Official blog for the book "Just Behind the Door"

Posts tagged ‘unconditional love’

There is No Final Goodbye only ‘See you Later’

In my book, I talk about the day when my sister realized her time to exit was getting close. She said she wanted to talk to me about writing her eulogy. Really? My best friend – my sister – expected me to rise to the occasion and speak her thoughts. It was not something I wanted to do but without question would do because the connection and love we shared was so deep. I loved her with every ounce of my being. When I had to tell her that the dialysis was no longer working, my heart sank as she looked at me with frightened eyes and said, “If I don’t go to dialysis, I will die.” Looking into her eyes, I know I saw her soul that day.

As I jotted down notes about what she wanted me to say, she ended by saying, “Tell them that I am not saying ‘Goodbye’ but just ‘See you later,’ because I will.” At the time I was so immersed in the thought of her passing that I simply wrote the phrase down exactly as she said it.

Now, years later, that statement remains so powerful to me. There really is no such thing as goodbye. Our loved ones are with us, just waiting for us to open up to the possibility that they are watching over us, hopeful, that we will recognize their presence, and invite them in.

My son, the powerful spirit that he was (and is) did not wait for me to open up and invite him in after his tragic accident in May, 1999. He had about as much patience as I have had in the past. That would be zero to none! Three months after his passing he started getting messages to me and continues to this day. As he has said in the book, “Life can be its own gift or its own undoing. It all revolves around developing one’s consciousness about ourselves and about how unconditional love allows the communication from our loved ones to continue forever.”

Thanks son, I needed to hear that then and share it with others now. It offers both help to those who are grieving and hope so they will feel strong enough to continue on the rest of their life journey.

You will find a decade of direct quotes from my son, mother and sister in my book, Just Behind the Door.

Have great few days!

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What is Your Gold Nugget?

Our thoughts, are the keys that open or close all doors in our lives. We know that positives attract positives and conversely, negatives attract negatives. Why would anyone allow themselves to be surrounded by or immersed in an ocean of negative thoughts from themselves or others? I believe it has to do with the concept of free will. Although we have chosen this life for the life lessons we wanted to learn, it is our RESPONSE to the lessons, using our free will, that is the key factor.

For instance,if you think of taking a cross country trip, you plan overnight stays in certain locations. You know ahead of time the distance you plan to drive in a given day, the time it should take. That seems logical, dependable and certain. However, due to our gift of free will, even though the major stops (or lessons) don’t change, we sometimes choose an alternate path. Maybe something sparks our interest and we take a short side trip on our route. Possibly, a detour on the road causes our plans to be changed momentarily. Road construction, even wild fires or floods can delay your progress. How do we respond to a change in our plans? Do we get upset and blame ourself or others? I have learned to look at those changes more simply. Everything happens for a reason and everything will work out just the way it is supposed to. The Universe/God doesn’t make mistakes. My son has told me this, repeatedly, in my book, Just Behind the Door. The important thing to remember is that your goal hasn’t changed, you will still reach your specific destination (the lessons you chose to learn).

Reflect back on some of the events in your life that just seemed destined to happen. A person you met or married, a specific job to agreed to or a house you moved into; didn’t it just feel right AT THE TIME? When your heart tells you ‘this is the place to go for now,’ I believe it is a sign of a predestined event where a life lesson has yet to be learned. These lessons are like precious gold nuggets that need to be unearthed in your mind. Be gentle with yourself as you do the mental work to unearth the lesson. Take the time to truly think about why, in retrospect, that particular situation happened? The WAY YOU PROCESS what your have experienced makes all the difference. The lessons you are learning in your life can be viewed as terribly unfair, eliciting anger, resentment and fear or you can allow yourself to feel that pain, recognize the hurt, but most importantly, SEARCH FOR WHAT YOU ARE LEARNING from it. You will know if it is a life lesson if it is one of the hardest things you have ever encountered. Treat yourself with love, do the work to unearth your gold nugget. You deserve it. You have a piece of Divine energy in you. Once you thoroughly process through the reason, eliminating the need to blame others, you will be able to move on with grace, dignity and, most importantly, a heightened sense of self worth. You did everything 100% right with the information you had at the time. After discovering your “gold nugget” on the issue and responding with a deeper belief in yourself and confidence in tomorrow you will be so much wiser and at peace.

The really great news is, once you unearth the nugget, that particular life lesson will not resurface again in your life. Trust me on this, I have had so many similar life lessons that I chose to move through quickly, while I just kept going at the hectic pace I had become used to in my life. What happened? The same lesson came back around to bite me again, again and again. Now I can finally say, “I get it!”

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Synchronicity – God/Universal Energy is at Work!

Today is the 13th anniversary of my son, Ronnie’s death. So many friends and family remembered (including my grandboys) that caused me to feel both grateful and overwhelmed. If you have gotten the chance to read the book, Just Behind the Door, you won’t be surprised by the next few sentences. The publishing house emailed me and verified that my copies (40 softcover and 20 hardcovers) would be delivered soon for upcoming book talks. Synchronicity, as defined by Carl Jung means the simultaneous occurrence of events that are meaningfully related. In other words, things happening that seem rather coincidental but have a certain common theme or effect and time. Well, once again, the synchronicity in my life continues. The books were delivered to my door TODAY, on the anniversary of his death. Thank you to God/Universal Energy and Ronnie for reiterating to me the message that unconditional love is forever.

For those of you who remember the artist, Carly Simon, she produced a song in the ’70’s entitled, “Haven’t Got Time For the Pain.” Although we would all like to believe it to be true, the reality is that certain days trigger memories of unconditional love and unconditional loss. The pain, once again, comes flooding into our consciousness. It is important to honor and hold both the pain and love in our hearts during these times. Denial of the feelings involved in loss or grief forces the hurt to bury itself deeper into our psyche. It is both mentally and physically unhealthy to keep it buried. A loss, as painful as it is, can be an opportunity for us to connect to the real truth in our lives. Our loved ones are always around us and ready to help and offer encouragement from the other side. Just remember they have 20/20 hindsight and foresight. The lyrics of Carly’s song, “I haven’t got time… room.. or need for the pain” sounds rather cold. But if you listen further to the song, it is a confirmation of everything I write about in the book. “You showed me how.. to leave myself behind …and turn down the noise in my mind… Suffering was the only thing that made me feel I was alive…’Til you showed me how, to fill my heart with love and to open up and drink in all that white love pouring down from heaven.” When you hear songs that resonate with you, there is a reason.

I again say thank you to all of you who have been emailing and calling me after reading the book. Some of you have even written while you were still in the middle of reading it! I am humbled and thankful that it is helping so many people think about the loss of a loved in a larger context. One of the quotes from Ronnie in the book is so fitting, “Everyone needs to know that nothing dies. The spirit, the soul lives on. Love and communication continues, forever, if people will open themselves up to it.”

Let that last sentence roll around in your mind for awhile. The truth will present itself to you.

Until next time, have a loving and joyful week.

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Death is Simply Moving to a New Location!

My son was killed in a tragic accident on May 16, 1999. He has been communicating with me for over a decade since then. In fact, his messages began 3 months after his death. His bigger than life personality refused to allow me to become stuck in the stages of grief and the endless ‘why’ that can consume all of us when we lose someone we love. The feelings of loss can render us both hopeless and helpless.

The purpose of my book is to give others the chance to read these communications and to think about them in reference to their own lives. It will give you hope, peace and a deeper understanding that life truly does go on for our loved ones on the other side. Most importantly, it will reassure you that your loved ones are eagerly waiting to reconnect with you. We can continue to communicate with them, I am living proof of it! Ultimately, I hope it will encourage others to drop the shield of fear or disbelief and realize that their loved ones, as the title of the book implies, are Just Behind the Door. The following quote is one of hundreds over the past decade in which my son reassured me that his life continues, albeit in a different energy form, and of his ability to continue to communicate with me due to our unconditional love.

“There is a vulnerability when someone dies; it allows those who love them to grasp onto this magic moment to stay connected. You had to go to that cold, dark place when I left so that you could explain to people that you have been there too.” He added, “Death is like taking a trip. When people say, ‘See you later,’ it is true, because you will. It is not the end. It is just like moving to a new location and starting a new beginning. Everyone can experience this type of communication that we have if they want to do it. You are now doing your soul work. You had to live through so much in order to be able to understand and to write this to help others… This book is about being present, being still and letting it come. You have been preparing your whole life for this; you just didn’t know it. It is fun to talk with you through the writing. You hear me loud and clear.”

The book, Just Behind the Door, is available from AuthorHouse.com, Amazon or your local bookseller. It is in hardcover, softcover or ebook format.

I would love to hear from you after you read it!

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Divine Virtues

This weekend I attended an amazing international conference and wanted to share some of the outstanding information and insights I was fortunate to experience. Robert Schwartz is a researcher and author. On Saturday afternoon he conducted a session on divine virtues and life challenges. There was standing room only for this break out session! I imagine that his next book will include these virtues with the accompanying exercise. He suggests we use this information to help us get to a deeper understanding of the lessons we have individually CHOSEN to work on in this life time. Analyzing your own life lessons just makes the learning easier. I will give you my interpretation of the definition of each of the virtues and what you can do with them. It will take two blog entries to synthesize this information. Since the exercise at the end will include doing your own individual ranking by life challenges, I would suggest you print off a copy of this blog and combine it with next Sunday’s blog so you will have a complete set. You may be as surprised as I was at what you discover about your life plan. I know you will experience some incredibly helpful insight about your life! Enjoy!

14 OF THE 27 LIFE VIRTUES

1. Faith (in a Loving Universe/God)

2. Trust (in self, others and the Universe)

3. Acceptance (being able to walk in another person’s shoes and allow them to be themselves; to accept your present/past life circumstances)

4. Compassion (for self and others)

5. Courage (to speak and live your truth; being your authentic self)

6. Kindness

7. Self Love (to accept that you are a unique individual who has the God/Universal energy within)

8. Unconditional Love (the nonphysical type of love that honors and celebrates the uniqueness of all living things)

9. Peace

10. Joy

11. Gratitude

12. Empathy

13. Patience

14. Self-referencing (realizing that your intuition/gut reaction is based on truth and following it; tapping into yourself for knowledge and wisdom)

Think about some of these virtues and how they may seem to REAPPEAR in your life – maybe as a challenge or lesson – until you have mastered them. On Sunday, I will complete the other 13 on the list and explain how you can use them to determine what you decided to work on in this particular journey. Until then – happy contemplating!

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