Official blog for the book "Just Behind the Door"

Posts tagged ‘after death communication’

Allow Yourself to Heal

I talked to a person recently who said that they no longer feel joy in their life since losing their loved one. They feel anxious, unable to concentrate and just basically empty inside. I understand. I have been there. From the moment you wake in the morning a heaviness descends around you and you have to absolutely will yourself to take that first step of the day. The loss of someone you love is not easy to put into words. Loyalty, trust and joy are just a few of the emotions felt when we love someone so deeply. We think to ourselves, now all that is gone from my life. Our grief is not only for today but the many unrealized tomorrows.

An important part of healing from loss or even just making it through the challenges of living as we learn our life lessons is to ‘allow.’ By definition, allow is ‘to permit.’ To give yourself permission to feel, grieve, remember, even momentarily to wish things had been different, and it is a natural part of grieving the changes that happen in our lives.

We are so used to making things happen that to just allow life to unfold seems counterintuitive. We may feel that it is a cop out, an excuse to do nothing. Quite the contrary. If we turn the kaleidoscope in our minds ever so slightly, we will see that when we allow, we resist the urge to try to control everything or to demand life be a certain way to make us happy. We still strive to become all that we can be but as things happen that hurt or derail us we look at them not with indignation but with a deeper understanding as we search for the personal lessons contained within them. To learn to allow is a hard lesson. To me, that one little word – allow – means a combination of acceptance for what is combined with a belief that ‘all is as it should be.’ It speaks of a power, an energy, greater than ourselves

Take some time over the next few days to think about the word ‘allow.’ How would your life be different if you looked at events, challenges even losses in your life and thought to yourself, my life is about accepting that the Universe is unfolding in perfect order. When you learn to allow, a sense of peace envelops you and you begin to exhale the stress that is so deeply bottled up within you.

A poem that has been meaningful to me on this lesson of allowing life to unfold was written by R. Bach.

A cloud does not know why it moves in just such a direction
and at such a speed,
It feels an impulsion…this is the place to go now.
But the sky knows the reasons and the patterns
behind all clouds,
And you will know, too, when you lift yourself high enough
To see beyond horizons.

Have a great few days!

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Happiness is an Inside Job

Listening to a webcast yesterday, I was hooked from the first statement. The moderator (Lisa Garr, the host of the Aware Show) said, “Did you know the number one goal people have worldwide is to be happy.” Then she added a shocking statistic, when responding to a survey on personal happiness, Nigerians ranked number 1 with the happiest people and the U.S. ranked 46 out of the 50 areas surveyed. Researching this further, I discovered that Nigeria has a per capita income of $2,748. The people of this country live on $1.25 -$2.00 per day. Health care, life expectancy even access to drinking water in the rural areas are major challenges dealt with on a daily basis. Yet, they are happier? Why?

Robert Holden, a British psychologist has been running a course on happiness for over 15 years. He explains that when we look OUTSIDE ourselves for happiness it is our ego controlling our thinking. For instance, the thought, ‘I will be happy when…’ ( I get a better job, a new boss, more money, etc.) is conditional happiness that doesn’t last. If you, by chance, achieve one of your “wish fors” by habit you will simply replace it with the next thing on your mental want list and feel unhappy, unsettled once again. Funny how that works. We are never at a loss for our next want. This approach keeps us locked into a thinking pattern of lack rather than abundance. We focus on the negative energy involved in what we don’t have causing us to feel lack in our lives rather than on what we do have which brings the positive energy of abundance to our tables.

Maybe the Nigerians do not live in a constant state of want but rather accept what they have with a belief in themselves and a higher power, feeling gratitude for simply being able to live another day. Sounds deceptively simple, yet their happiness ranking is number 1. They must be doing something differently than we are to achieve that ranking.

We each have the DNA of Divinity in us. Being happy, regardless of our circumstance is something we can achieve if we recognize the root cause of happiness. We were born happy – a gift from the Universe. Somewhere along the way we began comparing ourselves to others and accepting negative messages or experiences in our lives as truth. We may have lost our happiness – our belief and confidence in ourself – along the way. Our egos may have gotten involved and we began judging ourselves and others and the cycle of unhappiness began. Something in our lives from then on just felt a bit off.

Let’s return to the place where we were early in our lives, a place before life happened to us, a place of self acceptance. You are on your own unique path and learning the lessons you have chosen to learn in this lifetime. You don’t need to be more or less of something. You are perfect in the image of the Divine. When you think about it the Divine Energy that created you doesn’t make mistakes. The Energy made you perfect in every way so that you could learn the lessons you have chosen to learn this time around. You are learning, growing and becoming the person you wanted to become. Once you accept yourself, unconditionally, for who you really are – a spiritual soul in a physical body who is on their own unique path of learning, you experience happiness from the INSIDE and that can’t ever be taken away from you. It is not something to be bought, achieved or acquired. In other words, happiness truly is an inside job.

It may take time for these thoughts to take seed. I visualize these ideas like a feather. They are not something to be grasped at but rather to let settle into your outstretched hand or mind as you think about them over time. True happiness – the kind that brings a smile to your face for no apparent reason at all – will come to you once you accept the thought that the DNA of Divinity is in you and remember that the Universal Energy/God does not make mistakes.

Have a great few days!

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Help Someone Heal

Thank you to those of you who emailed me directly to respond to my blog on Sunday. It is reassuring that I am helping people who have experienced loss and the challenging, confusing and life altering feelings that accompany the letting go of what was…

Over the last few days, three different people have talked to me about loss involving a senseless act of violence. Taking someone’s life cannot be fully understood by those of us remaining here on earth. We ask ourselves, why would someone do such a horrendous thing? Our minds cannot process it and work through it to arrive at an understanding. We may think the perpetrator of a violent act was not in their right mind, extremely troubled, or did not have a stable upbringing, the list goes on and on. Whatever rationalization we attempt falls short. It still does not seem fair that the flame of someone’s life has been snuffed out as quickly as the flame from a candle. Another useless killing. Another family left to try to function in the aftermath.

Over 6,600 deaths from all causes occur daily in the U.S. The rate for homicides has dropped from a high of 9.8 percent per 100,000 in 1991 to 4.8 percent per year in 2010. These numbers are important. They show a significant drop in homicides and should help us feel a little safer. However, it would be impossible to expect the families of victims of these violent crimes to be encouraged by the numbers since they will no longer have their loved ones in their lives. Grief hurts. The longer it envelopes your life, the deeper the wound becomes. When I talk with someone who has lost a loved one 20 years ago and they still cannot muster up a genuine smile, their eyes showing a depth of hurt that is impossible to describe, my heat goes out to them. They seem to have stopped living and are merely existing. It is, as if, their life has become a sentence that they are simply living out.

On my blog last Sunday, I mentioned a man who lost his wife in a vehicular accident caused by a drunk driver. He has received signs that his wife is giving him to assure him she is still around him with loving concern. Again the statistics are improving but the pain continues. Traffic fatalities have decreased in the past five years. In 2010, the latest recorded statistic, 32,885 people lost their lives in motor vehicle accidents. Fewer is better but once again, doesn’t offer peace to those families who are facing each day without their loved one.

What can we do to help the thousands of walking wounded that have lost their loved ones through any type of loss? You can make a difference. Making a concerted effort to listen to them as they repeat and repeat what happened as they process the reality of their loss is so important. You don’t have to offer any sage advice but simply listen with love. Give them the gift of a empathic listener. Showing them you care by taking the initiative to connect with them and offering the little things that may cause them to think about healing their grief may be the life line they need. I know through experience that reading about others who have survived a loss can give hope for tomorrow. Usually these people do not even know what they need to achieve closure. Do the research to find specific support groups, or grief counselors by name and number so that they do not have to search for these on their own but can simply call a number if they so choose. Books or articles may tell a story that just resonates with them and offers the encouragement they need to take the small, arduous steps needed for recovery. When the student is ready the teacher comes along. Tomorrow the same ideas you may have mentioned previously just might be internalized and accepted by them if they are ready. Don’t give up just continue to support them as they struggle to stand and face tomorrow.

Each of us can do something to help. Eventually, we may be able to see them return from the grip of loss and move on with their lives. It won’t be easy and it won’t be fast. Their mind and heart must crawl through the muck of hurt, anger and denial to get to a point of acceptance. Be patient and be there with love for a human being who is raw with the loneliness and pain of loss.

As my son said in my book, Just Behind the Door, ” Mom, all is as it should be.” It has taken me years to truly ‘get this’ and to decide to live the rest of my life knowing the Universe did not make a mistake with his passing. My lesson has been to keep the wonderful memories alive that I have of him and move on with my life in peace, love and a knowing that I am helping others.

There is a poem in my book that has helped me and I offer a part of it to you.

When I am gone, release me, let me go.
I have so many things to see and do,
You must not tie yourself to me with too many tears
But be thankful we had so many good years….
So grieve for me a while, if grieve you must
Then let the grief be comforted by trust…
I won’t be far away for life goes on.
And if you need me, call and I will come…
And if you listen with your heart, you will hear,
All my love around you soft and clear…

Please make a copy of this blog and pass it on to someone who might benefit from it. There are so many out there who need a hand extended to them in love.

Have a peaceful few days.

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Tell Someone You Care

How many times have you thought about telling someone how important they are to you or giving them a compliment? In the last few days, I have received emails and a phone call thanking me for something I had done. Four people mentioned a recent blog that had made an impact on them. At first I was humbled and appreciative of the feedback and then I thought more deeply about the affect those messages had on me. I felt more positive energy around me. It changed a good day into an exceptional one for me. It made me think of the importance of ‘paying it forward.’

We often get so involved in our daily lives, the hustle and bustle of it all, that we may think, momentarily, of a kindness or help from someone and then let it slip from awareness as we quickly move on to the next item on our ‘to do’ list. Yet, when all is said and done, what really matters in life is our relationships, our love, concern and recognition of self AND others. People really don’t care how much you have or how much you know until they know how much you care.

Tuning into a T.V. program last night entitled, Undercover Boss, the message was, once again, so apparent. As CEO’s from various large companies disguised themselves so they could walk a mile – or in these examples – a week in the shoes of their employees, these CEOs were humbled by the passion and concern their employees brought to their jobs. All were shocked by the family challenges that so many of their employees endured. Yet, they came to work each day and did their jobs well. At the end of each vignette, the CEOs met with the employees and literally with tears in their eyes thanked them for a job well done. These folks beamed as their ‘top gun’ took the time to recognize them. The CEOs changed the lives of these employees as well as their own.

Conversely, during this election season, the T.V. adds are filled with negative messaging, and some are even designed to instill fear in us. I refuse to be entangled in this web of fear-based programming and will not accept the negative energy from these adds. Negatives just don’t get to me anymore. I will continue to search out truth, listen to the ‘fact checkers’ on the news and remember that I haven’t walked a mile in someone’s shoes. I will make up my own mind based on the facts I can discover and consider the amount of positive energy I feel when listening to a candidate. How incredible it would be if they decided to concentrate on hope rather than fear, on the positives of tomorrow rather than the negatives of yesterday. They could learn a lot from the CEOs that went undercover.

We all do the best we can do each day considering the challenges we face. I can’t believe that anyone wakes up in the morning and says to themselves, ‘I am going to have a very bad day’ and then purposely surrounds themselves with a negative mind set.

Positive energy is something we all need to survive. If we each take a moment to tell someone how important they are to us or how appreciative we are of a kindness shown or a lesson learned we will create a better world.

Maybe you can find an extra 2 or 3 minutes tomorrow to ‘pay it forward’ by complimenting someone, showing appreciation or just letting someone know you are thinking about them. It may help lift their spirits, walk with a little more confidence and have a better day. What a gift you have given them!

I’ll commit to making the world a little happier each day by taking the time to connect with someone for something. Will you?

Have a great few days!

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Forgiveness and Moving On

Do you ever think about a particular person and feel anger, resentment, or even rage? Be honest with yourself and really think about it. If you feel that you have been hurt, rejected or even emotionally attacked by another in your past it is hard to let go of it. Each time the person’s name comes up or you even think of that person, you may feel tense, hostile or even a seething inside you. Check out your body language. Your eyes, face, even voice intonation says it all. When that person’s name comes up it is easy to see if you are still holding on to negative energy surrounding the situation.

In my book, Just Behind the Door, I talk about past hurts as if they were a backpack we are caring around. Every time we think about a particular event or person and feel emotionally stressed by the remembering, it is, as if, you are actually experiencing the event again. It adds another rock to your backpack making it heavier for you to carry. I can visualize a person hunched over from the weight of past hurts struggling to put one foot in front of the other. The weight of the world seems to be on their shoulders and they seem to be a magnet that attracts more negatives in their life day after day.

Forgiveness releases the hold, the weight we are carrying. It doesn’t mean that we don’t remember past hurts. But rather we remember them without emotionally getting hooked into the negative feelings associated with them. You might be thinking that what happened wasn’t right or fair. In reality, what you lived through was PLANNED by YOU for this lifetime to teach you some valuable life lessons. When you can look back and release the anger associated with the experience and forgive yourself AND the other person you will have learned the lessons you set out to learn. It is not easy to emotionally let it go but it is extremely important to do so. Until those particular lessons are learned and your mind and heart lets go of the anger, similar situations will continue to surface in your life. When you accept responsibility for the choices you made for this lifetime and let go of the anger towards others, you exhale deeply, your shoulders relax and you view the person or situation in terms of ‘life lessons learned.’

The noise in our minds fueled by negative remembrances drowns out the sounds of love and forgiveness from the Universe. It keeps us locked on, like a GPS, to a path that will attract more of the same. Our minds and hearts can be filled with either love or fear. If you find it impossible to forgive a particular person, force yourself to look at what you truly feared most about the past circumstance involving them. Fear is the operative word here. That fear is your lesson in disguise.

We can live a life of love, acceptance and abundance or remain stuck, reliving the hurts of yesterday and attracting more negative energy into our lives. The choice is always up to us.

Have a great few days!

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You Decide

Don’t you just love a day when everything just seems to work! You may get to your job or meeting early, enjoy a conversation with someone that gave you food for thought and learned something new or saw a different perspective. You seem to accomplish more than you ever expected and at the end of the day when you reflect back it with a smile on your face you think to yourself, today was a GOOD day.

Other days, however, seem to be more challenging. It may start out with misplacing your keys, causing you to run late and get stuck in the rush hour traffic. At this point you are feeling so frustrated you might even say something to someone that, in retrospect, you wish you hadn’t said. The whole day just seems to be off and as you begin thinking about the issues they become magnified in your mind. By the end of the evening you may be thinking, well that’s my life, if I didn’t have bad luck I wouldn’t have any luck at all! You are exhausted as much by what happened but, more importantly, from the amount of time and energy you spent ruminating about them.

In the book, The Secret, by Rhonda Byrne, there is a worthwhile suggestion by Bob Proctor that might help you the next time your day starts out a bit off track. He suggests that to stop the cycle of negative thoughts that you have about events from going out into the Universe and magnifying the negative effect back to us, we stop ourselves in mind midstream and think. Since we are all made up of energy, each time we allow ourself to be in a negative mindset, the Universe ‘hears’ the message and delivers more of the same back to us.

Basically, you interrupt the cycle of negative energy by shifting your thought frequency. Proctor suggested that we make a mental list of ‘secret shifters.’ Those are things that can change your feelings and attitude in a minute and put gratitude and love back in you thoughts. Maybe it’s a certain song or a special memory that brings a smile to your face or a absolute howl of laughter from deep inside you. It could even be the thought of a future event or holiday that you have planned. (There is a logical reason why people plan way in advance for a fun break in their schedule). Do anything that can short circuit the negative flow of energy from your mind and body which causes you to catastrophize, and get you back on a more positive track. We don’t have to have an entire day of bad. Maybe we could try to reduce it down to an event or moment until we reduce those negative times to such a short period that you don’t ruin the rest of your God given day.

I really do believe that anything our minds can believe we can achieve but it takes mind and heart work. I’m not talking of simply a wish but something so important to you that you are willing to plan and work to achieve it. Once you have this goal in your mind, any set back you experience in attainment is simply viewed as temporary. I choose to believe in myself and the beautiful gift of tomorrow. If I have a problem or two along the way, okay, life happens. But I refuse to allow those events to ruin the gift of today that I have received from the Universe.

Are you with me on this?

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Decide on Happiness

Some of you may remember the children’s song, “If You’re Happy and You Know It Clap Your Hands.” Having spent over 38 years in education, I can close my eyes and actually hear the melodic voices of little children singing that song with accompanying giggles and enthusiastic clapping of hands.

As we become adults, the melody may slip away, even the words may be forgotten but the thought is worth keeping around to examine from time to time. Ask yourself right now, “Am I happy?” After really thinking about it, if you are genuinely NOT happy, it is time to do something about it. It doesn’t count to say to yourself, “I’ll be happy when…” as if it is a condition of your life that is dependent upon achieving something you don’t presently have.

What will it take to make you internally happy? What is the major sticking point that is keeping you stuck in unhappiness? Is it resolvable? Obviously, the death of a loved one is something that cannot be changed. But, the way you look at it can make all the difference. They did not desert you because they didn’t love you anymore. It was simply their exit point – their time to move on. They did not disappear forever. You really will see them again on a soul level, and in the meantime you can reconnect with them through the help of others if you choose. If you have stopped living and are simply existing since their death that is not what they would have wanted for you. Life is to be lived and a big part of living is to decide to be happy.

Yes, that’s right, I said DECIDE to be happy. It takes work and a concerted effort to make lemon aid from lemons but it can be done. What I do know is that there are no awards given for being, “The Most Unhappy Person in Show” category. When you see your glass consistently as half-empty rather than half-full, it drains you and those around you of the positive energy needed to live your life.

There are some things you really can do to improve your perspective. First of all, be the person you would want to be around. Smiling helps, laughing is even better. Find humor in the mundane and ridiculous – if you just look around it’s everywhere. Next, decide on a plan to work through any issue you are dealing with at the moment. A counselor or best friend could be of great help by being a reflective listener. Talk it out, verbalize your feelings and don’t allow yourself to let the issue ‘eat away at you’ from the inside or out. Until the real issue surfaces you may find yourself generalizing that your entire life is simply not good.

Exercise, meditation and spending time giving to others really does boost your physical and mental well being. Visualize yourself as a person who finds joy in life. How does it feel? Good, right? You may, at first, have to ‘fake it ’till you make it,’ but be patient with yourself. It will manifest itself in your life. When we hear that we have to believe it to see it, it’s true.

Give yourself permission to be happy. You deserve it!

Have a great few days!

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What is Truth?

Self improvement is something we seem to naturally just choose to do while on this earth. It makes us who we are- always planning and striving-to use the skills we were given by the Universe to become a better person. A big part of self improvement is dealing with truth. This truth is both about others as well as ourselves.

In the movie, “Something’s Gotta Give,” Harry says to Erica, ” I’ve always told you some version of the truth.” She responds, “The truth doesn’t have versions!”

Wow! That statement burned into my brain. The truth doesn’t have versions. It is either truth or not. What are you telling yourself about others or yourself that is only a partial truth? We all do it from time to time. As we become wiser we realize that truth is the most important thing you can give yourself and others. I don’t know another persons’ truth because I have not walked a mile, or even a step, in their shoes. Sometimes we think by not speaking our truth and masking our true feelings, everyone may be better off in the long run. Not so! You may have to mentally rehearse how to say something so that it is not hurtful – that’s a good skill to work on – but to avoid saying the truth hurts everyone eventually. This magnificent world that we are a part of inhales peace and exhales tension when truth is spoken.

Truth comes back to your own self worth. Do you believe in yourself enough to speak the truth about a situation? If you find yourself falling into the trap of comparing yourself with others, remember the issue of truth. Comparison is a violence against yourself. There will always be someone better or worse off than you. That is the path they have chosen for this lifetime. It is not ours to question. We all have our own unique journey. Your truth is your journey. The privilege of our lifetime is to live our lives in truth, to be our highest self and make the world a little better off by doing it.

So tomorrow when you start the day, remember the issue of truth. I believe truth is, simply and completely, an essential part of the Universe. I choose truth and love from this point on, how about you?

Have a great few days!

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Being Authentic in Grief

We often hear about the importance of being positive. Seeing your glass as half full rather than half empty is a mindset involving both a skill and an art. It is something that we work on continuously throughout our lives. We like ourselves better when we are positive. Others want to be around us because we have an energy field that is welcoming and uplifting. An important part of being in a positive state involves being our authentic selves. When we recognize and honor our true feelings about something that happened to us, we are being authentic. We are strong enough to show others that we are the same, emotionally, on the inside as the outside.

Being authentic, especially through personal loss is both the hardest and most important thing we can do for ourselves. Challenging or catastrophic experiences involving loss (death, divorce, separation) or other wounds or scars can easily become deeply buried in your psyche because the pain seems so great that you feel unable to confront your own feelings. You may be afraid that if the floodgate holding back your feelings is opened, you may never be able to get it together again. I understand, I have been there. I can tell you that those buried feelings just fester inside you and the anger and hurt you feel can become toxic in your mind and body. The choice between being authentic and verbalizing your true feelings or burying them cannot be overstated. I truly believe it is the difference between simply existing or a life well lived.

Finding a trusted friend who is willing to take all the time YOU need to work through your loss is critical. A good listener just listens and does not rush to tell you how you should handle something or how you should feel. These people are rare to find but are out there and will be of immense help to you. Grief counselors are trained to listen well and can also be invaluable in your search for peace. Send the intention out to the Universe to deliver someone to help you if you are emotionally stuck in a quagmire of anger, blame or discontent. You know you have found that great listener when you explain your situation and they respond with, “How do YOU feel about that?” And they listen with love and grace…

The importance of taking the time to process through your loss and express your authentic feelings about the situation can help you immensely. It is like putting salve on a wound. Eventually, the wound doesn’t hurt as much. Will it ever heal? Maybe not. But it won’t continue to hurt or bleed so profusely. We will live long enough to see the lessons we have learned from our losses and eventually the bigger picture of why those things happened.

Ultimately, we either choose to process through our emotions and arrive at an eventual peace about the situation or we will be dealing with the residue both here and on the other side. Lisa Williams in her book, The Survival of the Soul, talks about the importance of resolving our emotional issues on the Earth plane before we cross over. We will have to deal with the issues sometime, someplace, and it is better to do it now.

We can ultimately be more positive in our life if we choose to be our authentic self and live our truth, surround ourselves with love – of self – and others and remember that as difficult as our lives may be from time to time, we wrote our life script to learn specific lessons. It is no one’s fault, the world is not out to get us, we just chose a difficult path this time. Quoting from my son in the book, Just Behind The Door, “All is as it should be.”

Have a great few days!

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The Rest of Your Life

Today really is the first day of the rest of your life. What plans, what aspirations do you have for the rest of your life? Will you allow yourself to be controlled by fear of the unknown? Or will you look in the mirror and realize, as my son has told me many times from the other side, “all is as it should be.” It takes time to really process that thought. Even though we may have experienced loss, disappointments and challenges in our lives everything really is ‘as it should be.’ You may be thinking, ‘ but why did I have to experience this.. What did I do wrong?’ You did nothing wrong. You are simply living out your prebirth contract to learn certain lessons you have chosen. Remember the thought… ours is not to question only do. It’s true, questioning, even railing at the injustice that you feel you have experienced will not change things. In fact, it will only made you less ready, less of who you are, to face tomorrow. Show me a person who has not experienced loss and I will show you a person who has never really lived. It doesn’t need to make sense. It just needs to be absorbed into your very soul.

As the Taoist say, ‘we are constantly being born to the future and dying to the past, yet we remain what we are. In the whole of history there has never existed a single person whose conduct was always perfect. Understanding this, the wise don’t try to be perfect.’ There is no fear in dying only fear in living an unfilled life.

So tomorrow, look at yourself in the mirror and say, ” I can do this.” – whatever it may be – because you can. You are part of the unity of this incredible Universe. You are a part of the Divinity of all that ever was and all that ever will be. Be thankful that you have learned the particular lessons that have been presented to you. You have survived, you have learned and will thrive from both the lessons of yesterday and today. They have made you even stronger for tomorrow. Make it a great one!

Have a great few days!

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