Lynn is making progress in her recovery from Treatments.  We expect to have her back helping you with your miracles very soon! 

Here is one from a previous year:

 

Third Week of October: Living Fully

Copyright (r) 2007 Lynn Woodland

Evidence of an Eternal Spirit

While world religions have always taught the existence of an eternal essence, increasingly scientists and researchers are directing attention to these mysteries as well. The study of near-death experiences offers some of the most compelling evidence that consciousness exists separate from the body and that there is something beyond physical life as we know it. In Life after Life, Raymond Moody, M.D. published a remarkable collection of stories from people who had gone to the brink of death and returned to tell experiences of leaving their bodies, being immersed in dazzling light, and having profound experiences of well-being and transcendence. People who had these experiences emerged with a deep faith in the continuity of life beyond the physical body. What’s more, their many different stories described a similar experience, which Moody believes is the experience we all have at the point of death.

Melvin Morse, M.D. continued this line of investigation begun by Moody, and, working with children, who are less steeped in the religious images of our culture, became the first person to conduct scientifically valid research on near-death experiences (NDE’s). Morse observed that children’s NDE’s have the same predictable elements as adults’. He was also able to prove that people must be on the brink of death to have an NDE, ascertaining that these powerful experiences of transcendence and light are, in fact, triggered by imminent death, and are not merely symptoms of heavy medication, oxygen depletion, or serious but non-life-threatening illness. His first book, Closer to the Light, is a powerfully moving account of this research as well as stories of people who’ve had NDE’s.

Morse identifies the “Light” as being the core of the near-death experience. He says, “Although many of the NDE elements can be explained by our knowledge of the way the brain works, the one that remains a true mystery is the experience of light.” In his research he was able to identify a specific part of the brain responsible for things experienced during an NDE and other paranormal experiences. But, he says, “The experience of the light has no known origin in the brain.” He has come to believe that the Light is actually located outside of the physical body—something not of our own making, but something we return to. He concludes, “I would like to believe that the Light is where we go when we die. Like a birth into a bright new world, the Light of the NDE represents the beginning of a new beginning.” Increasingly, evidence is mounting that human consciousness is not limited to the physical body, and that there is a powerful and awesome reality that exists beyond what we know through our physical senses.

This essential spiritual truth—that we are something bigger than our biology; more than our thoughts, emotions and history; something that can’t be harmed by the destruction of our physical body—is at the root of virtually every spiritual tradition, yet is one that we have great difficulty believing and living by. If we truly believed in our eternal nature, there could be no tragedy because we’d know we couldn’t be harmed. There would be no victims or victimizers because by definition of who we are we couldn’t abuse or be abused by another. We wouldn’t live in fear of death because we’d know we are eternal.

The growing body of research with people who’ve had near-death experiences offers not only compelling evidence for the existence of life beyond the physical reality, but also a model for how life can be lived when we’re free of our fear-based identification with the body. In his study of adults who had experienced an NDE in childhood, Melvin Morse discovered that these people, who had profound experiences of being more than their physical bodies, have virtually no death anxiety, less depression, more sense of purpose, and a greater zest for life than the general public. They also have more paranormal experiences. That is, their perception is not limited by their physical senses and physical body. They use more of the full range of power available to us when we transcend the illusionary limits of our physicality. (See Morse’s second book, Transformed by the Light, for more on this.) Psychologist Susan Blackmore, another NDE researcher and author of Dying to Live, suggests that the NDE allows people to let go of a “false sense of self.” She adds, “With this insight, fear is left behind and life can be lived more directly and fully.”

Quite simply, when we become less identified with physical reality, life takes on a new purpose. No longer is it about surviving because we know we can’t be harmed. It’s less about reaching an outcome because we’re not so pressured by the passage of time. As we focus less on our destination, we become freer to live in the moment and enjoy the ride. The journey becomes a process of discovery and learning. Life as we know it begins to look more like a classroom with lessons and opportunities that allow us to see the consequences of our choices. Death is no longer the ultimate fear and physical illness and other life-changing events become learning experiences rather than tragedies.

Living Fully

As we continue our exploration of death, this week is all about living. The truth is that each moment could be our last. We can live in perpetual fear of this (consciously or unconsciously), or we can make the most of it, living in a way that simultaneously leaves less unsaid and undone, as it accepts the spiritual truth that we may not need to complete all our personal agendas to fulfill our soul’s purpose.

Exercise I: The Purpose of Challenge in Your Life

As always, give yourself some uninterrupted quiet time for this meditation. Before going into it, think about where you feel significantly stuck or challenged in your life. The meditation will help you discern meaning and purpose around these issues. Have paper and pen nearby for the writing exercise that follows.

 

1. The Meditation

Become comfortable, take some deep breaths, and relax. Inhale deeply and exhale just as deeply several times. Let your body relax and your mind become quiet. Reflect on where you feel the greatest obstacle or challenge, or where you feel most at a loss to understand why something is the way it is in your life.

Now let your attention shift. Imagine that your life in your physical body came to an end yesterday. It happened suddenly; no chance to say goodbye or take care of business. The transition out of your body wasn’t painful in any way, just sudden. Where your consciousness is now feels safe and peaceful and you have no anxiety about your transition. You may feel the presence of loving souls with you. Now, you’re simply looking back at the physical life you just left, seeing it with more awareness and perspective than you ever could when you were in it.

First, give attention to the people in your life who are suddenly dealing with the loss of you. Even though you feel your connection to them more deeply than you ever could in physical clothes, they’re having difficulty experiencing your presence. You feel close to them and know how much pain they’re in, yet all the while you know it’s okay and that they’re going to be alright. You realize they’ll know that, too, someday, so you don’t grieve with them. Instead you let your love shine through their grief and fear so that, even if they don’t quite register it consciously, their hearts are soothed. Some people in your life may be sensitive enough to hear whispers of love and guidance that you offer.

As you review your connections to people, is there anything you can see from this perspective that you wish you could have done differently? If you’d been given a few more days, weeks, or years to be in your body, what would you have done to feel as complete with people as you possibly could?

Look at your life as a whole. Imagine that no matter how much of your personal agenda seems left undone, you can see now from your broader vantage point that your life, just as it was, made a perfectly complete and whole experience. What did you most love about your life? What was your most important lesson? What was your greatest gift to the world? Ask this last question deeply. See if you can extract the essence of what your presence contributed. What was the gift of you?

Finally, reflect on the challenging issue that you brought to mind earlier and from this place of peaceful vision and perspective, see if you can comprehend the gift of this experience. Even if your human perspective sees incompleteness or failure, your soul sees the meaningful purpose of it. How has it strengthened you, changed you, and somehow enriched your soul for the better?

Now, return to the life you just left, only with greater vision and understanding, and perhaps more peace than you had before. Take some deep breaths to bring yourself back to a normal waking state. Come back feeling refreshed, alert, and fully alive.

1. Writing Exercise

I recommend answering these questions in writing because more information is likely to come that way. Also, you may find real power in the words you choose to define your life. They may prove helpful and meaningful beyond this exercise.

If your life ended yesterday:

1. What did you most love about your life?
2. What was your most important lesson?
3. What lesson do you feel you really mastered in the course of this lifetime?
4. What lesson do you see yourself still in the process of learning?
5. What lesson would you most like to master if you had another chance at life?
6. What was your greatest gift to the world? Ask this last question deeply. See if you can extract the essence of what your presence contributed. What was the gift of you?
7. Practice

Look at what you wrote as being “the gift of you.” This week, be aware of this gift you give. Look for ways to be conscious and intentional about giving it.

Exercise II: Living Fully

What if this was the last week of your life? What would you do with it? Specifically:

1. Do you have a will? Are you comfortable with how you’ve left your material goods to be handled after your passing?
2. What would you like done with your body?
3. What kind of funeral or memorial do you want?
4. What do you need to say to the people in your life to feel complete?
5. How would you most want to spend your last days?
6. What simple blessings have you taken for granted until now when you realize you have only a week to appreciate them fully?

Spend this week living as though it could be your last. Attend to any of the above that feels incomplete and live in a way that honors death, not by bracing in fear but by living each moment fully. Make a point to leave no loving words unsaid or small blessing unappreciated. Look at your life to date as a perfect whole, complete as it is, and yet see how every next moment offers a new world of possibility, too precious to be taken for granted.