Grief

Grief can be a bit like a monsoon ...spontaneous torrents of rain amongst long periods of dry weather. Sometimes it's a relief, other times you think that it's never going to stop, it's arrival a surprise and overwhelming you.

 

Being a Spiritualist doesn't change or stop you grieving either. Another reminder of how human you are.

 

When my mom died earlier this year after being ill for quite some time,  I had thought that, as I knew it wasn't going to be a good outcome, that it would be easier as I had adjusted to the fact that she was going to die. Like all change you don't know the effect of it until it happens. For me, its not that I have become unrealistic about my relationship with my Mom and she's suddenly become a long lost saint of my life. Indeed, my Mom would be polishing her halo and wearing it as a skirt if she thought so. No, people leaving your physical life to the other side has its effects, whether you were close or not, whether it was expected or not, or a blessed relief or not.

 

So I hear you say.. but you are a medium aren't you? You have belief in life after death? Yes, having a belief does help but the veil between here and the other side is still there. The difference between being alive and dead is still a big one to get passed, even for someone who communicates with the spirit world and supported by their beliefs. Removal of the veil does not change who the person was in their life, or how they behaved or the memories for those who are left behind. When you go home the truth of who you were is revealed, and a bigger perspective is offered. Yes I know my mother is home in the spirit world safe, and as I work with her physical absence from my life, her transition has still been an emotional one. This is not though intended to be a plastering of my mom through a magnifying glass for all to see, but rather an honest reporting of the effects of death and the loss of a loved one.

 

My mom was a very strong woman who was my biggest teacher of my life, through both negative and positive lessons. Like everyone she had her challenges.   Something within her needed a reassurance that no one could give her, and she lived by her own rules and beliefs. Born and brought up in South Africa and Rhodesia, she left her family and followed my father around country to county like most military wives, managing the kids, and life the best you could when you had to pack up and move every two years.  Arriving in the UK over forty eight years ago, she was, like most South African's,  direct and outspoken and so stood out as someone different and loud to traditional English conservative ways. She was marmite to some and adored by others. Although a woman of many opinions, she would have given the shirt off her back if she thought you needed it more than her, and would be the first to help someone down on their luck. She believed in loyalty and appreciation. She was a lover of shopping, a closet modern fashion icon, and attempted to be a model officer's wife.

 

As my mum, she was similar to a Jewish matriarch. She was the voice of my parent's, and the one who would challenge my brother and I in our teenage rebellions. She believed in interference. In truth she found it hard to let go of being the parent, even way beyond when both her children's faces were edged with age, and our own children becoming young adults. Like most mothers though, she was the one who made home home. She was the cook, the planner, the director and the initiator of any entertainment.  She loved entertaining and indeed it was when she was at her best. If anyone could make a party out of a ham sandwich and a piece of cake, my mom would have, and would somehow have had enough left over to feed the army she would happen to find walking past her front door. Mine and my brother's younger lives were surrounded by people my mom would adopt from the local army mess and who would arrive and be welcomed for Christmas dinner like some long lost family member. For us kids, our friends found her somewhat scary and dragon-like as,  whilst she could be both inclusive and accepting on one hand, kids were also bundled together into another space, well fed and watered, and expected to not get under adult's feet. It was an adult world we lived in.  Mom, however, was the one who instigated family gatherings, always remembered our birthdays and special events. Her way of keeping involved and trying to show we counted,   even if, in her later years, it was by proxy and by sending my dad out to make it happen. With me, my mom was always generous, but at times I was her own personal extension of a store cupboard. Fond of making improvements to her wardrobe and kitchen, She would regularly buy things and then change her mind, or it was a case of out with the old and in with the new.  As I would leave their house after a visit, my mother would ceremoniously present her latest castoff to me with a 'you need one of these don't you' and a look that you knew it was not an option to refuse. It took me years to realise that everything was given with a return label and that she may want it back one day. It was mostly her way of sharing and not being wasteful, but she never forgot an item that she had 'loaned' me. Even now I have items I have never used in my attic uncomfortable with disposing of them. 

 

My mom was the one who installed the strong sense of family within us which made us rally round her,  the one who had the strongest opinions and highest expectations that also made us dysfunctional as a family. My moms opinion stirring the family into one way or the other, creating a family line which you were in or on the outside of. In truth we were no different from any other family with strong and colourful characters within it.

 

My mom fought several illnesses over the years, and was well examined by the medical profession...her last year's diagnosed with potential lung cancer, to be told only a month before she died that no cancer existed. The 2nd time for this to happen, the last being a diagnosis of oesophageal cancer the year before, my mother unbelieving was unable to absorb the information that she was once again reprieved and that she wasn't going to shortly die of cancer. She didn't like the thought of old age or death curtailing her life and so was concentrating on the job of not dying, but had mentally already run for the hills when they had mistakenly told her she had three months to live. The big C was overwhelming enough, and although it mysteriously became nothing,  she did not consider that she was still going to die but through another big C word and through her favourite hobby of smoking. The diagnosis of COPD had sat in the background of everything else ticking like a time bomb. Telling her to give up the smoking stick was like trying to tell the queen that she couldn't rule and equally she was just as unamused.  It was her stress management tool and she had been smoking too long for her to be able to give up at such a life challenging time. The smoking damage to her lungs had already caused her to stop breathing, followed by cardiac arrest resulting in her having to be resuscitated. This bought her a few days in intensive care unit on a ventilator with her brain affected by the lack of oxygen. Like a stroke victim it took a year for her to become slightly close to who she had been before the resuscitation. Then,  so busy was she fighting the thought of cancer, and trying to have the last word, she wouldn't accept that smoking was killing her still in another way, and waved away reality. So one day in May,  in defiance of her smoking her lungs would whisper their last song and stop taking in air properly. For my dad and myself her death was actively very traumatic as we watched her die, but for mom the carbon dioxide in her blood sent her to sleep and that was that.

 

Even now, over six months on, it is all a bit surreal. As my brother lives in America and had a short window to be involved before having to go back,  the funeral was done and dusted within a week. People had come, paid their respects, gone and on robot mode we did it, despite my dad's and my head still being at the hospital where we had left my mom on a horrendous Saturday afternoon in May. The first two weeks seemed to be spent in a pub drinking with my dad and within six weeks,  I quietly fell out of my busy job, summer came and went, and months later I am now in another job, still adjusting, still trying to catch up with reality. Although my head recognises that it is still only a short time since she went, that time is a blur and it all seems a bit like distant memory that I keep trying to remember. Like a well loved tune, I can hum a few bars, but the words are confused and vague to the song.

 

As my dad would say, it was not a good time.

 

My story of the dying and death isn't much different to any other. The response to death for anyone is different, who has been lost, the circumstances and your relationship adds to the lottery of what you feel. The emotions wide ranging but also life changing.

What I discovered was that when a parent dies, it is the true time when a person actually stops being a child, and you really become of age. No longer is the parent there to run to when the child's world shakes. Whist many of you might say you stopped depending on your parents years ago, the truth is possibly different. Think of it honestly, how many of you feel safe that they are still there if you need them? You don't, but it is comfortable knowing that they are there for that possible moment where you might. The safety net that existed as a child, silently still existing as an adult.

 

In her later years, like for many grown up children, it seemed that the roles of parent and child had reversed between us. Me, the child having to become the active parent to my mother as she became frail and lost in her illness.  It was not a comfortable one. I did not realise though, until she passed, how much I had missed having my well mom around over the past ten years. Nor, had I realised whilst I watched her decline, how much I had held on to the hope that my mom was still there if I needed her, and that she would return to be the person she used to be, even if to just have the mother daughter argument. Death takes away the safety net. No longer can you be the child. The parent has gone. You have to exist in the real world, and no one is there to run to for comfort even if you wanted it. You are now the only one who can be your parent now, and if you weren't in charge before, you are definitely now. This is not about what other relationships exist for you, but the relationship of mother and child that has been lost. Of course grief for other relationships bring their own effects and changes to who you are.

 

It is true we are all born to die but isn't it amazing how this information is buried in our heads. Until death comes and shakes you by the hand, through friends, loved ones and famous people departure to the spirit world, it remains like a hidden secret. No one likes to look into deaths eyes, even spiritualists who regularly speak to spirit rarely ask questions about their own death. If they do, rarely will it be revealed. The veil set for the living is an important one in the journey of spiritual growth and understanding.

 

I have been lucky not to have lost many people. Indeed, family I may have known passed before I was born, and being part of very small family assisted that. My first real experience at the tender age of six was being told by my big brother that Father Christmas was dead and indeed had been shot, and my confusion when I received a letter from Santa a few weeks later, added to my bewilderment. Many people's experience in modern times is that of loss of relationship and many would not realise that even a childhood belief could be their first experience of grief and loss. Later I discovered that my beloved grandmother had written the letter, whose death when I was eight, I  had grieved for many years without realising it. She was for me a true loving grandmother and who I missed so much that I became a broken record to my own children about enjoying and appreciating their own grandparents whilst they could. It was only years later that I realised it was because the fun times I had with my Granny were cut short and that I had never had the opportunity to appreciate her or say any goodbye to her. Being too young to decide and living in another country made her death not part of my direct experience, but more of a bed time story and a character who suddenly disappeared from my life.  One minute I was expecting her to arrive from England at my Christmas school play, the next moment she wasn't coming and never would again. Christmas that year was terrible as her absence was felt by my father, and his grief seeped around our family like cold mist. Death's visit unwelcome and felt by all even if they didn't quite understand what death actually was.  

 

Other deaths I had experienced were largely by young associates at school being accosted by death through untimely accidents. Always still, the memory of them, lingering with me, unforgotten souls, whose lives had briefly touched my own. It is the colour and energy of the people you remember, even if it is a long time ago, and however brief you may have known them.  Johann and Tara, thank you for sharing your brief lives and the odd message I have received from you.

 

So is this a little morbid? I think not. Everyone has their experience of death but we rarely sit around the table to discuss it.  Indeed only 100 years ago death was everybody's acquaintance who visited regularly and came to our homes like an unwelcomed guest turning up frequently bringing about a social get together and what kept families close and in touch. Two world wars and disease prevented old age creeping upon many, including the young who had barely touched the earth because staying alive was an everyday personal struggle.

 

Now generations can exist together as medical science creates a population of geriatrics waving their walking sticks and death dragging it's feet as it follows eventually catching up and reminding us of our mortality.
 

Now I am approaching middle age, I know I will start to lose the people I love. Where once I had only the odd message from people in spirit, a small queue is starting to form. No longer is it the predicable message from Granny at the Sunday Spiritualist church meeting, but old acquaintances are popping in to give their regards. Uncle Jack has met up with Granddad Bill, and my mom bringing her wit and humour, as she talks about her sister, aunt and mom  and recent events in their world.

 

It is helpful if you are a believer in Spirit, it has its benefits that soften the blow and hardness of being left behind.  It doesn't stop the tears though, only time and appreciating other things in life does.  Grief is a process which you cannot avoid and have to go through. Elizabeth Kubler Ross says there are five stages of grief and loss, Shock/Denial, Anger, Bargaining, Depression and Acceptance  and indeed the first four you will ricochet around  like a pin ball machine, bouncing back and forth between them. It is rare that you won't feel it's effects or that it will pass by you unnoticed...to even feeling low and at rock bottom.  You will eventually end up on the other side at the destination of acceptance, but it can take time.  Death will become your friend, and it's changes will become part of you.

 

Of course, when death happens suddenly and unexpected it is a shock,  knowing  it is going to happen makes it an endurance test for everyone. For family supporting someone dying life goes into a type of suspended animation, all things mentally on hold, and even if you think that you are coping with it, you don't know whether you are until it is over.  It is excruciating watching someone die, you are an almost helpless observer despite doing many things to prevent the outcome. You cope in the moment and file things away, as inside you know the person dying has a bigger challenge to deal with. It is them who are dying and having to accept their own immortality and review their life. Balance their regrets, their didn't dos with the things they did, that they loved and achieved, against the now and what next. This is when death and his shadow, illness, allows the luxury of thought amongst the pill popping in the fight to live with hospital as a unwelcome holiday destination.  When eventually they let go of life is the time when the living have to get back to living, leaving the dead to the void and secret of death.

 

The funeral is not the end of grieving, but the start of being allowed to. It is though down to whether you have caught up with the fact that they have actually passed.  At times I forget my mom has passed, and it is almost still as if she was still in the hospital - such is the one moment here, and another moment gone.  It is hard to get used to someone who you have known all your life to suddenly no longer be there...and even if you do believe in the spirit world, to be able to visualise where they are now.

 

If you don't have an afterlife belief, the starkness of non existence must make death a very cold final outcome. The thought that you will never see a loved one again, ever, must be an uncomfortable one even if you are certain in your belief that nothing exists after life.

 

It is true though that our minds prefer stories of survival than cold reality and it's ability to avoid things it rather would not think about is part of its protection system. Many would question spiritual experience is part of the mind and as a hypnotherapist I can appreciate that conclusion. 

 

Death raises the question of immortality, and even as a spiritual person, you can lose faith as you get swallowed up in the grief and loss of your loved one. The mind no longer feeling safe in its existence, every threat to life and survival is examined and life stops about being tomorrow. Today suddenly seems way to short to be able to fit everything in, and a mental bucket list forms of what you need to squeeze in before your life is taken away.  Every moment becomes in real time, and as you feel your heart thump, as if a ticking clock counting down the final seconds of your life, an urgency in everything is thrown behind your everyday thoughts. It is not surprising that many people who have lost someone become subject to anxiety, panic attacks and that death triggers illness within their own lives. It is the mind becoming overwhelmed and imploding upon itself by its own questioning. A computer virus running into the survival program, corrupting the system and shutting it down bit by bit. 

 

Of course this is not everyone's full experience, for some this exists for only a moment, a short while, for others it becomes part of their lives for many years affecting their whole life. Marriage and relationship  breakdown, falling out of jobs, illness, alcohol abuse, are all a potential symptom of grief, of people unable to adjust after death shaking their hand. When death becomes amongst you, family and friends need to find tolerance and love when they see someone suddenly change. Even if it appears to be months after and separated from the death event, the mind can suddenly reveal it is stuck at a stage in the grieving process.

For me,  I knew that I was processing the loss of my mom, but still the extent of my feelings surprised me. Though upon reflection, I realised that the early days were automatic. The shock still very much protected me and my practical sense had kicked in as I stepped in to support my dad, arrange my mom's funeral and I put aside how I felt about her death for later examination. Those days became about knowing I couldn't decide about something's as I felt disconnected from my feelings and so doing them just in case I regretted that I didn't.

One of those was about going to see my mom in the chapel of rest. 

So many people talk about trying to remember your loved one they way they were, when they were full of life and vibrant. Often your loved one tells you this themselves as that is how they prefer to be remembered. It is really a question for those left behind. If you have observed their death, the trauma of it can interfere with the positive memories of them. You can suffer a type of post trauma that keeps you in the moment of loss, especially if you have gone through illness with them for sometime. When I was arranging the funeral, I also arranged for my mom to be dressed for the funeral, painstakingly choosing her clothes, shoes, matching jewellery, make up, her last going away outfit. Trying to do the one last thing for her that I could do, knowing that how she looked would be important to her. Her funeral was a gathering of her friends and family and if it were a party she would have been fashionably late after making sure that she was dressed and looking good for the occasion.  She was known for never being on time and for paying attention to how she looked. It was irrelevant that no one would be seeing her face to face on the day. 

The question of whether I went to the chapel of rest arose. As the funeral was going to be just a week after her death, and the hospital took five days to release her,  the funeral home could only offer one afternoon to see her . My father and brother both deciding not to go, I was left with a dilemma of not being sure what would be worse to see my mom dead again after an afternoon of seeing her die. What was more traumatic? I also found it hard knowing that she was all dressed up with no where to go and no one coming to visit, the daily habit of seeing her at the hospital still alive in my mind. She was dead but not totally gone out of our lives yet, and I wasn't ready to say that it didn't matter because she was dead. Uncertain, I sort advice from those I knew. Several of my friends had chosen not to see their loved ones, however,  one of my dearest friends, Debbie, very much recommended it and told me it was a positive experience and how peaceful her nan had looked.  

Funeral homes are sombre places, and on a last minute rush on the Friday afternoon I arrived with trepidation at the funeral home having decided to see her. I think they were trying to set a peaceful respectful ambiance but for myself coming into it, it was stark and cold and very much not an environment I associated with my Mom. After what was a brief wait whilst they got her ready, the guy eventually fetched me and walked in front of me, leading the way, funeral marching as he went, and respectfully waved me into a small chapel room. It was all too obvious that this was not a normal everyday situation. As I entered the softly lit room I was greeted by gentle music and my eyes immediately fell upon my mom lying in an open casket, noticeably still, her hands laying crossed upon her chest, her eyes closed and looking as if she was just asleep. She looked so at peace. The funeral home had dressed her, made up her face with the make up I had provided, done her hair and she looked ready to go out for a day out. She looked lovely and looked much like my Mom. Death had taken years off her face though and she had a more youthful appearance that existed before old age and illness had taken hold. I could see before me the beautiful woman that stood out in her wedding photograph taken over 50 years before and that I had in my hand to put in her coffin. It was still hard seeing her, but going to see her helped me with her last hours of life, and I am so pleased I did.

When someone close dies, if they have a cremation, it can be so different experience from a burial. At a burial the person is immediately buried. With a cremation, you have to wait for a few days for the ashes to be released from the crematorium. As my dad was working through his loss of his wife, I was the one who fetched her ashes and held them at my home as I waited for him to be ready to deal with the next stage. We had the challenge as to where mom would have wanted her ashes scattered and it was a question that was kept open for over 5 months. It was a family joke, as mom always threatened that she would come to live with me at some point, and had often talked about it. My mom being the strong woman she was, wouldn't have made for me a good house mate, and so living with me I hadn't encouraged. It seems she had the final word but having her live with me kept me in a place of not being able to grieve her physical loss. So when we go October scattered her ashes I found that tears would arrive at unexpected times and without much preamble.

Many people go through different ways of letting their loved ones go. It is a bit by bit process and I have been no different. As time gets older and a range of firsts happen...First Christmas, first birthday, moments that were once shared between you, and that a noticeable gap that someone is missing amongst you. It is all part of death. It is not just loss of a loved one but a way of being too. 

Being a spiritual person has allowed me to understand and make friends with people from similar belief systems. In the pagan world, the universe is one, and the energy of our ancestors live on, and like the seasons, the cycle of life goes in a full circle, from birth to death, to birth again. At Samhain, who most know as Halloween, pagans celebrate the lives of the dead, and believe anyone who has died need to be passed to the Otherworld so the can begin their journey to their new life, and to be reborn again. All hallows eve at midnight is the time where communication with the dead, and the dead can be passed over.  The relatives or friends of the departed go to local sacred pagan sites where the ritual and gathering of the souls of the dead are taken to the ferryman, represented by a pagan priest/arch druid, who accompanies and assists the souls to the Summerlands.

As I had lost my mom, I felt another way to help me process my loss was to join some of my pagan friends in this ancient tradition remembering the dead at Avebury.  So on All Hallows Eve we all met at ten pm, and along with others who had spirits to pass over,  we  took the traditional processional ancient walk through the Avenue of Stones up to the Sanctuary. It was a long walk in darkness following the Arch druid, Terry, who was acting as the Ferryman. Eventually reaching the Sanctuary just before midnight where Terry opened the circle and invited all to step into the centre one by one to talk of their loved one and giving an apple as an offering. The apple representing the body and cycle of life, and the seed within it the rebirth of the soul. In the dark starlit sky amongst the cold and wind,  all those gathered remembered the person who had gone on before them. Specific well known people who had died that year were also remembered. In the small gathering of strangers, so much love, respect, laughter and tears were given in honour to those people who no longer walked this earth amongst us. Farewells said and circle closed we departed our separate ways for the long walk back to the car park, my heart less heavy.  It may be a strange way to say good bye or to express grief to some but it helped me move forward and say good bye to my Mom.   I would be proud if my family remembered me in this way, as it was so much more about the living, than the death celebrated at most funerals.

Since my mom died, my spiritual belief has sat quietly in the background. A medium communicates with the Spiritworld through their senses, and when you are trying to shut much of your feelings out you are not allowing the communication to be part of you. When you live too much of a physical life you can miss the subtle spirit conversation that is part of every day life as the spiritual and physical work at different vibration, a different speed. As a medium you learn to be in balance between the two worlds and tune into Spirit by raising your vibration, how you perceive what you think and feel, noticing Spirit's active interaction with you. Those early days I was aware of my spirit family 'popping' in, including my Mom. I felt her presence and her impressions upon me, but often I was not ready to engage with her fully in that way just yet. I was still getting used to the fact her physical presence had gone and the days of reckoning of our lives together was still too raw.

So when I suddenly felt the need and desire to get a dog, I didn't stop to think about these new thoughts and where they are coming from. A house with four cats, a husband who was nervous about dogs, and a job that prevented me being at home had been a very good reason to dispel any notion of getting one. There was also the fact that my parents had two dogs, neither my favourite, and although I grew up with dogs in the family, cats were easier option.  My mom loved animals, especially her dogs. She was very close to her Jack Russell, Rosie, who devoutly followed her every move although I preferred the Old English Sheep dogs I grew up with.  The sudden urge to get a dog, and finding myself at home and no longer working all day, made me petition my husband about getting one.  Surprised at his agreement without the twisting of thumb screws, I got on to looking at adverts of puppies before he could change his mind. In a planned Sunday morning of doing housework, a impulsive moments look at an advert turned our day into a trip to London and back and before you knew it we were armed with a mad apricot cream cockapoo puppy and once again our lives had changed. What were we on! Were we mad? A dog is for life not just for Sunday you know. You could see our cats accusing us and hanging us as traitors, and my kids wondering what had hit them. Mom, aka me,  had always said no to having a dog and suddenly she has gone out and got one. Rather rash of her.  I forgot that having puppies were like having a new baby and there were moments when I thought I must have lost the plot. Dougal, was whilst adorable was also hard work. Named after the programme TV and book character, Dougal from the magic roundabout and with as much hair, was equally a very magical and enigmatic dog.   With his almost Old English Sheep dog type face, Dougal,  has been a focus and distraction and helped all of my family get over the challenging times of the last few months. A cuddle a day, and the daftness of him, even when he is hard work, has added funny moments to those sad days.  Even my dad with his own dogs, has found it hard not to warm and smile at him when we are Dougalling together.  We have Dougal days, instead of duvet days, and we all look forward to seeing his mad hairy face when we arrive home.  I can almost feel my Mom smiling by me and telling me I told you so, you have to have a dog in your life and they make it better.  I am sure she was the one behind it all, influencing and choosing her moments to help me find my own dog.

 

As I am used to her being in my physical world,  I don't automatically look for my mom on the spirit plain. However, every now and again she reminds me she is there, and I see her or feel her standing next to me taking things in as she did when she was alive. She is trying to help us all move forward and live our lives without her. As we both get used to the new change, and when we both are ready, I know we will have new conversations, and rehash some old ones. I know too that she has things she wants me to write, as I inherited from her my love of writing and this my own part of writing down my grief is also me processing our new way of living together.

 

Soon it will be Christmas, but today is another first.  I find I finish this today on what would have been her 74th birthday.  I would have normally got her something, so in her name I brought her one of her favourite Christmas flowers, a Poinsettia plant, which she loved.  As I couldn't physically give it to her, I have arranged it to be sent to someone else who was in need of some upliftment, and who would enjoy it too. I think she would have done the same, as it was something she did too, give things to others.  She lived her life as she chose, and her absence is felt by all of my family.  It is early days for all of us, there are still so many firsts to go through where I will notice that she is not sitting physically with us, and other moments where she would have added her opinion to matters at hand.  Although I talk of my own personal experience of losing my Mom, who lived a long life, and it is not to erode anyone who has their own feelings of their loss of their own loved one or their experience of it.

Death, and losing someone is always hard fact of life you have to go through and as you start towards acceptance, tears still fall upon an intruding thought of them, unexpected, uninvited and catching you at times and making you feel vulnerable. But like in between the monsoon rain, you find the warm moments of the sun, and these happier moments you start to notice more.  

Happy Birthday Mom. I miss you. xx

 

Failure or Liberty

Failure is a construct of the mind.  How do you feel about that? 

No...I did not say think about it....I said FEEL!

Most of you would have gone into your head to consider and think about the statement to agree or disagree. It is the modern human response to think rather feel the truth in your heart..

So what am I about?  Bare with me a little in my ramblings...

Recently I have been on my own little journey of experiencing life.   You could say that I have been taking a little holiday from being an active Medium as I have been thrust into the full physical human experience, body, spirit and soul. It has been a challenging time. I can only compare it to being chucked into freezing cold water and where all you can deal with is just coping with the shock and chill that is going on in that single moment.

In all of that it had seemed to me that Spirit had gone on vacation themselves and whilst I had never truly believed that they had gone away, they had been noticeably a little bit on the quite side from the constant channelling of information I am used to.  Sunseeker holiday spots in the Spirit world or not,  I realised though when I look back, that they had been knocking on my door every now and again to check in where I was at, often with a great big sledge hammer.  Me in my blissful ignorance hadnt been listening.   I was living too much human and, during that time, tuned myself out of the spirtworld.

So with recognition that I haven't been firing on all cylinders, over the past year I have occasionally grabbed at my wonky psychic tuner with renewed vigor, and would every now and again land on Spirit Radio One. Whilst receiving loud and clear the odd bit of information in still pictures and symbols, it was with the consistency of a dripping tap. Previously I had enjoyed receiving Spirit in a what would be a tricolour movie download supported by surround sound and smellivision. Now I had been relegated to what seemed like a version of charads and pictionary rolled into one.  Feeling somewhat lost like a ship without its navigation, I panicked.  Something had punched my psychic headlights out.

The human mind has its own special way of working - it is an amazing computer that's prime objective is to keep you alive and safe however irrational it may be. Therefore, when you suddenly believe you are lost....then this is a direct instruction to your sub conscious that gives it the licence to panic- and your computer kicks in to "safe mode" and every single thought after that becomes about survival through that moment.

Unfortunately my moment was two years long.

So what has this all got to do about failure and mediumship?

As mediums we rely so much on our senses – it is the natural side of us that has allowed us to go though life intuitively and sailing on the sea of life with some comfort and confidence that we don’t always appreciated how much we are supported by the spirit world in those times of challenge.   When many of us are truly spiritually awakened, it is like being plugged into consciousness energy and so what we once did automatically can suddenly become a bumpy ride.  

Why? As instead of still feeling our way, we have started thinking our way conciously due to our heightened awareness.  Developing as a medium is a human experience as well as a spiritual experience, it is the two worlds blending together  - the light unconditional love of spirit with the heavy physical reality and challenge of human existence.   As we touch base with our souls true home when we connect with spirit, nostalgia, homesick and sadness can envelope us as the feeling of what so much the human world is devoid of, love, acceptance, approval, safety makes many spiritual workers just want to exist in the energy of spirit.  

I know some of my good friends in the business may challenge me on this concept but many spiritual workers believe their sole purpose for living is to heal and/or pass on the message of spirit to those on the earth plane.  Why when spirit can quite happily work without us..and do? They are the superior beings and do not work to our limitations. We are the ones confined to our physical bodies. Why do all spiritual workers seem to have to work through human challengings if their only purpose is to be messenger for spirit? 

Even the best mediums have their view - but a point to consider is that the human ego works in many ways to justify our human existence and to reassure our reasons for living - and us spiritual workers are no different. We think therefore we are. Our thoughts leading our existence through our whole human experience.  This includes straightforward human fears but also an added spiritual worker one, the fear of losing our connection to spirit.

As a Newby in our development circles..we can all remember our doubts and our wonky messages.  Our fear that we may get it wrong..and that Spirit would leave us as not worthy of them working with us. As we grow as spiritual workers we learn and know that Spirit do not leave us. They are always there with love.  As we become more certain of our connection to spirit we can often forget to embrace the experience of living. We can so allow ourselves to be totally living with spirit that we find it too hard to live in the physical.  How often do we wonder at our challenges, and our momentary lapse of reason, as we struggle with human kind?  We are appalled at what the human race are doing to itself, the wars, cruety, the lack of kindness and love.   Often our medium minds prefer not to be part of this.  The human ego in us steps up to have a field day...but often spirit workers struggle to connect it to being part of human life as if our connection to the spirit world exempts us.

We are just as human as the next human, and our thoughts undermine us as spirit workers just as much as anyone who isnt working with Spirit.   Just think if we can let go of those occasional moments of fear of failure when we are up there working for Spirit and being totally pure channels.

So, here I am - lost in my ego, struggling with all sorts of fear when someone suggests the following to me....

What about the possibility that we entered this life to experience life, to develop our knowledge through the physical experience. Every human making the agreement before they stepped into the birth stream to enter into a individual designed experience of birth..living and death?   This birth, this life, and our future dying experience is our ownly purpose as to why we are here, and all we need to embrace and engage with.

Is it possible that, us Spirit Workers have just chosen the experience to be only partially emersed in the human experience and retain our connection to spirit to enhance this life experience?

So taking that thought further...

So if our purpose here is to only experience being born, life, and our dying where would you fail?  To experience life in any way is experiencing life.  So many people use the word “trying” – I am trying to do this, I am trying to do that, when their mind is tied up in the destination of their journey and in the fear of failure and not being successful at what they do.

How about believing that you are successful in all that you do, whatever it is? 

When we live in our head, allow our thoughts to dictate how we are, how we exist, the boundaries that it creates to keep our selves surviving the physical moment.   Fear stops us and restricts us because we believe our purpose is to follow a specific course of action.   When that course of action doesnt follow the route we think it should have, we then make a judgement on what we are experiencing, often labeling it wrong.

It is all a construct of the human mind controlling us, managing our experience to keep us safe in the experience.  You then, however, live every potential experience through your mind, and then tuneout of "feeling" your existence.

I am sure you can go back in your mind to a moment in the past where you still carry the emotional scars and still, when you go into a similar situation, you are reminded of the past experience, and can feel a heaviness in your heart challenging you about the situation. Your body acts as barometer telling you how you physically feel, specifically the heart. Tightness..constriction, pain anywhere or the subtle heavy feeling in your heart are all tell tale signs of your body telling you there is an emotion being held in your body and it is having an effect on your body..and subsequently your life experience.

Did you know you didn’t need to carry it around with you? Did you know that emotion is energy in motion and that it's nature is to move and not stand still?

Every emotion held is a mini volcano waiting to burst. Tears, or its softer parents sadness, anguish, like laughter is not meant to be held in. Why can we allow laughter to bubble so freely where our pain we hold on as if it is a treasured possession?

It is only because that for our spirit/soul selves joy is our natural state of being. So we allow the lightness of joy and positive feelings  to move naturally, where negative feelings are so uncomfortable that if we allow it to exist we feel it will grow into some horrible monster child that we cannot control.  The truth is, like every child which is screaming for attention, it is only needing to be acknowledged. 

Failure is a construct made in our modern society where our senses are battered with confusing and conflicting information, where wrong or right is the measurements of blame.  The universal law of polarity exists in all that we do and where the positive element exists so does the negative in equal measure,  there is no up without down or top with out bottom. It is always a matter of perspective.

So imagine it for a moment. I am calmly trying to tell myself all is well with my mediumship and shoving my anxiety down into my chest as if cramming a suitcase full of clothes to bursting point and attempting to squeeze it tightly shut. Meanwhile my sub concious is running around like Corporal Jones from Dad's Army yelling "don't panic, dont panic". The swelling fear inside me grabbs my heart as mind babble of every possible consequence runs a muck in my mind defining my next experience.

So what's this to do with being a medium?

Despite all of our connectivness, spiritual awareness and knowledge, we are living our human experience first. We may have chosen to do it as facilitators for spirit but we are not exempt from the human living experience itself. So even through the experience of mediumship and being a Spirit Worker we are going to get locked into our thoughts of failure, or believing we are here to get to a destination.

There is nothing wrong in being a dedicated medium.. Indeed the new spiritual revolution is being greeted by our spirit family's with excitement as the earth and spirit realms are drawing closer. More contact and connections are going to be able to allow the human race to evolve further to create a more connected experience. However many mediums see that their lives is only one of service..their experience being outside of them. 

I am recently reminded of the young man Stephen Sutton, who inspired the world with his battle with cancer and aged 19 passed to the spirit world. Before he left this life he didn't allow his illness to dictate to him and stop him embracing his full life experience. Indeed armed with a bucket list he set about grabbing life and packed his life with things he wanted to do, inspiring many along the way.  He lived life to the full in a short time which many do not engage in. Perhaps it was because he had nothing more to loose, nothing to risk and all to gain, and all he had left was to make the rest of his life experience as good as he could make it.

What if really it can be like that for everyone? That if we stop looking at the destination, the results, tomorrow, achievement, perfection, outcome, or fear of our last breath?

How about success is embracing every experience with acceptance and joy with the knowledge that it is as it is. Allow our heart to be the barometer to choose rather than our mind managed by our subconscious surrounded by all the fears of human living.

Failure is a human invention created from the judgment of right or wrong. If no experience, negative or positive, that you have walked into is wrong as it is just as it is in that moment. Why would you have failed?   You are in that experience because you are supposed to be - not as any wrong doing but the direction you choose to go. It is just like driving into a deadend..you may have not seen or ignored the sign telling you where you were going. You are there and the next step is to drive out to the next step of your journey if you decide it's not where you prefer to be. It doesn't change that you experienced steps of driving or seeing places you hadn't planned to go through. 

What we might choose to experience at a soul level indeed is a challenging thought to any human mind, but again it is a matter of perspective - our's is limited by the veil of not knowing or being able to see the big picture we may appreciate back home in Spirit.  

As Spirit Workers we believe we are infinite beings - and our lives, however long, is a drop in the ocean of the divine source, lived through the potential of many lives or multi dimensional experiences. Science has started to agree with much of our spiritual concepts through further exploration of quantum physics and that our universe operates to natural laws: Vibration, Relativity, Cause and Effect, Polarity, Rhythm, Gestation and Transmutation....some would argue that there are upto 12 that operates.  Much of our human brothers and sisters are not aware of any science in any form, just that they live and are only aware of their human experience. Those of a spiritual nature know that we are spirit living a human experience.

So instead of concentrating on trying to be successful. Congratulate yourself on being successful. How about the thought of just choosing the experience that you wish to be successful in, and letting go of all those past emotions where you feel that you failed or took a wrong turn?

So consider for a moment...the feeling of liberation that your heart feels about never being a failure in anything, and carrying on being the successful person that you already are.

Today I am who I am

Some of my regular blog readers may feel that I am against some of the love and light brigade or certain spiritual groups or of those who are being the arch typical spiritual person.  

Quite to the contrary.  It is good for anyone to hold to the affirmation “today I am who I am”.

The hot bed of spiritualism is thriving amongst our communities and indeed is having their own “coming” out of the closet like a dominant gay queen stepping out in Canal Street in Manchester, loud and clear and ensuring everyone knows they are there.  Anyone who is amongst like-minded people tends to grow in confidence and feel encouraged as they recognise that there are similar people to them out there.  There is, however, like in gay society, and in every society, the catty backbiting competitive crowd who stirs up the party, and some who just follow the crowd as it is safer being on the inside than the outside.

The strong “love and light” outlook, with the odd swing of colourful garments, that marks many spiritualists is just a way of them trying to show that they are dedicated to their spiritual belief and enjoying being who they are with passion and intent, and it is the same amongst Wiccan and pagan groups.  It is normal to want to fit in, and even like the young generation in trends and fashion, the “in” crowd lead the way as to what is going to be acceptable – or not.  Natural instinct is there to protect us all and, the human as an animal, is much like any other herd animal and attempts to stay with the herd to ensure its safety, and look and act much like the rest of its brothers and sisters.  The one on the outside or looking different is the one more likely to be identified by predators lurking hungrily around the edge.

As you work with Spirit, and learn to understand how they work, you will be taken through many experiences to assist you in your knowledge and development.  Spiritualism has though, become a religion with many at the helm applying human nature to control, manage and apply rules to how modern spiritualism exists within society.   You can give a thousand points to them for being passionate and wishing Spiritualism to thrive compared to the old days when we were all drowned and hung as witches or eternally fired for being a heretic and practicing our belief – the good old days of living in the closet.   Many good things have been done to aid modern Spiritualism but a fundamental thought seems to have been somewhat forgotten.   Being spiritual is a way of being, it is not a religion. It is an unfoldment, a realisation, an epiphany, and experience all rolled into one.  Everyones’ personal journey is not totally the same, and is theirs to claim alone.  The age old human thing of trying to reinvent the wheel, where ego and insanity takes over what needs not to be a manufactured way of being with dogma and dictators influencing who you are and how you should be.

Spiritualism has grown organically from the closet days, where devoted spiritual pioneers sat in circle learning and working with spirit and allowing them to grow in their knowledge and wisdom.  With the dawning of the internet and a more accepting society, we now have big schools, workshops, churches, spiritual centres with the traditionalists and the new all trying to spread their wings and bring to the world modern spiritualism.  It is truly wonderful that we can now share our spiritual awakening and as to how we feel about it and who we are.  But with the labelling of a religion and being part of a specific society, new rules come in as to how we should behave and think and how we should practice in being “spiritual” people.  Someone somewhere originally had a great idea to do good, to further the way forward and a little group got together to influence the way – and bang everyone is on the wagon and the generalist guide “how to be spiritual” is born.  Our version of the bible has arrived in all its glory, and not a second coming messiah in sight.

Some rules are good – the Seven principles are a good standing point for anyone with a spiritual belief.  I won’t discuss these in detail as they are easily found, and appreciated by any person wishing to understand spiritualism.  But every religion has started with a seed and its flower been admired and beheld, to only be torn up by the root and put in a greenhouse and given a label as to how best it is grown and propagated.

Like any wild flower it grew well enough on its own without help.

Human history and today’s multicultural society still shows that most religions end up with humans fighting against humans whether it’s by word or by sword.  Whatever it is, it is still a sad day for mankind and spirit alike.  Is it what we truly want for our spiritual legacy?  Personally, I don’t think so, but somehow I am not sure those who are waving our banner will be listening to me.  For me it is straightforward, Spirit is always there with their blazing light of love and it’s us humans which play the hokey cokey with the dark.

It is true; there are some people out there who do need human guidance.  A spiritual awakening is a confusing place to be at times, especially if you have great Aunt Mabel or even Angel Gabriel materialising at the breakfast table for a chat unexpectedly. It’s enough for anyone to suddenly choke on their Cheerio’s.  

What we see and what we think about spirit can be overwhelming, and our minds can run around like an abandoned chicken on a motorway dancing in front of dazzling headlights.  In our need to gain knowledge, we do need to understand that there are many ways of thinking, many different experiences.  Specifically if we are going to tune into the spiritual realm and invite strange spirits for a bit of a natter because we have their loved one sitting in front of us, is not about having a duty of care and abiding by the law, but caring about a fellow human. We do need to appreciate that there is a way to deliver the fantastic news that little Jonny isn’t going to be in pain anymore and will be shortly journeying back home to the Spirit world on a one way ticket. It is not about wielding a new found power, believing that as you have an insight to someone else’s life and they have given you money to give that insight, does not mean that you have acquired the god given right to destroy or ruin it by the “truthful” words you are blessed to give from the spirit world.    Too many times I have heard how a message has been given to an unsuspecting happy client, and the next minute they are lost feeling their lives are in tatters due to a message given thoughtlessly and without care about its effects. 

Spirit is indeed loving, but there are so many mediums who are untrained, not in tune, and misinterpret their communication with Spirit. Evidence is all about having “a lovely lady with grey hair, your grandmother, who gives you her love”, rather than the real evidence of the lady you knew who sat and watched the wombles with you and fed you peanut jelly sandwiches.  If you have the privilege of having someone sitting waiting for your words and that what you are giving or feeling matters more than what the person sitting in front of you is feeling or receiving – then check you are hearing spirit.  It is likely they are jumping up and down in front of you trying to get you to hear them.

That being said, we are human and spirit sharing a journey together and as human’s we are dominated by our fears and our doubts.   It is safer to be in a group when you are first developing. There are many excellent teachers out there who are every so willing to share their experiences and wisdom for free and even more so if you wave a score note around like a red flag to a bull in the right place. It is not wrong to earn money from teaching spiritual matters, but often where money becomes the main motivation, what you get in return can lose its soul. 

The point is though....if you are working with Spirit, truly working with Spirit, you shouldn’t need to be told.  Spirit will guide you.    It is good to find out different views, and experiment with new ways of working, traditional ways and different modern spiritual thinking.  You can be angelic, Buddhist, ascended masters, seventh heaven, ghost buster or mystic meg  – it is a case of learning to be a apple, then a pear, then a banana – or just being a fruit basket like me!  It is not wrong, it is just the way you are evolving and learning.  You do not have to trash what you first thought or the knowledge you first acquired, you just have developed it and decided what is right at that time for you.  You are all that you are because of everything you have ever done, not just because of one single moment.

Sometimes I may sound somewhat cynical about some Spiritual things.   It is not that I am truly trying to put down – it is a case of every man for himself.   It is ok to follow the crowd, it is ok to wear rainbow outfits and have crystal chandeliers as earrings.....I have done it.  So do still do it occasionally.  They are so beautiful!  I do it not as a uniform, but as an expression of me.

I have a lovely knowledgable friend called Jay, who the other day came to circle wonderfully wearing beautiful orange and colourful Indian garments in celebration of Ganesha, one of her favourite Hindu deities. It was his birthday and, because she resonated with him, felt it was a way to honour him by dressing herself in colours she believed he would appreciate. Other days Jay will be just Jay, another day she will come in wearing outfits which make her resemble a little native Indian squaw.  She is not trying to be something, she is just being Jay – comfortable and enjoying being aspects of herself.

The point is that is what spiritualism is truly about, being who you are, as a spirit.  Your guides and your spirit family know you inside out.  They have known you for eternity; you do not need to be something you are not.   They will help you find who you are inside, and if you feel for a moment that you should dress like someone else, they will happily not say a word, as they want you to benefit from the experience of adopting a persona which makes you feel that you can be confident and bring out the innerspirt, the true you.  It is your human experience and for you to decide what is right for you.

You do not need me, or anyone, to criticise or to tell you are wrong in your way or thinking, or living or to tell you how to be or what to believe...and if they do, then do wonder about what it tells you about them...or even you.  If you feel it is right to be there, then that is where you should be.   It is all about synchronicity at the end of the day.  Allowing the universe to conspire to help you develop who you are, and it is all so amazing how it comes together to bring the like-minded friends, the daring of being something different than you may have been before.  You may allow them all to influence to you, wear the same outfits to fit in, be draped in crystals, use the same Tarot cards, go to all the workshops and circles to feel acceptance or part of something bigger than yourself. Even read a blog to look for insight.  It won’t always be that way, as like most people you will grow in confidence and being and enjoying who you are will become who you are.   

You may one day feel that you don’t need to know it all, don’t need to be like others, don’t need to wear a “spiritual” uniform to fit in, not needing to acquire knowledge or being part of something bigger. You will just be you in the way you want to express yourself and be comfortable in saying that.

I have found it is good to say...

”today I am who I am”.

Just Being Human

So now you are a fully fledged medium. Your Facebook list has become the who’s who of Theso Arthur Findley Spiritual College with some of your peers now adorning a double barrelled surname of “spiritual medium”, and those mentors who you once regarded as near the lofty heights of the Great Spirit are now classed as fellow friends.  Your bookshelves that were once laced with fantasy smattered with the odd mills and boon, now look like the Mind, Body and Spirit section of Waterstones, together with an extensive unused tarot card collection.  The once uninteresting wardrobe now houses a number of rainbow outfits which would look good at a fairy convention and highlight the many colours you are.  Now, when the odd spirit pops in uninvited when you are watching corrie because they are worried about little Joey who has fallen out with dad or Burt who is dancing on the edge of the spirit world, it is just a mediums way of life.  But now you have acquired the status and the notoriety, is it all it is cracked up to be?

As a developing medium, and I will always call myself a developing medium however long I am working with spirit, you will have times when you have to put down your crystal ball and just live your life and be the human you are.  All is not always well living in the shadows of the realm of forever and even knowing that you have spirit and your belief to support you does not make you suddenly immune to living life.

The last year for me has been one of those years. A lot of starting and not finishing with a lot of where life has become so physical that much of my spiritual work has been put on hold.  I have just had to be.    Even finding time to write my blog has been lost as the big hobnailed size nine boots of life stomp through my world.  So I have lived life day by day, but, like bubbles in a shaken champagne bottle, I have had little bits of the writing monster burst from me and splash over my facebook page as a reminder that, like spirit, the soul inside is still there waiting.

So I still write little things when the urge takes me.  My husband has learnt to recognise that I may suddenly become a bit quiet and, then as he wanders on to Facebook, he sees something rather wordy appear in my status as explanation for me being awol.

Recently a lovely medium friend, who is perhaps wiser than me, recommended to me to put my name at the end of my wordy posts on facebook. Not wanting to disagree with a clever friend, I did it a few times even surrounding it with a couple of pretty stars to justify why it was there.  It just didn’t feel right however much I wrote it or embellished it.  I wondered for a moment whether it was because I felt that there was something lacking in me or that I was ashamed of my words or that I didn’t want to own what I wrote.

When it came to it, it was simply one thing.  I wasn’t intending to post my work to the world in order to be a Guru, or to be some sage that has the answers to the universe and everything to a waiting audience.  I was posting because I was human and that I was also recognising that I was surrounded by other people who were just like me, and equally just as human, and trying to live their lives in the best way they could in many human ways.  It goes without saying that the last year has provided its emotional challenges. It has been hard for me and as my thoughts about it came to the surface, I was just writing it down because it was me just trying to exist through the mayhem of it all.

I have always written, so it is a natural expression for me but even some of the statuses I have put up have still made me look in amazement at them.  I know some of it is me, but I also know my friends in the spirit world are always with me, and maybe having the odd dabble at writing too.  The Spirit world is perhaps trying to upgrade their publicity department with modern ways of contacting the physical world -  facebook and twitter is the new Daily Spirit Times.

So I don’t feel the need to put my name to everything I write. If people on Facebook want to copy what I write, they will, whether my name is against it or not. Whether they wish to give the credit and thanks to me for my words or pass it off as their own, it is always still in their choice when they post it.  If they don’t, what does it matter? If something reaches out through them and others benefit then that is a good thing. If they resonated with my words, then surely those words are, in essence, their own too? Truth always lives inside the heart and the conscious mind can often be the last to find out an open secret.  Whichever way my words get out to the universe Spirit knows where they came from and, if indeed I am to be rewarded for my moments of humanity, it will come from somewhere.  It is not important.

Facebook is, however, a wonderful place to observe how people are living their lives. I have said many times that there are many of God’s PR agents writing their own version of war and peace.  There is so much out there telling you how you should or could live your life.  There are wonderful people like Eckhart Toll and Abraham Hicks, and every day you come across people posting somebody’s wisdom on facebook, either in a picture or in a verse. Plagiarism is alive and living on Facebook - let’s not tell the lawyers!  That being said, sometimes the energy of god, the universe, Great Spirit, the goddess or whoever steps out and touches you with a one liner of truth and you feel a profound connection to something so big that you know that something indefinable has occurred within you.  An epiphany which rocks your world, and from that moment you know you feel and think different.

However it comes, I am sure after all this spiritual growth that you can look back and see your journey and that you were one person once and you now fundamentally feel different now.  You, during your development, have been graduating from the school of life.  Now when you look at others you know and see the differences between you, and your connection to the Spirit World has added so much more to you, and it is who you are today. Whilst the innocent and ignorant remained sleeping, you woke and danced in the Garden of Eden and ate the forbidden fruit from the tree of knowledge. What is known cannot be unknown and you are now running hooky from human life along the edge of the earth.  You have vaulted from being mere human to spiritual being. Congratulations!

And what’s this to do with achieving the dizzy heights of being a working spiritual medium?

It has everything to do with it.   Spirit and the spirit world are always around us, even when you are feeling somewhat remote or disconnected from them.  Many mediums go through times when they still have to grow as a spirit themselves, even if they are a guru, a teacher, or a person who other people aspire to.  You can’t deny your humanity and just live chatting to spirit people, disconnecting with life and your physical being.  Being a medium doesn’t grant you a pass to the top of the class just because you can talk to dead people, a host of angels, or ascended masters. Ok chatting directly to god might make you a little bit important!

The biggest thing you will learn as being a medium is that despite knowing you are a spirit inside a physical body, you still have to live a physical life and allow human everyday things to exist in your life.  You will never stop developing as a medium and you also never stop growing as a human either.

Through my own long list of facebook friends, I see fellow mediums trying to live life, some living it uncomfortably, some questioning their own spiritual ability, some accepting, some wondering why, some content at where they are in life, some frustrated, others chasing rainbows and believing that their purpose is to be more than they are.  Many believe they are trying to be the spiritual being they are, but really in essence they are being terribly human in their response, not spirit.  You do not need to try to be something which you are already and apart from being human,  you are a soul, and you are spirit.

I often hear many mediums telling me that working for Spirit is the sole reason why they have come to earth, or that they are earth angels and that they are only here to do the Great Spirits or Gods work. Some mediums exhaust themselves every waking moment working for Spirit.  Others meditating for hours and hours a day to strengthen their connection and thinking it is the only way for them to be worthy of the connection.  Week in and week out they attend circles, workshops and the Arthur Findley College to get attain the  level of Spiritual Medium. Pushing themselves harder and harder.  Sadly, through working with Spirit, many spiritual workers become less connected with the physical world, their children and families losing them to communicating with Spirit. A mother, father, daughter, son, best friend not fully present in their lives, not gone to spirit, but almost as much so with the loved ones missing them.  It is truly admirable to be so dedicated, to work so hard and to offer so much of yourself to one thing. I have been there. I have felt it the pull.  I love working with spirit and connecting to that light energy of love. I love the Arthur Findley College, it is a wonderful place and I do recommend any spiritual worker should go there. Working with Spirit is very addictive and once you feel the energy and the connection, you miss it. Also,  working with Spirit feels so much easier than working with human beings with the heavy and darkness that exists in the human world.  Meanwhile Gods beautiful and colourful human world grows grey as you continually live with Spirit.  Is this really what we are supposed to be doing?

It is true the call to work with Spirit can be strong. The Spirit world want ambassadors for spirit to pass on their message of our continuing existence. They are always very pleased to work with us and, if it is something that we chose before we came to the earthly life or chose later to do, they do their best to help us tune in to them.  They rejoice in our remembrance of them and enjoy our questions, our dedication to working with them. But, to stop enjoying living our physical lives, to disconnect ourselves from life, from  our loved ones who lives with us in the physical world?  No, that is not what they expect or what was agreed in the contract of working with them.   They didn’t get you to sign a contract with them in blood. They are not the Devil following you around waving a toasting fork at you shouting that you will rot in hell if you stop working with them for a while and enjoy your life.  You chose it wilfully and equally can unchoose it.

I know this is a matter of what you personally  believe as to what the Spirit world looks like, but consider this.  You arrive in the Spirit world greeted by your guide, your soul group, your family and they ask what your experience of life was.  How did you grow, what did you directly experience, and what did you learn by being human?  Did you grasp every opportunity you were offered? If you believe in soul groups and the contracts you had with them, what would your fellow soul friends say? 

This is not an answer for the human mind to find an opportunity to whip itself - remember god is love, spirit is love….and they would be gentle and loving in their answer. But what would you think, as your higher self, when you are looking and reviewing your life in the Akashic records?

The spiritual influence and our recognition that we are more than what we are strongly pushes us forward to be better as people. It is all over spiritual life to be a better spirit or person.   It is a good thing to be conscious and aware but sometimes the love of spirit makes the human part of us feel unworthy and less, and we strive harder to be what we think we should be rather than being who we are, Human.   In the world of spirit we are part of something beyond our current human comprehension. We resonate to a different vibration that our human physical body cannot spin to and the awareness we feel here is a drop from an ocean too big to be seen.  The unknown, and what we fear, our mind is always trying to logically make sense of, to reassure our subconscious of our being.  It is so terribly human of us.

It is not about stopping being a medium and not trying to be better and improve yourself. But about ensuring that we do not allow the human part of us to push us so hard and so much more than Spirit is actually doing.  When you arrive home in the Spirit world, working with spirit cannot be the reason why you did not experience your human existence to the full.  Our Guides understand our human qualities, are loving and patient and know that we are hungry for knowledge of who we really are, and to be what we can be. They are guiding us through the experience as interactive as they can.  You would not ask a blind man to look and see the beautiful vista, but describe it to him and help him touch it and hope that he enjoys the experience of the connection you have assisted him with.  Even if the blind man, by miracle managed to see it, he would still perhaps not see the same thing as you would be seeing as he is seeing through his eyes, not yours.  As human we are purposely blind to the Spirit world to aide our physical experience. It limits us in the interaction.

So Spirit recognises that there are times which we will not see what they see, not know what they know, and not hear what they hear, and that they can only guide us, and not make our life their journey or experience.  What we feel is totally down to us, and they are guided by us in that connection. They want us to excel at being human, and they have agreed to be with us every step of the way to encourage us through our journey in the physical world to grasp the experience of life.  They also have to allow us to interact with our experience in our own way, allow our free will to take us on the journey of our lives, allowing us to fly in any direction we want to gain the biggest experience to bring home to the spirit world.  In the many moments of now that they have loved and worked with us, even when we were unaware of spirit, they always have known and seen the bigger picture.  They do not expect us to be more than who we are as they already know and love us as whom and what we are. It’s just us human’s who don’t. It is all part of being human and our development.  

Yes, not everyone will be aware of Spirit in their human life time, but that does not make them less, just a choice that has been made to hear a different drum and to dance to a different tune.  It doesn’t make them less capable than us, and can even sometime make them even more connected to both spirit and the physical world more than us, as spirit is still influencing and working with them.  Truly being a medium does not lift you to the level of a god above other humans!

The beauty of being a medium is that we learn that we can rely on the fact that Spirit guides and helps us, as that awareness of the two-way link we have always gives us the opportunity of being able to ask for their view. But, however, they will not, and cannot, give us the answers that we need to grow as human and spirit, but will always facilitate to help us explore and expand our understanding and knowledge.

Recently, in my quiet connection with Spirit, they helped me understand certain aspects I was questioning in my recent life challenges.  It is not a point of sympathy, and I am not asking for a chorus of wailing (but thank you anyway if you are so inclined) but we all have to go through the cycle of life with our parents. It is the way of nature being born to physically die.  Death knocks on our door in many ways, and sometimes it can be a cruel slow process of painful watching and waiting of what you know is inevitable, and when any person is face with their mortality or mortality of their loved ones, even a talking to dead people worker, the magic can fall out of life and the stress of living volume button gets turned up a few notches. It has been that type of year. It is normal though.  Whilst living my human experience, I recognised that I needed some assistance through it and so asked for it.  First it came through a fabulous lady called Julia, who shared some lovely ways of thinking and discussions about universal law. And secondly, through a book arriving in my space “Butterflies are free to fly” by Stephan Davis. (free on kindle download through Amazon).

After talking with Julia, and me being blonde with several brain cells on a permanent holiday, I decided to expand my knowledge on the universal laws, not just law of attraction, but the real scientific view against the spiritual view.  As usual my lovely spirit guides (through my best friend Google) led me to this book which for a while did rock my world quite profoundly, so much so that I shared it with some of spiritual best friends.

So what is so great about this book, apart from the big blue butterfly on its cover? It does tell you it is a very radical book in its thought processes. The first thing I will say is that the book is written by a guy who used to be highly active in the scientologist movement.  However, it is an interesting book and makes good use of metaphor and analogies to explain it's point.  It specifically highlights that we humans live reality to that we can only directly see and what is in our experience and perception of it. Plato, as well as having a mention, would have loved it.  I won’t be a plot spoiler, as I think it is a book everyone should read as it is has many truths, much wisdom, and other points to share that will help add colour to anyone’s thought processes and knowledge, even if they throw out the way of thinking.  The book has a point of view some would argue against and that may even bring some spiritual warriors to draw passionate “S” words at dawn, particularly as it challenges spiritual thinking.

For me, though, it reminded me why I thought the way I did, and of the strong belief I have always had since a young child.  It made me think and consider many points of my belief. It rang question after question in my heart, as I could not argue with some of the mind blowing elements of wisdom and truth in some of his view points. It was clear, though, that his much of his belief was deeply ground in his own personal experience, with elements which I could not resonate with because of how and what I believe.  There were several interesting viewpoints about our lives being governed by an “Infinite one”, and for those who have read it, or do intend to read it, I still like to refer to my infinite one as being my higher self….and I couldn’t resist and went through the door!  Whether it was the one intended is another point altogether!

The one big point which shouted out of the book was that life is there for us to experience, and most of all, that we should enjoy the experience.  We may all seek a purpose, but in truth our purpose is to experience life and to “feel” it to the very core of our soul, higher self, or as in the book, infinite one.  What that experience is, I think, is for us to choose…and perhaps guided by our higher self or infinite one to the experience it directs.  Even when life is uncomfortable, like this last year has been for me, I recognise I have chosen it to be that way somewhere along the line by how I have interacted with it.   I can fight it, challenge it, but it will still make it as uncomfortable as it can be as I am resisting the experience and it will continue to be that way whilst I resist.  After having what seems a very long year, the saying is true that what you resist persists.  

So there you are, the Devil is merrily dancing, teasing and prodding you with his fork, and because he is a little sadistic little so and so, he doesn’t have it in his ability to go away politely when you keep telling him you are not enjoying the experience. He though is gleefully ignoring you as he is enjoying every second of his experience of watching you squirm uncomfortably and shaking in your boots, providing him with the emotion and drama he is hungrily looking for.  He is more likely going to dance and jump around you revelling in your fear and discomfort with the hope and anticipation of you giving him more. He could be in for a surprise, as the moment you accept and smile back accepting the experience of him dancing, it becomes no fun and no longer is he getting the emotion and drama he was being fed by you, as you are no longer resisting but engaging in and enjoying the experience. Suddenly the pain and prodding you were experiencing stops.

Some years ago during my recruitment agency work, there was a lady who I had to go and discuss business with.  She was very professional, and cheerful lady, but I couldn’t help noticing that she had a habit of saying thank you before speaking back, or just generally sliding it in the conversation in response to my comments.  At the time I thought it strange, but I left feeling that I had missed some important point, as well thinking that I had met a very enlightened soul that day. 

My recent experience through the book and my friend Julia is that life is for feeling and enjoying. Every experience you go though is to be appreciated, be it negative or positive. It’s not about being grateful and constantly saying thank you, but appreciating every experience that comes into your space by acknowledging your feeling of it and the growth it is trying to bring. 

Ok, you may think it strange, but give it a go – just beware of the too many loud thank you’s; people may think it’s a tick.

In that appreciation and acknowledgment of it, you can connect to an experience you wish to enjoy, rather than existing in an experience you do not.  Saying thank you, or just appreciating the experience, allows acceptance (a mental yes) to the awareness of truth to resonate and interact with you about the experience.  It brings learning, nullifies any resistance, and brings the opportunity of conscious change to your experience.

So now when I am having a challenging moment, I try to remember that I am experiencing life I have chosen, and say thank you.  Whether it is to my higher self, my guides or infinite one, as in the book, is immaterial.  Those who read the book may appreciate the viewpoint even more though.  

Spirit always like to show they have a hand in things – and in confirmation of this, I now strangely work for an organisation called infinite – and weirdly for a week or two I had to daily type a password of “infinite1” to log into a local network.  It still baffles me that I do that, but synchronicity and my spirit guides are truly amazing…and I thank them for the experience!

Another important point of wisdom, that my lovely friend Julia gave was to remind me that everyone has the right to be an individual source of the divine, be their own path, their own drama.  It is their life, their reality, their experience…and no one is either right, or wrong, despite what we have always been told as children.  Both right and wrong exist in the universe, and when you make a right, then the natural law of polarity means that it’s polar opposite of wrong always exists somewhere in the situation, whether it is someone feeling it or being it, and vice versa with wrong and right.  It is like a coin, one side facing up, and other down, and seeing the facing up side as the right side.  You only need to reverse it, and the other side now is the right side where in reality they both exist and it is always your perception of it which makes it right or wrong.  By recognition of both sides and accepting that they both exist, you become neither up nor down, right or wrong, but neutral.

Knowledge and hindsight is a wonderful thing though and I can see when I look back as to how many times I have fought and resisted this past year, what my heart already knew. Although the uncomfortable journey I have been experiencing this past year has been as a result of my own reaction to loved ones own fight with their experience of life and health challenges, I appreciate more now  that the resistance I gave to accepting the experience was futile and unproductive, as it is like trying to stop the world from turning round.  I see now how my humanity shouting at me protesting at its reality, and my spiritual connection trying to remind me of the bigger picture.

You cannot avoid being human. It is what you physically are. By nature humans measures the world in polarity. We are emotionally motivated by feeling ok, and not ok, right and wrong, Yes or No, and the internal battle which can be created by the polarity can affect our daily lives and our decisions. Living up to our own expectations, perceived other’s people’s expectations and how we interact with our life time experiences is what makes our reality and our final experience.   Often it can be put upon us like a cloak we believe we should wear, forgetting that it may not be ours to put on, as we have in truth just allowed ourselves to get dragged into a moment of dressing up in somebody else’s clothes, and then trying to look good in it and feeling unhappy as a result.  The point is, even unconsciously, you made the choice of wearing the cloak…and that goes for every experience you have had – you made the choice to be there.  We are all supporting actors in the drama of other people’s lives, and so are they when we are the lead.  Often, entering into others experiences and making their drama our drama, and even through the love of Spirit we can adopt the worlds drama as our own.  If you are not enjoying it, resisting the experience, then how about turning it on its head, like the coin? Sometimes you have to take consciously take off the cloak and look in the wardrobe for the one you want to wear. 

You might be in someone else’s wardrobe but you don’t have to put their cloak on.  You can appreciate it without entering into the direct experience of feeling it.  It is their right to be in their own experience, it is their reality, made by their own interaction with their experience.  A good question to ask when you think you may have wandered into someone else’s experience is this my truth?  If you feel your heart tightening or constricting, or some resistance to the idea – it is clearly telling you that something is amiss and perhaps it is not what you should be doing.

As you develop as a medium, you will have many moments when you are reminded that you are human. To work well with the spirit world, it is important to ensure there is the balance of the physical and spiritual in your life.  We are all Alice’s in Wonderland. Sometimes you may tip too much one way, and fall down the hole and find yourself sitting at the Mad Hatter’s tea party or in front of the Queen of hearts.  It is normal and natural to experience this life and when you are there don’t resist it, feel the experience you are in. Don’t try to make yourself fit in a box that is not designed for you. Love working with Spirit, and by all means acquire new knowledge, grow spiritually.  But don’t work so hard to just be, when the only thing you need to be in this life is a happy you.  This is the life you chose and are still choosing.

So be how you really are. Enter into and engage with the experience of living, feel your life, feel the world around you.  Love being human and spirit on a journey as one sharing an amazing experience.