Song Dedication: Gotta Make Sure by Twin Bandit

Where do I even start? No matter, you gotta start someplace…one step is all I need.  And even if I think that some people will read this and believe I am bat-shit crazy, I still feel deeply compelled to go there…where?  Well c’mon, let’s see together shall we? One foot in the psych ward maybe? One foot on the verge of awakening possibly?  One foot in total reality even?  I’ll let you be the judge, for today I am just a messenger.  Let me suggest that rather than judge even, you receive with an open heart.  Foot firmly planted…and here I go.

I have been simultaneously re-reading Eckhart Tolle’s A New Earth as well as I randomly came across the work of Brian Weiss, M.D. in the bargain book section of our local book store (which I’ve come to use “bargain” loosely as I end up buying 3 times as many print books as I should, but that’s another issue…I could start my own self-help, spirituality lending library…)  Anyhoo, Brian Weiss has several works, but the one that caught my eye on a wall of 500 other books was Many Lives, Many Masters. I can’t say what compelled me to grab this book at the time as I previously had little knowledge or curiosity for the after life or past life experiences…at the time feeling my ego’s internal woo-woo eye roll at the subject matter.  Nonetheless, I followed my instinct and bought it and proceeded to read it.

Now for me, proceeding to read something as soon as I’ve brought it home is a big deal because I’ve purchased all manner of books, brought them home and put them in my “to-read” stack and pulled the next one in the rightful cue of books….like a book hierarchy of turn taking…but there are those other times when my intuition intervenes and compels me to read that book at that moment.  This has proven very useful in my enlightenment and growth process as usually the content is very timely in whatever the context of my life is at that time.

So Many Lives, Many Masters rudely jumped the cue straight into my lap and it was off to the fucking races.  I admit, I am a slow reader.  Like really slow.  But this book made me into a professional speed reader.  It wasn’t like I had my nose in it constantly, demanding all my attention.  But when I did commit my time to it, the ideas and stories flowed easily into my brain like a gush of cleansing power-wash.

If I have piqued anyones interest, I will do my best not to spoil it for you…and really whatever I am able to reflect on this content will do the actual book little justice because there is just so much to reap from every page but here are a few salient points that stuck in the crevices of my brain.  Brian Weiss was a traditional psychotherapist until a client with many debilitating symptoms walked through his office door.  After 18 months of treatment, she had shown little to no improvement and so he decided to try hypnosis to tame some of her life-altering fears.  To his surprise, when he asked her to go back to the time in her life when a specific symptom began she recalled a body, landscape and culture that was not of this lifetime.  Sounds like fiction I know!

His work to write this book as a true story was difficult as he was conflicted by tradition, profession, culture and competence.  In the end, he chose to risk all that he had built for himself because the remarkable recovery his patient was able to find through what he would come to call regression therapy.  He continued to explore and develop this hypnotherapy treatment and now trains other mental health professionals and continued to treat hundreds of his own patients with continued success.

My research and work to heal my own body, mind and spirit has taken me down many paths but they all seem to diverge at a common meeting point, a green sunlit drenched meadow in the middle of a thick forest (that’s just me sharing my visualization), where I can breathe expansively and feel peace and joy within, alone yet not.  This meeting point from the art of beingness, presence, self-compassion, acceptance, mindfulness, mediation,  epigenetics, and now past-life and the soul’s existence as infinite energy have converged in a beautiful dove-tail.

Some of the big ideas of Weiss’s work is that the soul is energy and it is scientific fact that energy cannot be destroyed, it only changes form.  We come into this present life, we choose the when, and our circumstances, and the body that will serve as the vehicle to do so for the most growth potential.  We also choose when it is time to leave.  While we are here it is our soul’s purpose to learn lessons and heal from our mistakes and missteps of others in the now and in the past.  My favourite concept presented in his work is that souls reincarnate in groups.  Often changing roles but still very much intertwined, purposefully connected to work our shit out, no matter how many life times it may take.  I wonder who my husband was in another life time to me…perhaps a child, a grandparent, a sibling?  I am certain my son has been my parent before, even an influential teacher in another time, his intuition and our connection is far deeper than only 7 years of this lifetime.  Some of you are like, all high-pitched voice,”Rrrrrreddddd flagggggggg” but I know there are others who are smiling and wanting to believe, or even identifying because you to have the knowing deep down too.

Those of you thinking of unfriending me on social media or in real human life of this life time, maybe check out Weiss’s work or the plethora of documented work by other physicians, scientists and psychologists before…or after you do;) . Your choice.

So Weiss’s work has opened up a whole other dimension of thought for me to consider and this has helped immensely with my own anxiety and discontent.  What a gift to not fear impending death, as it is just our physical body that dies when it can no longer take on any more miles.  What a gift to know that each soul chooses when to come and when to go, this helps me reconcile the inevitable exit of the physical forms of souls who have graced my life.  What a gift to know my soul chose these challenges and circumstances to learn as much as possible during this existence.  What a gift to know that life is more vast, precious and beautifully mysterious than our human brains can fully grasp.  What little I can grasp, brings immediate peace and acceptance.

I see in Tolle’s work that much of what he teaches is also about the soul, but it is about the soul in this one moment right now.   When we are present, our soul’s purpose and effort is amplified, more efficient than when we constantly push and strive and stress. Nonetheless, our souls have a purpose and our body is what is provided to do the work.

My work right now is to be present and the way I frame this for my interfering monkey mind is that my creeping anxiety, that use to be full-blown dysfunction that was wreaking havoc on my body in many ways was my choice to resist what was.  Every turn I resisted.  Every time I was meant to merge or slow down, I did the opposite…slammed the brakes, accelerated, tail gated erratically…whatever provided resistance to the moment on that immediate stretch of road.  My anxiety is much more in check these days as I’ve trained myself to get out of my head and into my body quickly and frequently…constantly checking on myself like a loving parent of a traumatized child.

Lately, I’ve become more open to the idea of emotional pollution. (I was aware of this concept before but it use to anger me like when I tried to read Caroline Myss‘s work a year ago on the soul, I became deeply offended, er, my ego did).  While everyone talks and some take action on climate change due to the physical pollution of human beings on the planet, I now realize I, myself have been polluting the collective unconscious with my own negative turbulence.  Much less so now but it’s still there.  With this realization I believe the solution to emotional pollution is acceptance which is the antonym of resistance.  Simple.  Beautiful.  Truth.

A parting anecdote for those of you still with me at roughly 1400 words (thank-you by the way)  or that are on the fence about my sanity (or just love to watch the train wreck you think you are witnessing:) Before I began this spiritual work, I avoided any notion of spirituality…no my ego did…because it knew it was gonna have its legs taken out Tonya Harding style if I went there.  A friend of mine has always owned her spiritual energy and has spoken to me about her own experiences, I listened but I resisted internally, somewhat skeptical.  However, when my anxiety was especially activated I would sometimes ask her to read my tarot cards or share any intuitions she had about my questions of uncertainty.  One afternoon, sitting in the sun by her parents pool, I shared with her my fear of losing my then 3-year-old son in an untimely way.  She smiled gently and said, “Sarah, that is not something you will ever need to worry about…that is not your story.”  Those words were a gift.  I had no way of knowing if she was right or not, but I often revisit her words when I am doubtful and know that it doesn’t matter if this is fact or fiction because it helped me let go of this stifling suffering I was holding internally and unknowingly over my son.  Toxic energy polluting what is good, whole and peaceful.

A small conjecture as well, my past work with epigenetics (inherited family trauma) also allowed me to link the unresolved pain between the break in the relationship of Mother and Son, when I allowed my heart to explore my maternal Grandfather being taken from his birth mother as a toddler, never to see her again…well until after his body died….

And moreover, as I write this post, I see how right my friend was.  I don’t know what will happen or when and end will come to my body or my son’s in this lifetime, but my recent awakening has allowed me to let go of the worry of losing him…which is what her words really addressed in that moment of compassion.

So when I talk about reincarnation, I plan to accept this story the same way as her words.  Instead of fearing death and departure, I choose to see it as a closure to one lesson and know I will be given another opportunity to continue my learning journey and the cleansing of the collective unconscious when my soul is called upon again.

And for now, I sit here, sanity intact and a reverberation up my spine, joyful that I was able to find the words to adequately express what my soul wanted me to today.