My ‘supposed’ purpose

Like most, I always reel in shock when I read in the media about an apparently normal person or pillar of the community reveals they have been leading a double life in some good or bad way.

While my double life was nothing sordid, it is not what would society would consider 'normal.  Therefore, I’ve often felt a sense of nervousness when I think about having to reveal my ‘special abilities’ to friends, family or the wider world.

The first two groups I haven’t yet been able to work up the courage to speak to about all this. This blog is an attempt to begin the process to the third group in the hope it makes it easier to tell friends and family at some stage.

Why so hard you say? There are thousands upon thousands of people claiming psychic expertise of one sort or another. Why are you any different?

I think it comes down to my conservative personality and my inability to be fully convinced about this 'gift.'  I’m not one for putting myself on a pedestal, being the centre of attention or boasting about my abilities whether in business or day to day life.

But speaking out is something that I have felt compelled to undertake because of the continual ‘urgings’ over the past decade from grandma and several visitors from the other side.

In fact, it was the subject of one of the very first ‘discussions’ I had with grandma when she appeared soon after I started the dream groups and serious meditation. She hasn’t let up since and it even got to the point where I'm sure some of the others have been co-opted into her plan to have me go public! I finally relented by starting this blog.

I first began this conversation with grandma in 2001.

Me: I’m struggling to come to terms with the belief I’m actually talking to you and not dreaming, or going insane. Why would you want me to go public.

Grandma: There is a purpose in all of this.

Me: I can’t see it. Do I have to work it out?

Grandma:  Some you will work out as you experience what you need to experience. I’m here to help you with the steps you need to take in the broader plan.

Me: You’ve lost me.

Grandma: I’ll help. Darling, on earth you go through a process of growing up, being educated and gaining enough experience to hopefully lead a life of purpose that allows you and society to feel like you are making a contribution.

Me: I’m not sure I am.

Grandma: That’s why I’m here.

Me: Am I? Leading a purposeful life?

Grandma: What do you think?

                                                  

Me: I work hard, think I’m a good father and generally do the right thing. If I’m being honest, I’m not really convinced I’m doing anything that makes a huge difference and I’m not sure what my purpose is beyond that. I’m not unhappy but....

Grandma: Is there something else?

Me: That’s it. I mean I do ask if there is something else. But my main question now seems to be why this is happening. I mean you being around and the headaches stopping. It’s not easy to comprehend. Doesn’t fit with my logical side.

Grandma: Darling, you are doing fine. But there is a greater purpose for you. Going right back to why you chose the subjects you did at school, what subjects you excelled in at school, why that then led you to journalism, then communications and what you have planned for you next.

Me: By whom?

Grandma: By a greater source. That will be explained later. Just accept for now. We need to take small steps in getting you to where you are headed next. All before has been a preparation, your education, your career, your purpose up until now. You are awake now to where you need to head, your new purpose and the reason why you are on this earth at this time and in this life.

Me: This is all too confusing.

Grandma: It will get progressively easier if you have patience and accept. I’ll always be here for you to help.

Me: I’m tired. I don’t really understand.

Grandma: Darling, we will talk many times for many years. We have only begun.

Me: OK. I want to know about the career purpose. Do I have another career path?

Grandma: No. You are preparing for and getting experience in communicating something that will not be accepted by most and understood by even less.

Me: Sounds no different to some of the issues and problem jobs I’ve had to manage for companies that the public hate!

Grandma: This is far tougher. You will be communicating for the other side. From myself and others. Messages about things that the human mind won’t or doesn’t want to comprehend or accept. That is your purpose. To help people accept. In this life, there isn’t enough time for you to be able to convince people to comprehend or understand. The human mind isn’t and won’t be able to do that for some time yet. But you will convince many, many people to accept and question. It isn’t your purpose alone. You’ll have help from other communicators. You’ll see and understand who they are and how they do it at a later time.

Me: What if I don’t want to do this. Can’t do it?

Grandma: I’ll help you find a way that you can accept and understand that this is what you are here to do.

I fought Grandma and her ‘helpers’ for over a decade. She has never forced me and been anything other than supportive and encouraging. In your own time she has repeated to me often. The time just never felt right. Now it does and there is a lot to reveal.

I’m interstate for the rest of this week on my day to day job – corporate life. When I’m back, I’ll share some revelations about the purpose of our day to day work lives, church and religion. I’ve had many discussions with Grandma and the others about day to day life on earth. I hope you find it interesting.                      

Truth and Proof

In the coming days and weeks, I intend to share some more of my experiences and 'chats' with the other side. As I go through my notes and jottings from the past decade, at times the detail still strikes me as a little unbelievable (and I'm the one experiencing them!). So before I share these with you, I’d like to tell you about my inner battles in coming to terms with what I’ve experienced in the past decade or so.

Unlike a lot of other mediums or psychics who often write or talk about understanding and accepting their special abilities from a young age, for a long time I was entirely the opposite. And while I’ve come to accept, I still fail to understand.

As you know, I was trained as a journalist, then added an Arts Degree from university and have been working in the corporate world for nearly 25 year. Asking questions, challenging and testing a premise and implementing rational decision making processes are part of what I do and what I am.

So confronted with my visions and ‘conversations’ with the other side, and needing to know why or at least find a rational reason for why I experience what I do (at one stage, I even hoped that I would be diagnosed as having a mental illness), I visited doctors, psychiatrists, psychologists and counsellors in the hope that I would be diagnosed with some sort of disease that would at least be able to answer the question of what and why this was happening to me. This would have been a relief to me.

I’ve undergone MRI brain scans, attended countless workshops, academic and medical seminars and read an enormous amount of literature to try and get to the bottom of it all and find that ‘ah ha’ moment when it all made sense according to science. I’m still searching and still trying to understand and it will take some time yet (for me and others to understand (one of the ‘visitors’ from the other side did explain to me why it will take some time yet but I’ll get to that in a later blog).

So when confronted with not being able to understand how or why, I guess you either accept or choose not to accept. For me, it was and still is a question of (a) do I forget about all this and go back to my ‘normal’ life and risk the headaches? (b) accept what I experience when I meditate and be happy that I don’t get headaches accepting that the down side is I have paranormal experiences?

Ten years ago I chose (b) and accepted the premise that just because I can’t understand doesn’t mean it doesn’t happen. It wasn’t an easy decision at all and I still doubt myself often. And the sceptics make some good points that resonate with me and the way I think in my day to day life.

In the end, what helped convince me to just go with it and accept it was the concept of faith. I think I’m the least religious person on earth but what I admire in people who support a religion is their faith in the face of the unknown. I’m not saying they are right because I’ve been ‘told’ by my ‘visitors’ that while there is a superior power or source, our minds aren’t able to comprehend (yet!) what that entails so we individually or collectively choose a name, religion or way of life to make meaning of what we can or want to understand. This is faith.

As we all know, humans seem to fall into one of three categories in regards to faith. You either have it or you don’t or you have an each way bet.

After years of counsel from medical experts and mulling it over myself without finding the answers I sort, it was a leap of faith that eventually made me accept what I experience when I meditate.

I came to the conclusion that many people don’t see God or whomever else they believe in but accept him/her/it/their religion anyway as a leap of faith. Was I any different? Just because I couldn’t see it, did it mean it wasn’t there?  

So having been unsuccessful in seeking answers about my ‘condition’ from scientific experts and their trusted tools of medicine, I decided to make a choice and I took a leap of faith. If nothing else, the headaches stopped immediately and haven’t returned. Go figure. I wish science could.  

Thanks for your feedback

Firstly, I would like to thank those of you from various parts of the world who have contacted me about my writing, blog and commentary on other sites. It is great that you find my experiences a worthwhile contribution to the ongoing debate about psi and I appreciate your encouragement to continue.

In answer to a couple of questions that have consistently been raised:

1)      No. I’ve never done this for money. I’ve worked for 25 years in corporate life and that has been my day job.

2)      Absolutely I get it wrong. However, the more I meditate, the more ‘accurate’ I seem to get according to the feedback from people whose dreams I’ve worked with over the past decade. My level of accuracy also usually relates to how open the person is who is seeking some clarity from the other side.

3)      Do I take clients? Well, not really to be honest. Although I ‘communicate’ with my grandma and other spirits regularly my last session with someone else other than myself who wanted to connect with the other side was three years ago. It ever been a plan of mine to make a career out of this!

The reason I stopped was I found some of what I ‘saw’ and ‘felt’ a little too confronting. What sealed it for me to decided to take a break was heading out to dinner one night with my partner and ‘feeling’ that a man I saw at a table with a group of people in the far corner of the restaurant didn’t have long to live, despite him appearing quite jovial and happy. Although I didn’t know him or his wife who was with him among many others at the restaurant, every time I glanced in his direction, I felt this terrible heaviness in my heart and a few other signs that suggested he wasn’t going to be around for long on this earth. It really put a dampener on my own night out with my partner.

Two months later, I saw his wife walking alone down the same street as the restaurant and I followed her into the supermarket as I saw from the look in her eyes that she was forlorn. Some people in the supermarket sympathised with her and asked her how she was coping since the funeral.

At that point in my life, I decided I needed a break from doing this for others it all so I flicked the switch and tuned out for a couple of years and just left it at 'communicating' with grandma and the spirits I choose to 'hear.' That is enough for me for now.

Again, thank you for the feedback (and that from the sceptics too – I’m not 100% convinced about all this either – I’m just reporting what I experience, whatever it is and why it happens). Happy to hear about all the possible theories.

Thanks   

A new voice guides me as a medium

When I read through my notes from the past ten or so years and begin to write this blog, I still shake my head at what has happened and how. I continue to question how and why this paranormal stuff can possibly happen, more so to a person who questions anything and everything on a daily basis.

It is not the easiest thing to accept all this either. Yet, while it is much safer being normal, having the good job and happy family existence, the chance that I enlighten myself (if that is the result of my coming out about all this), is too compelling. Besides, if nothing else, it is really nice not to experience the headaches!  

One of my earliest experiences of being introduced to a guide from the other side was six months after the dream group sessions had commenced. At the request of Darlene, the woman who was the recipient of my first channelling experience all those years, I reluctantly agreed (after two months of her pleading) to listen to the dream of a friend of hers that was going through a really rough patch in her life. At that time of my life, I really had little interest in becoming a medium or delving into this side of my life. It was all too raw.     

We met at Darlene’s house on a Saturday when I was supposedly heading to the football. Partly out of nervousness that I was suddenly being thrust into the role of dream adviser or medium to people I didn’t know (reluctantly I might add), I meditated for about an hour before I arrived at Darlene’s place and also for ten minutes before Kelly* arrived.

Kelly was a thin woman in her mid fifties and nothing stood out about her except her tired eyes (for me, the eyes really are a window to the soul). She told me the dream she wanted to share with me was recurring over many months. Other than that, she told me very little of herself.

Almost as soon as I introduced myself and shook her hand, I ‘sensed’ the presence of an older man associated with Kelly. He ‘stood’ over in a corner, like he wasn’t sure about getting too close to her. I ‘felt’ it was a balding man in his sixties – maybe her Dad?

With the formalities over, Kelly began her recurring dream:

‘In my dream, I’m at work in an office job, but it is a different location to where I normally work. It is dark both inside and outside. I’ve been out to lunch somewhere and when I come back to the office there are several phone messages written on paper that have been placed under my phone. People are running around the office in different directions and my boss is shaking his head at me and laughing at me while whispering in the ear of his secretary. There is pandemonium everywhere. I realise I’m working for a shipping company and there has been an incident with one or more of our vessels, we can’t find out if the crew are OK. I keep thinking big empty vessels. I try to call people to find out what has happened, try to return messages but there are people coming in and out of my office. Christ, I’m the bloody PR officer. Then the wives of the men who work on the ships burst into my office, trying to protest at what has happened and sniggering at me. Are their husbands OK? They are causing a disturbance while I’m trying to phone people back. I feel tense, stressed, agitated and out of control and my boss keeps on peering at me but won't help. Why is he still whispering to his secretary?Get these people out, I scream. Another group of woman come in, their husbands have lost their jobs on the ships and they have come in to make my life a misery, throwing my things around the office, putting things in the bin, turning my computer off and pulling the phone out of the wall. ‘How do you like that?’ they ask. I can’t properly read the writing on the messages, to know who to call to be able to find out how serious the incidents are. This is my dream.’

Almost from the time she spoke, the ‘presence’ of the bald man moved closer to here and kept ‘speaking’ to me in a soft and almost apologetic voice. At the same time I kept writing a combination of my own thoughts and words he was ‘passing on’ to me.

This is what I wrote and fed back to Kelly:

 The dream reminds me of a feeling of being imposed upon – you didn’t stand up for yourself, you were relying on others making decisions for you.

 The dream reminds me of the book, I think it is called Heart of Darkness – the unfriendly setting, the feminine forces at work, the feeling of being out of control, feeling lost, needing help.

The dream reminds me of the saying - When the chips are down, you’re on your own. It seems no one was prepared to help you.

 The dream reminds me that some men feel that women are out of place in the work environment – perhaps you felt in the dream that the women were trespassing on your space.

 The dream reminds me of the Tarot Card – The Tower – things falling apart, change is needed. If I don’t change nature will make it happen. The feminine energy of the women in the office is creating a personal earthquake. I need to change my attitude to be able to see the messages.

 The dream reminds me of the term women trouble – some men feel they can be bothersome, destructive and have nothing to contribute.

 The dream reminds me that sometimes we get clogged up, what I would call spiritual constipation. Until we find the right glasses to be able to open the spiritual channels, we will feel we are up against it.

 The dream reminds me that women sometimes have an important message to deliver to males. Although I think the women are getting pleasure out of seeing me suffer in the dream is unfair, there is actually a message for me the male – the feminine part of my psyche needs attention and some direction.

 The dream reminds me of the saying - feeling all at sea. The ships are struggling, you are working for a shipping company, you are struggling – you are ALL at sea.

 The dream reminds me of opening Pandora’s Box – in the dream. I feel like I’ve opened up a Pandora’s Box of problems. However, if I stop, work out why the women are there, attend to their immediate needs and calm the situation for everyone and myself in my office, things may change for the better. In life itself, we sometimes think that we are opening up a Pandora’s box every day we wake up, but once we change our attitude, open up our psyche to new possibilities and attitudes, our life opens up for the better.

 The dream reminds me of the fact that you didn’t confront the problem at hand – you were too distracted by the women.

He’s telling me he is sorry for leaving a mess and for his infidelity.

This became my pattern of channelling through the dreams that others experienced. My feedback from ‘the other side’ would include metaphors and examples, sayings or experiences that the dreamer could related to as delivered by me on behalf of someone who had passed. And it would almost always end with a direct message from the departed.

After the session, Kelly told me that her husband had died of a heart attack nine months earlier and she subsequently discovered his financial affairs were a mess. She had also suspected but could never confirm that he had been having an affair with a woman at his work.

I didn’t like seeing her in tears, however she assured me that she was relieved and was thankful. I’m not sure I felt the same way at the time.   

Hearing from the other side

For me to connect with the sprit or the presence I know as my grandma or the many other unexplained ‘individuals’ from the other side that have felt the need to ‘visit me’ over the past decade or so, the process is definitely helped along by meditation. 

As I briefly mentioned in an earlier blog, it is a process I call spiralling – for two reasons. One, because I feel like I’m spiralling into the earth when I begin to meditate. Secondly, I feel the presence of a warm, golden light filtering slowly through my body, almost like I have a funnel at the top of my head that opens to allow this light to come in from wherever it emanates.

I know there are far more learned individuals and experts than I who can wax lyrical about the benefits of meditation. I can only agree. If nothing else, meditation makes me feel like the most relaxed, focussed and calm human being on the planet.

The night of my grandma’s first appearance at the dream analysis workshop, I had a more profound experience if that was at all possible and one that really shook me up.

Ten years down the track, I still look back in awe of that first night. In the hundreds of ‘visits’ from grandma and the others since that night, I’ve had many ‘discussions’ and messages from the spirits that I’m more than happy to share with you in coming months as I write of my experiences. I haven’t read the book series Conversations with God by Neale Donald Walsch but I resonate with what he has experienced, except we are both having conversations with a different presence.

But back to that night following the first dream group.

I remember feeling extremely tired but I can’t remember a time before of since when my mind has been so clear, so charged and so receptive.

While my body wasn’t willing anything other than sleep, I felt compelled to ‘spiral’ that night.

I don’t remember much of the meditation process that night in bed but I do remember the ‘chat’ with grandma.

Me: I need to understand why? And why now as well.

Grandma: You are finally awake darling.

Me: Awake?

Grandma: I’ve been trying to reach you for some time.

Me: How?

Grandma: How are your headaches?

Me: I’m not sure. Tonight my mind felt as clear and untroubled as I can ever recall. Is that what you are saying, my headaches were you?

Grandma: A combination of me trying to contact you and you being blocked to receiving me. I’m glad I finally got through.

Me: I’m still unsure about how that happened.

Grandma: We found a conduit. The dream group.

Me:  So if I hadn’t met that guy at dinner and had the suggestion planted about the dream group, this wouldn’t have happened and I’d still be walking around experiencing headaches? Talk about fate.

Grandma: Fate is a word many people use. Perhaps you should think about things happen for a reason.

Me: Why me, why now? This happening to me is what I mean?

Grandma: You are ready. It will help you, it will help others. Meditate, open your mind and I will be there. There is a purpose to this, for you and for others. Rest now. You have lots to see and experience, slowly until you understand and grow.

I remember as clear as if it happened yesterday that I awoke in a lather of sweat at 3.10am and wrote this down in my dream notebook. It was the middle of winter yet my hair and t-shirt were drenched like I was trying to get to sleep on a balmy summer’s evening near the equator.

Since that night, my life has not been the same. I’ve gone about my normal western experience – corporate career, family, all the usual stuff while keeping this all to myself, except for the people who were in my dream group, my current partner and ‘grandma’ and the other ‘visitors.’

Some of the things I’ve ‘seen’ and ‘heard’ I still have doubts about and at the opposite end of the scale, some things that are passed on to me from the other side (or wherever it comes from), makes the hairs on the back of my neck stand up. I’ve been ‘told’ and ‘discussed’ with grandma and the others, subjects such as: Is there a God? the purpose of life and been ‘shown’ advanced souls – people who many of us know well who are living extraordinary lives on earth for a reason and have similar characteristics. On the down side, I’ve had the unfortunate experience of looking at someone and getting a terrible feeling that they haven’t long to live.  I will discuss these down the track.

Next time, I’ll share some of the other dream group experiences I had when I again dared venture beyond my comfort zone and ‘heard’ the messages from the other side.

Please be assured, while I have little control over any of this that I experience, I deeply respect whatever it is that I go through. While it is a cathartic experience for me personally to be able to writer about and share these experiences, I do so often with feelings of trepidation as I really fail to understand all this and why it happens to me.

My first outing as a Medium

As a novice in this type of work, I wouldn’t normally be the first to volunteer when our host asked for group members to open the free association feedback for Darlene’s dream. However, I felt compelled to on this occasion, given the ‘urging’ I was feeling courtesy of my grandma’s spirit that I felt was overwhelming my senses from across the room.

I looked down at the notes ‘she’ had helped me write, looked back at the spirit ‘figure’ that shimmered behind Darlene and followed my grandma’s ‘lead.’     

 The dream reminds me of the sense of powerlessness we sometimes have in our lives. Others who are carrying weapons can make us feel like spectators, unable to do anything and making us feel like we are on our own.

The dream reminds me of the saying often used by the elders in my native Brazil – evil always has a message. In this case, the jester is doing something evil by chopping the top off people’s heads but there could be good to come out of this, it now exposes the mind, opening it up to new thoughts, ideas and directions. In the past, these may have been closed off.

The dream reminds me that sometimes we can be running faster than the crowd but still can’t catch up to where we need to be. This makes us feel helpless. But we must have the end goal in sight – the goal being that we are often here for a better cause even though we are being taunted at present because we still feel way behind.              

I looked up and Darlene was writing furiously. A lot of the time she nodded and I took comfort that the insights she was being provided with seemed to be striking a cord with her

Our host suggested someone else may like to offer some feedback but Darlene interrupted him and looked at me.

‘Please go on,’ she asked me. I continued.

 The dream reminds me of a term that I have heard often in my life. We can turn darkness around if our motives are right. Feel pity for the jester, stop chasing him, let him go and don’t follow him. Go in a new direction and leave the jester behind.

Tears rolled down Arlene’s checks but she continued writing. Like her, I couldn’t stop and my grandma’s ‘advice, words, guidance’ came pouring out of my mouth.

 The dream reminds me of many horror movies I have seen where the victims feel impotent to do anything about the evil character. They are not strong enough to do anything about the situation.

 The dream reminds me that sometimes we have a feeling of being held back in our lives because we live by the motto that it is ‘better the devil you know’. Perhaps a better motto would be ‘stop and get to know the devil you don’t know’ – yourself.

 The dream reminds me that we have to stop running around in different directions and find another way. Go with your own feelings and stuff everyone who thinks you should follow their rules.

 The dream reminds me of encouragement. By this, I mean the jester hasn’t done as much damage as he could have done with a machete. He has only taken the top off people’s heads and this can heal. This gives us hope.

 The dream reminds me that we need to get to know who the jester is. When we do get to know him, to understand him and get in touch with what he represents, we will take away his power.

 The dream reminds me that often we wake up from dreams when the best or worst part is about to happen. Next time you have this dream (I remember staring straight at Darlene) follow him and see where he leads you. Live life a little dangerously.

My final piece of feedback that night ‘via my grandma’ for Darlene was something that made her gasp and put her hand to her heart. Rather than a metaphor, a figure of speech, an anecdote or an example, this feedback was direct.

“There is a letter ‘M’ written on the blade of the machete. You need to disarm him before he hurts you.’

 There was a lot of discussion for the remainder of the night but I don’t remember much more than Darlene’s words to me as we were about to leave.

“My husband’s name is Mark. He has a cutting tongue, puts me down all the time and I’ve had enough of his belittling me. I’ve been thinking about leaving him. Thankyou.” All I could do was smile nervously and make a hasty exit to my car.

As I drove home that night I felt enormous guilt, concern, wonderment, humility and fear that I may have been responsible for a tearing a marriage apart.

What worried more than that was that I had no understanding of what had taken place that evening. It didn’t take long to find out. I had another visit from my grandma later that night. And it all began to be revealed – and still continues to do so over a decade later.        

There's someone behind you!

A woman I'll call Darlene cleared her throat and nervously opened a folder that was sitting on her lap. She then began to share her dream with the group.

‘This is my dream. I am standing on a street corner somewhere in the city. It is night, dark except for a few street lamps but they are not very powerful. It is windy and cool. I am standing watching a parade. There are marching bands and performers moving down the street. There are families, lots of them, standing on the side of the street smiling and enjoying the parade. I feel uneasy and suspect something is wrong. Then I see him across the road! He’s laughing at me, showing me the curved machete in his hand. He raises his eyes to taunt me. He starts running quickly through the crowd and down the street, indiscriminately cutting the top off the heads of people - scalping them – but they can’t see him. Why can’t they see him? ‘Look out,’ I scream. But they don’t hear me. I chase after him yelling out to the crowd to get out of the way but they don’t respond. People keep falling down as this smiling jester type figure continues to scalp his victims at random. I am racing after him but I can’t get close enough to catch him. He is always just out of reach. My fear for what he is doing keeps me going. His victims fall slowly to the ground and feel their heads. He hasn’t killed anyone but has inflicted pain and disfigurement on them. When will he stop? Still the parade goes on. He gets to the end of the main street, turns and smiles at me, then moves off into a backstreet. Should I follow? I cautiously look around the corner of a dark side street and I see him there, smiling and waving for me to follow him. I think it’s too dangerous. I’m scared. Why is he doing this to me? This was my dream.’ 

For what seemed like an eternity, no-one said a word. I was speechless for another reason. For the entire time Darlene read her dream, I couldn't takes my eyes off the shimmering figure that seemed to be standing behind Darlene with what 'looked' like a hand on her shoulder. Later I was thankful that Darlene had printed copies of her dream to hand out that night. I'd written down words while she read her dream, but what I wrote was what I was 'hearing' from the figure that had somehow 'spoken' to me while Darlene spoke.

Two things where clear at that time of the night. First, I had a page full of notes, metaphors, saying and examples relating to the meaning behind Darlene's dream. Secondly, and perhaps more importantly, these messages that I had written down had not come from me (or so I believed). I can't remember thinking about anything that was now written in front of me in my own writing.

The message I had to share with Darlene was from another 'source.' The presence that was 'standing' behind Darlene at the time she shared her dream. A presence that I understood to be that of my grandma.

And like any human being that has ever felt a combination of exhilaration and fear at the same time - like the feeling I can only imagine that is experienced by elite sportspeople as they attempt a new feat or record, I was about to enter uncharted waters. I was about to share a message with Darlene, a message that came from a person that had long ago departed this life.          

Finding the key to unlocking my ability as a medium

It was alike a lightening bolt striking me between the eyes or the ‘ah ha’ moment when you finally get it! I was at a dinner with some work colleagues of my then partner when I felt one of my regular headaches coming on (and it had nothing to do with the company I was keeping!)

As I rubbed the back of my neck and then subtly massaged my temples in an attempt to relieve the pain, a guy next to me at the table asked if I was OK. While most of the time, I kept the headaches to myself, for some reason I sensed he would understand when I told him that they were a common occurrence. Talking with this guy over the next two hours was nothing spectacular but pleasant enough. It was all polite and nothing out of the ordinary until I asked him about some of his interests. Whether he had consumed too much  alcohol I’m not sure but this guy waxed on about the normal things that med like – sport, movies etc etc. Then he volunteered that he’d once been dragged along to dream analysis workshops by his wife and that while she loved it, he thought it was all hocus pocus.

For me, it was like getting a message from the lotteries office that I’d won first prize.

For the next 15 minutes, I garnered as much information from him as I could about his dream analysis group experience without wanting to give him the impression I was at all interested. Truth was, I was fascinated. I’d been an avid dreamer all my life, instinctively knew that my dreams were important as a means of getting guidance or messages from somewhere about my life, where I was headed and why. However, I never thought any more deeper than that about my dreams – such as really analysing them.

After the dinner ended, a few phone calls and a month or so later, I was driving to the location of my first dream group meeting, at the apartment of a little known and part time Jungian psychologist.

Upon arrival, I was greeted at the door of a poky apartment by an eccentric looking man with a beard and a nervous disposition. Sensing he wasn’t a natural communicator, I made small talk while he led me to his sitting room where I met the other members of the dream group – three middle aged women and a scruffy looking guy in his early 40’s.

After the introductions, we took our seats and our host cleared his throat and said, ‘Each week, one person will get to share a dream. I will ask at the start of each session who among you would like to share a dream? If one of you has a dream that you feel you would like to share or if you have an urgent need to seek some clarity about a dream, please speak up. Ultimately, each week the group will decide who will share a dream.’

‘The person sharing their dream will start by stating, ‘this is my dream,’ this will let us know you are ready to commence. Please read the dream out loud, slowly and deliberately so we don’t miss anything. Try and restrict your recall to a few minutes. While one of you is recalling the dream, the rest of us will take notes. At the end of recalling your dream, finish by saying again, ‘this is my dream.’

‘Following this, we finish off with what I term free association and interpretation. This means we give the person who shared the dream the chance to get some meaning behind what the dream is trying to tell them, what message it has for them compared with where they are in their lives at this point. With the information we have gathered from the question gathering stage, we share our thoughts on what the dream might be trying to say. We can use metaphors, symbols, expressions, comparisons with other events or experiences in our own lives to get our thoughts across,’ he said.

‘This free association can run for as long as we like or until we have exhausted our memories and suggestions. From experience, the free association allows the dreamer to hear and experience the dream in a new light. It is often the most beneficial and creative part for all concerned but also the most challenging and confronting. At the end of the free association, I will ask if someone would like to take the dream on as their own, sort of your own interpretation having gathered all the facts and knowledge. This is often a powerful way to conclude and leaves the dreamer with some new insight into what message the dream is trying to deliver.’

‘Who has a dream they would like to share?’ he asked. 

I sat on the edge of the chair and waited for someone to answer. Although I had many of my own dreams written in a scrapbook sitting in front of me, I felt the need to listen to the process and someone else on the first night.

As  the group exchanged nervous glances around the room, I felt excited and of clear mind for the first time in many years. It is hard to explain but it was like getting a glimpse of earth from a spaceship and marvelling at the unexpectedness of it all.

I sensed a strange presence in the room but didn’t say a word. What it was, both shocked me and was unexpected. It also changed my life.

A little about me and when this all ‘really’ started

At this early stage, I feel like I need to convince you that I’m really a normal person – in the context of ‘average’ male in his late forties.

Although at times I’ve questioned my sanity, I’m fairly normal and have what would be considered a normal career. I've worked hard and made my way up the corporate ladder, I like money, success in whatever I undertake, love my family and son, enjoy travel, passionately support my favourite football team, a game of golf with friends, like a drink, nice food and the simple things in life as well. I buy lotto tickets hoping for a win like everyone else, follow the fortunes on my brother’s greyhound and my neighbour’s horse, have a few shares without knowing if they will ever do enough to help pay off some of the mortgage at some time in the future and experience the ups and downs of normal day to day life and love like everyone else.

It’s just these damn feelings of a presence having been in and around my day to day life from pretty much an early age. Strange noises, visions of spirits, the feeling of someone being in the room or next to me, the sensation of being touched when no one is close by - I've experienced it all. As I grew older and learnt and understood more about déjà vu and intuition, read stories about the effect of the full moon on people and began to accept that gut feel was a common occurrence for many, I felt happy that there was nothing unusual at all about me.

Until that night in 1977. It had been a confusing week. A school colleague had committed suicide on the previous Monday and I was stunned but not surprised when I heard the news of his death via my father two days after. Dad was in tears as he told me and I sat there stunned as I had seen him the previous Sunday at Catholic mass where he seemed buoyant and full of laughs, having just played his first game of football.

I say not surprised because leading up to his funeral, my intuition was in overdrive that we, me or someone would receive or deliver a message as to why a happy, healthy and popular 15 would take his own life. I was relieved and felt pacified when a message from my school friend was read out by a family member at his funeral without really explaining why he had taken his own life.

That night, I had enormous difficulty getting to sleep and after trying to read, listen to music and count sheep in an attempt to get the sad events of the day out of my mind, I let my mind and imagination go free and undertook my first meditation session as a novice. 

My mind wandered to a place that I often used to go to or imagine in my daydreams. It was a fictitious house near where I lived. I shut my eyes and imagined being in the front room of this small house where I could see out but nobody could see in. I imagined myself spiralling into the floor of this room and into the soil below. While I did so, I could feel the warm sun peering in through a window of the room and kissing the crown of my head. I felt as one with the earth and the sun. 

I continued to spiral (my way of meditating in later years which I'll explain later), feeling myself overcome with warmth and a sense of calm, imagining the sun filtering through my head, down through the rest of my body and my arms and legs. I felt safe, protected, close to reality but half a world away, aware of what was happening outside but in a different space altogether. 

Then, whether it was a dream, my imagination or something completely different, I felt what can only be described as a spirit presence that, while it didn't have the physical characteristics or features of my school friend who committed suicide - I instantly recognised by the way he 'communicated' with me.

He 'spoke' in an apologetic 'tone' and his message was simple. I had to go because I couldn't live with my family knowing I was gay.

I woke on my bed - back in the real world - and looked at clock. three hours had passed since I went to bed and my body was cold with sweat and I had a massive headache. I couldn't move and didn't want to. As a 15 year old boy, there are some things you just can't understand. As the years went on, despite my best attempts to rid myself of this affliction, despite suffering constant headaches that I knew were more than something a pill or doctor could fix, I avoided visitors, messages and my 'abilities' as a medium in lieu of a 'normal life and career.

That is until my grandma came to visit some ten years ago. My life hasn't been the same since.      

Therapy with Grandma

What I’m about to tell you still makes no sense to me and for the majority of people reading this blog it won’t make sense to them either. For others, they will understand. For everyone who reads this journal over the coming months, I hope it improves your life on earth and helps give you a sense of comfort about what happens when we die. Writing it has already begun to help me. I am not trying to convince anyone of anything, least of all myself. I’ve just accepted that this is what it is. I’m simply reporting what I feel and experience. If anything, for me personally, it is a coming out of sorts, and in this way, it is a good feeling.

The simple truth is that for as long as I can remember, I’ve felt or experienced a presence of energies, spirits or something that doesn’t relate to the normal day to day reality of life. Call this energy whatever you like; ghosts, souls, auras or whatever. I’m not sure it has a name nor does it need to – it is a presence of something that I experience that ‘communicates’ with me. When I say communicate, I don’t mean that in a way that you and I may communicate via normal verbal or written communication that takes place every day of our lives. It is more like communicating through my mind without saying or writing anything.

Throughout this journal I will put parentheses around the words similar to the way I highlighted the word  ‘communicates’ in the previous sentence. You will find that I use that a lot as a way of trying to describe in common terms, what it is like when I experience or feel the presence of an energy or spirit nearby. I do so because it is meant to highlight that I am emphasising that I have no idea if it is fact or fiction or whether I know if it is true or untrue. Therefore, it is a way of questioning what I actually experience or feel.

For most of my life I found this energy presence as a tiresome burden and something I wanted to avoid, mainly because I don’t understand why I have been ‘given’ this ability to experience this presence. And that’s why I avoided meditating for many years because the times in my life I had meditated, the more I felt the presence of energies around me. It was a bit of a catch-22 because for many years, I experienced mild headaches and meditating made the headaches go away for some reason although I have no idea why. You might think it crazy to choose headaches over feeling the presence of energies around me but when you don’t understand something or are fearful of it, you tend to choose the easier or more rational option. When I finally accepted this was normal for me and accepted it as a part of my make up (and I think we all have the potential to experience what I experience), the headaches went (I don’t know why either) and my other life became my normal life.       

 The best part of all this is when I feel the presence of an energy or spirit that I somehow ‘know’ to be that of my Grandma. She often 'speaks' to me through my dreams or at times when I’ve been willing to accept this ‘gift’ via intense meditation, it can feel as though she is sitting in the chair next to me and we are having a conversation even though we aren’t in the true meaning of conversation. Please understand, I can’t physically see her but I see an energy. It isn’t on a level we understand as part of what we experience with others on earth. The best way to describe it is I see what some people might consider an aura – which then begins to form an outline of a presence of energy or light that I feel is my Grandma.

Now before I go on, I need to tell you that I am not claiming I have supernatural powers nor do I consider myself a lunatic or a nut job (although I have questioned this assertion on some occasions when I’ve experienced an intense presence or actually started to talk to a presence). In fact, I’m normally the most sensible and logical person around.

To be honest, for most of my life, I’ve absolutely hated having this ‘ability’ to  feel and ‘communicate’ with this presence. In my mind, I’ve continually questioned and dismissed all of this as bullshit. So I’ve just decided to write it as it is. I have no concept whether what I’m about to tell you is actually true or not (and I’d really welcome someone giving me a logical explanation either way – however, as yet, no ‘expert’ on either side of the fence has been able to do so.)

By ‘coming out’ about all this I recognise that my day to day career as I know it could be about to end, I’ll no doubt lose some friendships and many acquaintances as people will quite rightly question my sanity (don’t worry, I’ve done it many times myself) and each and every person I’ve ever come across in business, corporate or personal life will look for clues to whether there was a time they could pick a hint of insanity or madness at one or many points in our relationship. I especially apologise to my family and those close to me who I love dearly.   

No doubt some of you reading this are asking the question; then why come out now? Why put yourself out there, damage your reputation, put a very comfortable six figure salary and life at risk  and open up the chance of ridicule and while causing potential embarrassment to myself and those close to me?

I don’t have the answer. Like most of the important decisions I’ve made in my life, it just feels the right time and I’ve been ‘nudged’ a bit by my grandma who seems to be ‘telling’ me that coming out will help others as well as myself.

I encourage you to read my story and experiences with an open mind and make your own mind up from there. I repeat, I have no real idea whether what I experience is real or not.

For me, there seems one undeniable fact – based on my own experience. The power of the mind is phenomenal. The more meditation I do, the more my mind seems to be able to do and experience. For me, if I meditate, I get messages in my dreams and visits from this presence. That’s just what I experience. What I choose to do with these messages is up to me. Maybe it is the same for you or could be that way if that is what you choose to do.

Tomorrow, I'll tell you about my first time.