfectly as a test to my willingness. Could I in these circumstances honor my own experience without focus on him and what he did? With some breathing, and some clarifying of my own sacred intention, that soon was happening.
I sent him a text message: “I apologize for expressing disagreement with your choices for your life. It really is not any of my business. I appreciate the opportunity to more deeply choose to live in unconditional love…”
Even so, my mind ruminated about these events before finding a landing place more free of judgment of both of us.
In her talk, Mary gave an example of how fear and judgment and anger and blame and frustration function like a thread between us that gets all wound up. As we move around, telling others about the events of our lives, we are bound up in ancient conflict energy. She says you can earnestly go within and own everything you feel and get to a place of forgiveness of yourself (the way you have seen things, and your actions). As you bask in this forgiveness of yourself, that thread of conflict energy begins to fall away from you. As it falls away from you, it must also fall away from the other because you are not feeding this conditioned state.
Mary has spent time with the Dalai Lama. If you would be blessed by listening, you will find her story very riveting. After taking 97 prescription pills in a suicide attempt and waking up two days later, Mary surrendered her ego. She has lived some pretty intense experiences on her road to mysticism. Appreciating my own gentler path of reading and studying and learning from others experiences…
“I am always doing that which I cannot do,
in order that I may learn how to do it.”
~ Pablo Picasso
Some days—more than others—you are aware how connected we all are.
My dear friends/colleagues and I are experiencing palpable loss and questioning around changes with regards to massage therapy services provided by our local hospice organization. We value these therapies. The massage therapist was the one person on her hospice care team who knew when my mother-in-law had begun her active transition in October of 2015. The nurse was caught off guard, but Marjie was not.
As my heart finds relief through my fingers on the keyboard, a lot is happening.
Carol is driving three hours to check on her son. He has experienced alcohol addiction, and has not been going to work or answering his phone.
Claudia is doing her best to support herself and her husband, Wayne, as they deal with the day-to-day experiences of his Alzheimer’s.
Another friend is navigating misunderstanding and fears around her psychosis-like symptoms, most likely related to a kundalini awakening.
During my inner time this morning, holding all of this in my heart, I asked, “What is real about all of this, and what would Spirit have us know?”
We may claim that something means little to us when, in fact it means a great deal. The situation needs to be handled with care. This is the time to call upon Honesty for aid!
Faeries Oracle Card
# 40 Honesty
Reminds us not only to be clear in what we say and do, but also to act and speak with compassion and tact. Dishonesty, even in the name of tact, is not helpful.
~~~~
How does this situation get redeemed? I can barely hold it in my heart, it is so painful. Knowing how valuable Marjie’s massage therapy was for John’s mom; seeing the loss, but knowing it is important to not activate the drama triangle.
Thoughts of the Old Testament story about Joseph and the coat of many colors pops into mind. Joseph’s brothers, smitten with jealousy, sold him into slavery. Years later, desperate to buy grain, the brothers come face-to-face with Joseph. Joseph is now second in command to the Pharaoh, and in charge of the supplies. The brothers feared for their lives! But, Joseph was not vindictive. He was conscious of the bigger picture. The proof of Joseph’s world view is demonstrated by him telling his brothers, “You meant it for ill, but God meant it for good.”
Zen Osho Tarot
Knight of Water
Trust
When we take trust to the level of the quantum leap, we don’t make any elaborate plans or preparations… No, we just jump, with hardly a thought of what happens next.
Trust life. With trust, something immense opens up.
You are not deceived; there is nothing that can be taken away from you… You cannot lose your real treasure.
~~~~
I have wondered before if this is about offering massage therapy house calls for critically/chronically ill as private pay. This might just be a step away from dependency on insurance. For sure, the insurance industry has been problematic for our society. It has not been financially good for doctors. It has not been mentally good for patients who have lost touch with self-responsibility as an employer paid premiums and an insurance company paid charges. Might this current chaos have a good long-term outcome, as with Joseph all those years ago?
What would spirit have us know about all of that?
Angelic Messenger Cards
# 39 Cooperation
A Nourishment Card
Cooperation between your feelings and your body create physical health and feelings of happiness and fulfillment. Cooperation among your feelings, your body, and your spirit give you the ability to experience the grace of God as love and to interpret the energy of love as the guidance you seek. The spiritual energy of love is arising from the divine Presence and raises you to the status of inspired mortal and wise healer of other living things.
~~~~
I don’t know how everything is going to unfold in all of these situations. We do know we can choose how we view LIFE. For example, Abraham Hicks’ take on Alzheimer’s. Listening to that may bless you, too.
In the meantime, remember the truth: We truly are, as Ram Dass says, all just walking each other home.
