Goldfinches

Goldfinches are flocking to the new finch feeder in my garden daily prompting me to contemplate their nickname, their current presence in my life and their connection to Donna Tartt’s 2014 Pulitzer Prize-winning novel, The Goldfinch, centering on the 1654 Dutch painting by Carel Fabritius, originally titled Het Puttertje.

According to Wikipedia, source of all true knowledge in the world, goldfinches were popular pets in the 17th century because they could be trained to draw water from a bowl with a miniature bucket or thimble-sized cup. The Dutch title of the painting refers to the bird's nickname, puttertje, literally “little weller,” derived from the verb putten, “to draw water from a well.”

It seems to me that it is what Donna Tartt didn’t put into writing that garnered the Pulitzer Prize rather than what she did. Like the pet songbirds drawing up their own water, it is up to the reader to draw up the meaning in the book just as it is up to us to draw up the meaning in our daily lives.

Last year, when The Goldfinch was a monthly selection for our book club, opinion varied greatly, from “It was too long,” (that’s it – the reader’s entire statement of insight and opinion after reading its 771 pages), to an iconoclastic and symbolic metaphysical interpretation of its numinous view of life, art and the universe.

In the book, Tartt explains the significance of Fabritius’ contribution to painting. His revolutionary style represented a transition from his master, Rembrandt, to his pupil, Johannes Vermeer, who further improved the skill of painting shadows. I still thrill at the memory of reading her description of how a close examination of The Goldfinch painting reveals the transfomation of the artist’s brush strokes into a living bird’s feathers. The artist is literally creating life, bringing it into form out of the void, out of nothing, just as we do. Tartt draws a parallel between the artist’s interaction with the painting during the creative process and the viewer’s interaction with the completed work of art centuries later. Both include an encounter with the numinous as the painting and the viewing come into form. So too with our lives. All involve drawing from the well.

The painting itself depicts a small goldfinch secured to a perch on its feed box by a fine chain, a metaphor for the myriad ways the book’s characters chain themselves to their grief, their loss, their addictions, their trauma, their relationships, their possessions, their money, their thoughts, their beliefs… The author’s unwritten invitation to the reader is to examine their own life to determine how and to what they have chained themselves, opening up an opportunity for self-redemption.

More than a year after reading the book, I find it still speaking to me as goldfinches frequent my garden. Why? Hmmmm…..

The finch feeder is a new addition to my garden this year. After looking at all the different makes and models at Lowe’s, Home Depot and Wal*Mart, I was attracted to one with a black metal mesh column to hold the nyjer, or thistle, seed. It has a yellow lid and tray, which doubles as a perch and a catch for seed husks. The directions advised patience as it might take some time for finches to find the feeder. They have. It’s not unusual to see several clinging to it at a time. AHA! After several weeks of welcoming mostly goldfinches, I finally realized the feeder is the same colors they are. OH!

Only after several weeks more did I understand the connection between my wild goldfinch neighbors in the bosque (river forest) and me. Two months ago, I completed writing the narrative of !Ultreya! A Caregiver’s Journey, a book about the spiritual transformation my son Grant and I experienced while facing his life-threatening illness and death, but I could not bring myself to work on and finish the minimal rewriting and editing that remain. Instead, I have been doing a lot of emotional healing and forgiveness work through acupuncture, therapeutic massage, a twelve-step writing group and Family Constellation work. 

Recently I realized that, subconsciously, I felt finishing the book would be like losing Grant again. Two wise friends helped me reframe this chaining thought. One said, “Grant will live on through the book and its readers.” Another said, “Terranda, you are going to lose Grant over and over again.” When I recognized the truth in what they both said, I unchained myself from the perch and set myself free to write. Two nature poems, one about Canada Geese, and one about the finch feeder, came through me, appropriately, on Mother’s Day. Gifts from Grant.

Next I realized the goldfinches in my garden were unchained – wild and free – coming and going at will. I accept their symbolic meaning for me. As I do my own inner healing work and attend to my spiritual growth, I am freeing myself from chains that bind me. 

Whales Don't Have Lips

 2.2.15     Aboard the Vanguard  in the Santa Barbara Channel 

“Whales don’t have any lips,” the marine wildlife naturalist aboard Island Packers’ Vanguard explains to eighteen of us cruising the Santa Barbara Channel. This bright sunny day is perfect for tracking migrating whales as they swim slowly north on the one-year anniversary of Grant’s death. “They don’t have any nipples either, so how do the mothers nurse their calves on the 6,000-mile return trip to the Arctic from the birthing grounds in Mexico?” Prepared with illustrations and a plastic model of the California Gray Whale, she tells us the 1500-pound babies gain 100 pounds a day drinking 100 gallons of milk as thick as yogurt produced by their mothers. As the mother whale streams the milk through the water, her calf “catches” it. I love it. Grant would have loved it too.

     Grant and I chose shared experiences to mark special occasions like his birthday or Mother’s Day. We both felt we had enough stuff and preferred quality time together having fun to more tangible gifts. On his last birthday, in June, he chose whale watching in the channel, and we got up close and personal with humpbacks when they dove beneath our boat so close we felt we could touch them. Literally thousands of dolphins surfed the waves that day competing for attention with whitecaps. Four years earlier, we went fishing on the half-day boat for his 34^th birthday just after his melanoma was diagnosed and while it metastasized into the tumor surgically removed at UCLA.

     I know immediately I want to spend this day the same way Grant and I spent those birthdays - with him, on a boat in the channel where his ashes are scattered. I know I want to go without friends, free from distraction and conversation, mindfully present with the day, the moment, the experience and my son. It isn’t sad. It is wonderful. When the boat returns to the harbor after four hours spent with 800 dolphins and 11 gray whales teasing us with their spouts and tails, I feel peaceful, relaxed, infused with bliss.*

What? How can a mother whale nurse her calf when whales don’t have nipples or lips? Like so many things in life, it doesn’t seem possible at first glance, yet there is a way. We may not know the way, but there is a way. Nor do we have to know. Life supports itself. The mother whale has clear intentions – to nourish her calf, have it thrive, have it survive. She knows what she wants. The baby whale has clear intentions too – to eat, to grow, to thrive, to survive. It knows what it wants. The rest of the process is organic. It unfolds. What a beautiful metaphor for us in our lives.

So many times on the journey with Grant, I had no idea how something could happen, but it did. I had never before been present with anyone while they died, let alone my beloved son. How could I do that? How could I ever encourage him, send him on his way as his spirit left his body, with my final words, “Yes. Yes. Yes.” And yet I did. I didn’t have to know how. I had clear intentions – to love him, to support him, to honor his soul’s journey even if that meant his leaving me behind. It was organic.

Spiritual master teacher Edwene Gaines has taught me, “Your job is what. What do you want? The how is up to God.” Trust. Trust that there is a way even when I don’t see the way. Perhaps, especially, when I don’t see the way. Thinking and feeling there is a way, trusting I don’t have to know the way opens up a space that allows the way to appear. It lifts a weight off me. It lets me breathe. It’s so easy to stop the manifestation of a dream, to get stuck at how thinking there must not be a way because I don’t see what it is. I need to return again and again to the spiritual practice of asking myself, “What do I want?” Then let go, reminding myself, “God’s job is how.” That’s how I was able to send Grant out into the universe in a peaceful, loving way.

*Excerpted from

¡Ultreya! A Caregiver’s Journey of Spiritual Transformation

©2015 Terranda King

¡Ultreya!

¡Ultreya! villagers living along El Camino (Sp. the way, the road, the journey) shout to pilgrims walking the route across northwestern Spain on their way to the shrine of the apostle St. James. The 1,000-year-old pilgrimage is made by over 100,000 people each year from points all over Europe and other parts of the world to the cathedral of Santiago de Compostela, where tradition has it that the remains of the saint are buried. It is an ancient, and allegedly enchanted, pilgrimage. People from St. Francis of Assisi, Charlemagne, Ferdinand and Isabella to Dante and Chaucer have taken the journey, which comprises a nearly 500-mile trek across highways, mountains and valleys, cities and towns, and fields. Books and movies chronicle the journey. Shirley MacLaine described her transformational experience in the book, The Camino: A Journey of the Spirit.

Home now in New Mexico after seven months in California taking care of my son Grant, being with him when he died, dealing with his estate and taking care of myself, I tell myself inwardly, ¡Ultreya!  “Keep going.” I’m not sure where the path will lead or how to find my way. A gift from a friend in my patio garden, a large, grey river rock etched with the word ultreya, reminds me I don’t have to know the way to keep going.

Grant and I lived an experience of ultreya three years ago when we couldn’t find the path. Keep going. We were on our way to the studio of a well-known photographer, Will Bertz,* who donated portrait sittings to a nonprofit fundraiser. I purchased one. “The last professional photo I have of you is your senior picture. And that was taken seventeen years ago!” I lamented to Grant. “That’s what I want for Christmas – a photo of the two of us. Will you go?” Reluctant agreement followed.

Will lives on an avocado ranch in the rural farmlands of Carpinteria, south of Santa Barbara, CA. Directions were something like, “Turn off on the dirt road past the polo fields toward the mountains. Drive over the bump, turn left at the tree, go past the three cows, turn in at the first stone pillar and follow the driveway past the four garages and around the barn. The studio is on the ocean side of the house.”

Grant was driving. My navigation consisted of “Keep going. Keep going…” But we couldn’t find a path past the four garages and around the barn. We tried the house next door. That wasn’t it. We returned to try again. So many vehicles were parked on the concrete apron, we couldn’t see the dirt path past the garages and barn. Only when we kept going while there seemed to be no way, was the dirt path revealed. We found the studio. Grant and I relaxed outside while Will set up the lights and equipment. Playing with the family border collie and enjoying the calming ocean views, avocado grove and trickling creek on a fresh, clear day prepared us for the sitting. Will, a commercial filmmaker for many years with a long list of Fortune 500 clients, sold his company to Industrial Light & Magic. Warm, personable and attractive, he was really good with people, working his magic in a relaxed and playful way to capture the unique essence of each subject and the relationship between them. Our Christmas portrait was wonderful, the experience memorable.

Driving past the stone pillars as we left, Grant said, “You know, Mom, this was really a good lesson for me. ‘Keep going – the path will be revealed.’ ” “It’s a good lesson for me too,” I replied. Grant’s melanoma was in remission after his first round of treatments. Once we merged onto the northbound freeway, I said, “You know, Grant, Will is recovering from a malignant brain tumor. He had lung cancer several years ago.” I was so glad Grant had the opportunity, which he actually seemed to enjoy, to see a great role model at work – a happy, successful man earning a good living doing what he loved through creative self-expression. Perhaps it would inspire the artist in Grant.

On New Year’s Day my cell phone rang. It was Will. He said he had to call after reading our family Christmas letter several times and learning Grant’s cancer returned. His call was a call of encouragement. ¡Ultreya! I shared the story of how we found his studio. He urged me to continue writing, telling me how much the Christmas letter touched him. He supported Grant’s healing. His kind, thoughtful gift of love, the phone call, was not his only gift. The call revealed the book title for Grant’s and my journey together: Keep Going – the Path Will Be Revealed: A Caregiver’s Journey Supporting An Adult Child with Cancer.

At Serenity House, the beautiful hospice building overlooking the entire city of Santa Barbara where Grant spent his last four days, the subtle presence of ultreya infused the experience of facing the unknown. “I don’t know what to think. I don’t know what to do,” Grant said to me, aware he had little time left. “You just do what you do,” I answered. Grant’s friend Chris, who gifted him with an L. A. Kings’ hockey jersey signed by the team, shared their interaction at Grant’s Celebration of Life service. Chris said to Grant, “I don’t know what to say.” Grant replied, “I don’t either. This is the first time I’ve been told I have a week to live.” “I guess we just do what we always do,” Chris said. “Yeah,” Grant answered, and they continued their conversation. When the time came, and Grant was breathing his last few breaths, I could tell his spirit was leaving his body. “Yes. Yes. Yes,” I said. Keep going. The path will be revealed.

*changed for privacy                                                                                                                                    

Behold. . . .with Rapt Attention!

“Miracles are commonly defined as rare and extraordinary events that defy the laws of nature. . . sometimes described as acts of God or. . . divine intervention that only a few of us will ever experience,” says Dr. Deepak Chopra on Day One of his “Miraculous Relationships” CD set. Chopra believes miracles happen every day, not just in far-off villages or holy sites across the world, but here in our own lives. He thinks miracles only seem extraordinary because we are not paying attention to their presence in our lives.

The word miracle comes from the Latin root mirari, “to behold with rapt attention.” In Spanish, the verb mirar means to look. Look! Pay rapt attention. When we are really present, paying attention, “We begin to notice the miracles in our lives, the everyday acts of grace that guide us on the most evolutionary path.” Grace is unearned love. The universe is loving us through people we meet and experiences we have. We need do nothing to earn it. It just is. It just is the nature of the universe to love.

Renewing her California real estate broker’s license this week, the Spiritual Adventuress was immersed in grace, bathed in love, marinated in miracles. Driving south from Ventura to Los Angeles can be a seamless experience. Who knew? Internet directions guided the car from the Ventura Freeway to the Hollywood Freeway to the Harbor Freeway right into the heart of Los Angeles, one block from Pershing Square, to the State of California’s Junipero Serra Building, formerly a Broadway department store. Parking, at $2 per 10 minutes with a $13 maximum, is available on the corner where live attendants shoehorn your car into the lot (and out, if you’re lucky. I was!) In the lobby, a “homeland security” airport experience is recreated by uniformed guards with grey plastic trays and a walkthrough scanner. “We don’t make you take off your shoes,” one says. I’m only going to the third floor.

Behind a glass service window, Apollo Uban, whose blonde, shoulder-length dreads remind me of light rays emanating from his sun-god namesake, asks how he can help. “I need help renewing my license. I received some forms I don’t understand. They seem to indicate you cannot have a California real estate license if you live in another state. Is that true? I’ve had a license for 35 years. I have a license in New Mexico, where I live now, but my son is being treated for cancer here. I may need to move back, to make a living. I want to keep my California license.” “I bet you came in today because you think you have three days left to renew it.” “I did.” “You have two years, not just one.” “Oh, thank God, but I’d like to take care of it now.” Apollo says, “Before I can let this conversation go any further, I need to know your son’s name.” 

One page needs to be notarized. “Do you have a notary here?” “No,” Apollo says as his work computer blocks his search for the nearest one. “I’ll just use my personal i-pad,” he says. “I see why you received the Caring Service Award,” I tell him, acknowledging his certificate of Commitment to Service too. After speaking with his co-worker, Angel, he tells me, “A notary is on the way. She’ll be here shortly. You can wait in the lobby.” “Angel,” I emphatically repeat her name, acknowledging her assistance. I have the distinct impression the notary is another department employee whose job does not include notarizing documents.

The notary efficiently completes her job. Her fee is $10. Expressing my appreciation, I hand her a $20 bill, saying, “I don’t need change.” Protesting her protests I say, “You could just say yes. You have made my life immeasurably easier today, and I really appreciate it. I want you to have it. Travel,” I say, referring to her journey from the back office to the lobby. “Well, if you insist.” “I do insist,” I say. “Would you like a receipt?” “I would. You can just make it for $10.” While writing it out, she says, “I’ll be honest,” noting the $10 notary fee and $10 travel expense. Placing her mobile notary service business card in the case with my reading glasses, I tell her, “I’m going to keep that!” And I am. Her last name is Easter, the name of a dear, long-term friend in Ventura. Every time I open the case I will remember the resurrection of my expiring real estate license with the assistance of Apollo, Angel and Ms. Easter. I will know the universe is a place of grace, of unearned, unconditional love where I experience its miracles.

“In the infinite, unbounded realm within us, sometimes referred to as Spirit, Source, God, the Higher Self or the Divine, anything and everything is possible, including miraculous relationships,” says Deepak Chopra. “As you tune in to Spirit and pay attention to the presence of miracles, your life will be transformed into a dazzling experience more wondrous and exciting than you can even imagine.”

“Love and spirit are forever conspiring to create miracles in our lives.”

“Today I am open to the presence of miracles.”

                       - Deepak Chopra, “Miraculous Relationships” CD

Ageless and Timeless

Hummingbirds are gone. The feeders are down, washed, dried, stored, hanging in the pantry. The metal birdbath dish is removed from its pedestal, scrubbed clean, winterized, leaning against the enclosed adobe patio wall, no longer welcoming yellow-breasted gatherings on its rim to drink fresh, sweet garden water. A whimsical image of birds on ice skates gliding over its frozen surface makes me laugh. New Mexico nights in the thirties are here. For the first time this season, the Spiritual Adventuress donned her microfiber bathrobe and sheepskin slippers to meditate in the dark. Fall arrived yesterday. Wednesday, she flies to California for her son Grant’s antibody therapy. A milestone birthday arrives Saturday, but gifts are already here. Today’s Perfect Health meditation was on being ageless and timeless as things change.

Hiking the ditches, drains and acequias for ninety minutes with the “Walking Albuquerque” class yesterday made seasonal changes even more apparent. Muddy floodwaters from the 100-year rains coursed through the channels on their way to farm fields and the Rio Grande. Giant cottonwood trees along the Paseo del Bosque (Forest Walk) leaned out over the ditch banks, their downed branches, no match for 90-mile-an-hour monsoon winds, part of a natural obstacle course on narrow paths. Duck families took flight, horses whinnied from their corrals when we passed. I spotted my first “V” of honking Canada geese, but no Sandhill Cranes yet. As Henry David Thoreau said, “An early morning walk is a blessing for the whole day.”

In addition to the natural beauty, another gift presented itself – the awareness of how much easier it was for me this year to keep the pace set by the two Joyces, our quick-walking leaders. Last year I had the pink rose cane from my hip surgery with me just in case I needed it on the uneven terrain. This year, I walked in the first third of the group behind our trim leaders, who, to my everlasting enjoyment, were sweating. Being twenty pounds lighter from a year’s worth of aquacise didn’t hurt me either.

A few residual aches and pains from yesterday’s walk remind me I will soon be present with my son’s pain. I will have an opportunity to practice surrender – surrender to what is, surrender to my own pain, the pain of a mother being with her child’s pain, the pain of being with another’s pain. It’s human nature to want to avoid or distract ourselves from pain. We are in good company. The American Academy of Pain Medicine website reports that pain costs our society at least $560-$635 billion annually, an amount equal to about $2,000.00 for everyone living in the country. Grant’s stomach pain has progressed to the point where he has surrendered to prescription medication assistance to manage it, just as I did prior to my hip surgery when I personally experienced the debilitating effects of chronic pain for the first time in my life. But it's different “helplessly” watching your child suffer. I can cut myself and dispassionately see myself bleed, but when I see my son bleed, a visceral, squeamish feeling takes up residence in my stomach and migrates throughout my body.

“Embrace the pain,” one of my spiritual teachers said. How counterintuitive is that? Everything inside is screaming, “Run from it. Stop it. Avoid it. Deny it.” We medicate it with sex, drugs, rock ‘n roll (alcohol, food, shopping, gambling, relationships, television, video games, recreational drugs. . .) So, that is the spiritual practice. As in “do-it-over-and-over-until-you-master-it” practice. Don’t run. Stand still. Look pain in the eye. Be present without attachment. Easier said than done, as the saying goes. Grant pain being. Hmmm….what an interesting expression. Let it be. Be with it. I actually listened to the spiritual teacher and put what he said to the test.

One holiday season, I invited 35 people to my home for an exquisite, candlelight dinner of white wine scallop lasagna in appreciation for their volunteer work in an organization to which we belonged. I had bronchitis at the time. My ribs felt separated from my chest wall after coughing for six weeks, yet I did everything myself – from cleaning and decorating the house, putting up a tree inside and lights outside, covering the round, rented tables with white, linen tablecloths, setting the tables, purchasing and cooking the food. There was a complicated, multi-step recipe to follow on each of several main-dish casseroles. When time ran out, I had to hire my son and his friend at $20 apiece to finish the salad while I dressed. When the final guest left, my body started convulsing. I lay down on the sofa racked with pain. My thoughts led me to principles of truth and the teacher’s statement of “Embrace the pain.” At that point, I felt I had nothing to lose, so I did. Gradually, the pain began to ease. Then it stopped. I was amazed. It had transformed. I later realized I had stopped resisting, stopped believing in duality, stopped thinking there was something outside myself - something other than the one universe that could cause me pain.

On Thursday, the stakes go up when I spend time with my son in the hospital as he receives intravenous treatment. I’m entering the Ph.D. pain management program. Am I up to it? I don’t know. But I do know that the universe is preparing me for the practice with this writing and in meditation. Although I am not Catholic, I follow the New Mexico tradition of reverence for the Virgin of Guadalupe by burning a columnar glass candle with her image on it in my home, sometimes all day. I have bought them at Walmart, Dollar General, a pharmacy and Smith’s grocery store where there are cases of them on the shelves. They vary in design, quality, color and price. The blue window trim and blue front doors on brown New Mexico adobes are a tribute to Guadalupe, who protects homes and those within. Blue is the color of her robes. This morning, during meditation time, I thought about her experience of being present with her son’s pain. I thought about her name, the Holy Mother. Metaphysically, your name is your nature. Her name reflects her Whole-y-ness, her ability to be present embracing it all. I will carry this awareness with me when I go. 

Tat Tvam Asi

TEXT:  I’m in for blood again at the hospital. Record low 6.2 

 

Since the average hemoglobin score for an adult male is 15, my son Grant's score is dangerously low. When we talk, he lets me know, “I’m angry. I’m angry the cancer is back. I’ve been staying home and not doing anything. I just figure, why bother?” “There are a lot of people who want you to bother,” I tell him. “I know,” he responds.

Our continuing discussion reveals Grant feels the extremely difficult treatment he underwent three years ago with interleukin-2, which has a long list of horrendous side effects and is so toxic it is rarely used, was pointlessly endured. Discussing the situation with his girlfriend, Natalia, brought clarity. The anger led to feeling “what’s the point,” which led to not taking care of himself, which led to low hemoglobin from blood loss due to his bleeding ulcer. Aren’t we complicated?

“I’d really like you and Natalia to get to know each other better,” Grant tells me. Change, change and more change. I met her in June and know she’s really important to him. He’s never said that about anyone before. Since there seems to be so much at stake in so many ways, I feel really vulnerable. I really want her to like and accept me and am fearful she might not.

“I need to be proactive and set up a schedule for receiving blood,” Grant says. I look in the mirror of my son and ask, “How will I be proactive in taking care of myself?” (See “Mirror, Mirror. . .” post on 8/19/13). I call a friend for support and coaching. Ask and receive.

The universe provides coaching and support throughout the day, first at my Sunday spiritual center. As I walk in the door, I hear the affirmation for the day: “I use my energy for constructive purposes.” Then we sing the meditation song:

I send my love over the mountains,

I send my love over the sea,

I send my love into the heavens, and it returns to me.

I send my love to Grant and Natalia. I know I must give what I want to receive. If all things are connected, I am giving to myself. The morning talk is about steps for improving mental well-being. The first step is connection, or relationships. “Relationships help us stay awake,” the speaker says. “We are all scared. We all want to be loved, liked, supported.” Suggestions follow for moving from scared to sacred. During hospitality time, I extend love and support to two friends facing health challenges. I leave feeling renewed. At a support group meeting later in the day, I share my concerns about my son’s health and his new relationship ending with “I don’t know what to do.” The reading for the week tells me exactly what to do: meditate, pray, intuition, trust, ask and receive. I leave feeling centered with a practical plan of action. Now, all I need to do is follow it. And, I do.

This morning, in meditation, it all comes together when I listen to the Oprah/Chopra “Perfect Health” CD. The centering thought for the day is “I cherish my every connection.” Ahhh. There it is. Ask and receive. Here is the guideline for creating the relationship I desire with Grant’s girlfriend. The mantra for the day is Tat Tvam Asi, “I see the other in myself and myself in others.” By practicing these principles until they are part of my consciousness, an integral part of my being, I can relax and trust I am creating the relationship I want. On the CD, Oprah says, “As social beings, which we all are, we need to feel deeply connected with others to thrive. Connection, in its many forms, is essential for our overall well-being.” She goes on to say that in all the years of the Oprah show, one of the things she learned was “the number one common denominator in the human experience” is “we all want to know that we are seen and heard.” Deepak Chopra adds when we socialize and connect with one another “. . .we are doing wonderful things for our brains and cardiovascular systems.”

A good-sized toad, hunkering down in the corner, between my front doormat and the wall, brings the lesson home. Its amphibious nature, or ability to live in two worlds, is symbolized by its position right at the threshold between the interior/exterior of my house (consciousness) and represents my physical/spiritual, human/divine aspects. In Animal Speak, author Ted Andrews says toads “. . . reflect a need to learn to use the emotional energies (water) constructively (land).” Laughing, I think that sounds vaguely familiar. Since Spirit is everywhere present, it can speak through a rock, a garden toad or hot air balloons overhead. The question is “Do I listen?” And, more than that, “Do I apply what I’ve heard?” “Do I continue to practice what I’ve learned until I integrate it and it becomes part of my being?” If not, I might as well have not heard it. Then I’m saying to the universe, to myself, “Why bother?” 

A Prayer for Protection

Plump, swimsuit-clad gummy ladies ride sugar seahorses across the blue icing pool on Andrew's goodbye cake this morning. Standing guard in camouflage at the corner of the cake is the soldier he will become. This is his final week as our aquacise instructor before he flies to Ft. Benning, GA, to become an Army Ranger. Two years of his four-year contract will be on active duty, two in reserve. Then his education will be paid for – if he lives, whispers the concerned mother’s voice within. The “seahorse” exercise involves half the class straddling a “noodle” and riding it to the end of the pool and back, first forward, then backward, while the rest of the class works out with Andrew then switches. It’s his signature exercise. I’m choosing to know he too will go there and back. Twenty of us surprise him with a potluck lunch including the cake, ice cream and a balloon-fiesta-gift-wrapped money box with a slot on top. He's so young to go in harm's way.

If I were Andrew’s mother, what would I want for him? What do I want for my own son, for every mother’s son? I want to know he is under the umbrella of the Prayer for Protection, so I write it on my small gift envelope:

The Light of God surrounds you.

The Love of God enfolds you.

The Power of God protects you.

The Presence of God watches over you.

Wherever you are, God is, and all is well.

The blessing goes with him as I let go, let God.

Being present and paying attention to common, everyday experiences reveal a universe at work beneath the surface of appearances, surrounding, loving, enfolding, protecting and watching over us. Deepening our faith and trust, these experiences become a reservoir of comfort, confirmation and peace, a resource we can later draw on in difficult times. At a recent Southwest Writers meeting, I was present, paid attention and had just such an opportunity to watch the universe at work.

Each month, a door-prize ticket is given to those in attendance. The drawing is for. . .what else. . .books. Some new, some used, some by writers who are members. I knew my ticket would win. It is the third one called, three for the trinity – Father, son, Holy Ghost, symbolic of Grant’s dad, Grant and Spirit. The digits of the ticket, #0032, add up to 5, the number that represents change. From more than twenty available selections, I choose Elizabeth Berg’s book, Home Safe. I heard her keynote address at the Santa Barbara Writers Conference, resonated with what she said and wanted to read her work. Here it is. Handed to me. For free. Not only was I listening to the universe, it was listening to me and saying, “Your wish is my command.”

The story is about a woman writer whose husband dies, father dies, daughter grows up and moves away. “. . .it seems her life is beginning to change in ways  she is only beginning to understand.” Synchronistically, the protagonist and I have at least ten things in common. Both of us have been through deaths, losses and periods of not writing, both are facing unknowns, both have adult children entering relationships and starting new lives, both of us know it is time to grow and take on new responsibilities, do more letting go.

She “thinks of all she has lost and will lose. All she has had and will have. It seems to her that life is like gathering berries into an apron with a hole. Why do we keep on? Because the berries are beautiful and we must eat to survive. We catch what we can. We walk past what we lose for the promise of more, just ahead.” The experience of winning and reading the book, of watching the universe work, deepens my trust, my faith. It provides comfort, confirmation and peace to sustain me through difficult times. Through it all, we arrive, Home Safe, at home with spirit, our lives, ourselves. The universe is surrounding, loving, enfolding and watching over me. It speaks to me through a book this time.

Charlotte

Yellow, plastic “crime-scene” tape is anchored from a terracotta flower pot on the ground to a clothesline with a wooden pin on the other side of the morning glory fence I share with my neighbor, Betsy. She knows about it. She put it there.

 

While watering my garden one morning this week, I heard a keening cry. It was Betsy. I stopped what I was doing to see what was wrong. “I accidentally walked into the web. I forgot it was there. I’ve ruined it. Charlotte. . .” “What would Wilbur say?” I asked, referring to the children’s book, Charlotte’s Web, the story of a spider with a humble pig for a friend. At first, Wilbur thinks humble means "close to the ground." After talking with Charlotte, he knows it means "teachable." Everything in my experience is an expression of spirit, the one universe, and is speaking to me. Do I listen? Am I teachable?

Lamenting the damage she inadvertently caused, Betsy genuinely felt bad. As the daughter of a biologist and a geologist who writes and illustrates children’s books, many about animals and insects, Betsy has an innate affinity for the natural world. She keeps a terracotta pot saucer filled with water beneath a bush to attract toads to her yard. She makes sure the bird bath is full so they have a place to bathe. Every monsoon season on her morning walk, she rescues as many as 150 baby frogs washed into the gutter by the first rain, picking them up one at a time and returning them to the adjacent field in a nature preserve.

 

“I put up the tape to remind myself the web is there,” she says. I know she needs consolation. “It’s okay, Betsy. She’ll just repair the web. Spiders know how. They do it all the time – every time an insect ventures into the web for dinner. They have everything they need within themselves to do it, just like you with your painting and writing.” “I wish I could capture my dinner,” she muses, “but I don’t have silk in me. This would be a good topic for your blog.”

 

“What kind of spider is it?” I ask. “I think it’s a New Mexico Orb Weaver,” Betsy replies, “I looked it up.” The spider has beautiful red and white markings and makes a large, spiral, wheel-shaped web. I’m hoping it will catch some of the pesky flies plaguing us. Today, around noon, I stopped by for an up-close-and-personal look at the spider, the web and the crime-scene tape, but the spider wasn’t home. Later, I saw her on the web again. Wikipedia explains most orb weavers tend to be active during the evening hours. They hide during the day. Toward evening, the spider will consume the old web, rest for approximately an hour, then spin a new web in the same general location. I was gratified to learn some are semi-social and live in communal webs which have been cut out of trees or bushes in Mexico and used for living fly paper.

 

Symbolically, to Native Americans, spider is grandmother, the link to past and future. Unlike insects, spiders have two body sections instead of three, giving them a figure-eight appearance, when horizontal, the sign of infinity, representing the wheel of life flowing from one circle to the next. In his book Animal Speak, Ted Andrews provides an extraordinarily rich symbolic description of what it means if a spider has come into your life or is your totem. It is powerfully appropriate for Betsy and me and perhaps for you too.

 

“Spider teaches you to maintain a balance – between past and future, physical and spiritual, male and female. Spider teaches you that everything you now do is weaving what you will encounter in the future.” Andrews mentions that the spiral shape of the web is the traditional form of creativity and development. “We are the keepers and the writers of our own destiny, weaving it like a web by our thoughts, feelings, and actions."

 

The spider is considered the teacher of language and the magic of writing because a primordial alphabet was formed by the geometric patterns and angles found within spider’s web, according to Andrews. Most of their movement occurs  in the dark, often in inaccessible areas. “Weave your creative threads in the dark (It’s 1:00 a.m. as I write this) and then when the sun hits them, they will glisten with intricate beauty.” Andrews presents a series of important questions to contemplate if spider has come into your life:

• Are you not weaving your dreams and imaginings into reality?
• Are you not using your creative opportunities?
• Are you feeling closed in or stuck as if in a web?
• Do you need to pay attention to your balance and where you are walking in life?
• Are others out of balance around you?
• Do you need to write?
• Are you inspired to write or draw and not following through?

"Spider can teach how to use the written language with power and creativity so your words weave a web around those who would read them,” Andrews says. I saw a toad in my garden this evening for the first time in a long time and a hummingbird earlier today. Dare I look them up? I have enough to think about now. I’m trusting you do too.

 

 

 

 

 

BBaddict’s Evening with Gus Fring

Fifty-seven channels and nothing on. . . yeah, that’s what turned the Spiritual Adventuress into a BBaddict. Scrolling past “Breaking Bad,” she thought why watch a show about a meth lab. . . even if it is filmed in Albuquerque. But there’s nothing else on, maybe I’ll just check it out. Two days and twenty-one episodes later, she was as addicted to the story as drug lords are to power, as addicts are to meth – so addicted, that she hooked a friend in California. “Well,” she consoled her now bleary-eyed co-addict, “At least we’re not as bad as they are! Unbelievable!!” Then she shared breaking news about Connecticut viewers so outraged by an ill-timed cable outage during Sunday night’s episode that they called 911, unable to connect with the fix for their habit (fact).*

“We are receiving numerous 911 calls regarding the [Cablevision] outage,” a representative wrote on the [Fairfield Police] Department’s Facebook page. “This is neither an emergency, nor a police-related concern. Please direct your inquiries to Cablevision.” The rep also warned that “misuse of the 911 system may result in arrest.” “Clearly Fairfield PD doesn’t watch Breaking Bad,” one Facebook user replied to the department’s post. Ahhh. Vindication.

Where your attention goes, your energy flows and the result shows. Divine Flow took over in an amazing, synchronistic way with delightful results. You knew this would connect to spiritual practice and principles, didn’t you? But isn’t it an adventure each week to see how? It’s like six degrees of Kevin Bacon. Reading Albuquerque’s weekly independent Alibi on Saturday afternoon, the Spiritual Adventuress noticed a special event that evening at the Kimo Theatre. The very same magical location where, last fall, Zia Pueblo Indians sang “Happy Birthday” to her in their tribal language on the sidewalk in front of the theatre. Presentation of the Robert and Sibylle Redford Creative Achievement Award to Giancarlo Esposito would follow a showing of “The Usual Suspects,” a film in which Esposito portrays a policeman. Giancarlo’s current role is Gus Fring, ruthless drug lord in “Breaking Bad.” The final season, the last eight episodes of a five-year run, would begin the following evening. I went.

A long line of people clutching $21 computer-printout tickets snaked around the corner and down the street. As I approached an event staff person to ask questions, a man on the street asked me, “Do you have a ticket?” “No,” I replied. “Here,” he said, handing me a computer printout. “A friend couldn’t make it.” As I reached for my purse to pay him, he said, “No, he told me to just give it away.” It was second row, center, at a sold-out event. I was literally ten feet away from Robert Redford and his wife and Giancarlo Esposito. But that wasn’t the miracle. The miracle was Giancarlo Esposito, who he is as a person.

In the Q & A following the film, Giancarlo described his thirty-year career and the thinking which informed it. He began on stage, singing and dancing, taught by his African-American, opera-singer mother how to use his voice. He knew he did not want to be limited to being a theater entertainer, so he left to explore other art forms with the clear intention of expressing all creative aspects of himself. Film clips from about twenty of his fifty-eight films disclose very diverse roles. Esposito, whose father was Italian, grew up European. He had “to learn how to be black” for parts in six Spike Lee films. He hung out on the streets of Philadelphia to learn both language and body language. Pursuit of excellence in his craft extended not only to learning to speak Spanish to play Gus, but also to hiring a coach to teach him Spanish with a Chilean accent since the character was from Chile.

Giancarlo shared not only his outer expression, but also his inner expression, woven naturally into the conversation, revealing his beliefs about energy, intention, meditation. Referring to his daily meditation practice, he said, “I listen to the mountains.” It is in meditation he receives guidance. His commitment to doing what he loves with passion and at least one thing each day to move his life vision forward has served him well. He urged audience members to do the same. The description of his first meeting with Robert Redford at Sundance sixteen years ago reveals a great deal about both of them. They were drawn together by, and resonated with, each other’s energy. Seeing beneath the surface of outer appearance into deeply connected spiritual lives was both uplifting and inspirational. Comfortable with themselves, they allowed the essential truth within us all to be revealed.

With great joy and delight, I couldn’t wait to get home to call my California co-addict to say, “Guess where I was? I spent the evening with Gus Fring.” Only another BBaddict can appreciate what that means.

*As reported by Ethan Sacks, NEW YORK DAILY NEWS, Monday, August 19, 2013.

Mirror, Mirror. . .

Today is the day. Today we receive PET scan results. Today, after three years of being symptom-free and in remission, my son faces the recurrence of melanoma. A meeting with his primary care physician last week revealed “activity spots” in three locations. A meeting today with his oncologist will provide details, and, hopefully, information about a treatment plan. “At least it’s not in my liver – that would pretty much be it,” Grant informs me on the phone. “Once it’s in the liver or the lungs, it’s untreatable. I’d talk with you longer, but I’m baking. I’m making cornbread for our office picnic tomorrow, and Natalia is coming over to take me out to dinner. I love you, Mom.” Life goes on. Thankfully.

I have been living with the recurrence information for several weeks, trying to adjust to it, but having a hard time. Although I know there's a center of strength and peace within me, I've had trouble finding it, trouble residing there. Waves of sadness wash over me. I feel helpless, powerless, out of control. Negative thoughts keep flitting through my mind like the pestering plague of Albuquerque flies now torturing residents. Ideal weather conditions of drought and downpour have provided an endless supply.   

The Spiritual Adventuress is currently participating in the 21-Day Meditation Challenge, "Miraculous Relationships," offered by Deepak Chopra and Oprah Winfrey. Yesterday, I decided to return to blogging after a hiatus and began writing a post about relationships as mirrors. Today’s centering thought is “The world is my mirror.” Chopra says when we recognize we can see ourselves in others, every relationship becomes a tool for the evolution of our consciousness. The synchronicity reminds me I am not alone. I am in the divine flow. 

It has long been my spiritual practice to ask, whenever I make a statement about another person, "How is that true about me?" I don't always like what I see. This week, when I sent property information to a real estate contact, a reply came back that it looked pretty good "if it's not a scam." My reaction, definitely not a response, was "Don't even go there. What you think about, you bring about." Negative thinking brings about negative experiences. It didn't take long for me to see my reflection in the mirror, swatting away pesky flies. “In order to transform that which no longer serves us into what we truly desire in our hearts, we must embrace both the dark and the light of who we are,” says Chopra. Mirror, mirror on the wall, who’s the fairest of them all? That would be you. Mirror, mirror on the wall, who’s the least fair of them all? That would also be you. I am grateful the mirror's reflection gave me a chance to choose again. It really served me.

Masaru Emoto's scientific experiments photographing water crystals were mentioned in another day's meditation. When positive thoughts and emotions, such as love, appreciation, happiness and truth were focused on samples of distilled water, the molecules formed delicate, symmetrical, crystalline shapes. Water samples exposed to negative thoughts filled with hatred and hostility displayed chaotic, fragmented structures. It is startling to think of this in relation to the fact that 60-70% of the human body consists of water. Meditation suggested I send Grant my copy of Emoto's book, The Hidden Messages in Water, which I read several years ago. When I went to my bookshelf to find the book, the first book I touched was Viktor Frankl's Man's Search for Meaning, in which he says our ultimate freedom, which can never be taken away, is our freedom to choose how we will respond to the situation in which we find ourselves. Again, the synchronicity reminds me I am not alone. I am in the divine flow. The universe is communicating with me.

Looking into the mirror of my son, I see someone freely and powerfully choosing his response to a challenging situation. I see someone pragmatic with courage and equanimity. I see someone living his life fully, baking cornbread for a picnic, going to dinner with a friend. “I admire your great attitude and appreciate your being a role model for me,” I tell him. “Thank you,” he says. He is my teacher and my student. I am his teacher and his student. We are reflections of each other in the mirror of relationships.

"We do not see things as they are. We see them as we are."  -The Talmud

Courage Is My Word

“Courage has no guarantees, or certain outcomes.

 It is a risk taken on an unknown path.

 Courage brings about change. Growth is dependent on courage.

 I procrastinate out of fear of failure. Have I enough courage to examine that fear?”   

                                                                                                         – For Today

This week, prompted by the above quotation in a support group, the Spiritual Adventuress had an opportunity to write about courage and the fears she is encountering at her growing edge – body, relationship, writing. Beginning sentences with “I’m afraid I won’t know how…” or “I’m afraid I won’t be successful at…” revealed the path of growth, reminding her of where she needed to go, reminding her what spiritual teachers told her a long time ago.

“Where don’t you want to go? Go there. What don’t you want to do? Do that.”  By asking those questions, Val Jon Faris, co-facilitator of The Mastery, an in-depth, personal growth seminar, was shining light on the path which would require courage and bring about change. The last place I wanted to go was to sit next to Val Jon, so I did. The last thing I wanted to do was to ask for help, so I did. For me, feeling as helpless, powerless and out of control as I did in my family of origin was to be avoided at all cost, so I asked Val Jon and Cynthia if they would help me through the workshop process. Going where I didn’t want to go, and doing what I didn’t want to do, transformed my life. Now, twenty-two years later, whenever I face a difficult decision, I still ask myself those questions. The answers show me what to do next.

At the completion of The Mastery, participants were invited to choose a word to guide them, a word they would be and become. “Truth,” I said, soon adding “with compassion.” Two years later, I changed it to “Courage.” Cynthia said, “I think that will really serve you, Terranda.” It was a huge understatement. Courage accompanied me through my son’s life-threatening illness. It moved me from California to New Mexico where I had no friends, no family, no job, no place to live – but where I discovered my writing group and teachers. It joined me on a spiritual pilgrimage to Peru where it helped make decisions about participation in a shamanic journey.

Courage is still my word. Now, I am calling on courage to help me surrender in areas where I want to grow. To surrender, as in give up, old ideas, thoughts, beliefs and behaviors that are comfortable friends, life-long companions who cannot accompany me to the Promised Land, the unknown terrain of fulfilled dreams ahead. Like Moses, they have brought me this far, but they cannot take me where I want to go. To do that I must rely on an obsolete meaning of courage: “The heart, as the source of emotion,” in addition to the traditional meanings of courage: having the confidence to act in accordance with one’s beliefs; the quality of mind or spirit that enables a person to face difficulty, danger, pain. The French word coeur, or heart, is the root word of courage, the terrain of intuition and feeling. The Mastery gave me access to my feelings, my emotions. Before then, I lived in my head. It took more than ten years to integrate what I learned so I could not only identify what I was feeling, in the moment, but also express it.

At aquacise today, I experienced Mastery’s precious gift. A friend asked about my recent trip to California. I told her about the magical experience my son Grant and I had seeing thousands and thousands of dolphins on a whale watching trip for his birthday. Migrating humpback whales breached, rolled over, showing us their pectoral fins, their tails. They swam under our boat, literally five feet away. I told her how happy I was to meet Grant’s girlfriend of six months, to learn they are enjoying each other. Tears came when I shared my concerns that his past treatment for melanoma might keep someone from taking the risk of being in relationship with him, loving him, marrying him, having children with him because of the possibility of losing him. She immediately hugged me. "What’s the matter? What’s wrong?” two other women asked, swimming over. Hearing the story, they both hugged me too. “Thank you for sharing that,” said one. Courage, the heart as source of emotion, gives me access to my feelings in the moment, connecting me authentically with others in relationship. I know courage will take me the rest of the way, guiding me through the unknown. Courage will help me surrender. Courage will manifest my dreams.

Someone

Someone

Tacked

to the corner

telephone pole,

someone

left a single-word sign.

On gold cardstock,

red calligraphy proclaims

Poetry

Slippery sheet protectors

shield Emily Dickinson,

Jackson Holly, Basho  

from sizzling summer sun,

wind, monsoon rains.

Filling

a cornflower blue
 ceramic glazed pot 

with Veronica spicata,

magenta Petunias, gold Celosia,

I set it

on the adobe ledge

in front of my home.

                                 ©2013 Terranda King

Fastened with binder clips to two clipboards are six poems. On the bottom clipboard, the page reads “KIDS” parallel to its left-hand edge and includes a poem about “a snail upon the wall.” No poet is named. I wonder if “Someone” wrote it.

The sign and poems have been there for months. I meant to stop. Before I did, they disappeared, and I was disappointed. Perhaps they announced a local poetry reading/writing group I could attend. Recently, the sign and poems reappeared. Today, I stopped and received the gift I'd already been given, the gift waiting for me. How many gifts await our receptivity? What difference will their contribution make? There’s no way to know who stops, how many read the poems or how they respond. The act of leaving them there seems whimsical, generously free of attachment. 

  

Almost all the poems are about nature, the night, a flowering tree, a snake and a snail, appropriate since they are posted on the street leading to the Rio Grande Nature Center. Familiar with Basho and Emily Dickinson, I had not heard of Jackson Holly. A little internet research to find his two poems led to music videos of a Jackson Holly playing guitar and singing a blues version of Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Raven.” He could be the “Someone,” I’m just not sure. If so, in these days of social media platforms, poems posted on telephone poles really are “stealth marketing.” How many people are curious enough to spend time tracking him down? Looking in his mirror, I wonder how difficult I make it for others to experience the essence of me.

The experience inspired me to express my own creativity. Since I haven’t written poetry for a long time, it was a real treat to do that. The experience made me wonder if I give anonymous (more or less!) gifts of love to unknown strangers. It made me wonder what those gifts might be. It made me wonder how I can give them more consciously, more often. It made me wonder what the world would be like if more of us did. I think we all give gifts of love to unknown strangers. I think we do it every day by showing up as who we are. Sometimes we don’t recognize how just being ourselves makes a difference, how it is a gift to others.

During my recent trip to California, dear friends in real estate had me stay at their home. They organized a Sunday afternoon BBQ, inviting people I worked with 15 - 20 years ago. It was a unique experience for me. For the first time in my life, I felt an intangible sense of perspective in time – it must come with age. I could feel the relationship I had with each person, the contributions we made to each other. It was a warm, soft, expansive feeling in my chest. One man has had extraordinary success in real estate over the years. Last year, he sold 250 short-sale and foreclosure homes. He told me that when he was new in the business, a bright young man with an MBA from Northwestern University, but a stranger to me, I was his mentor without knowing it. He told me he followed me around the office, listening to what I said, watching what I did. His telling me about the difference I made in his life was his contribution to me. Aware consciously of our contributions or not, we can be confident we make them, and that we have a choice about making them consciously.

Beloved

Beloved. We are the Beloved. In so many ways the Universe is letting us know how much we are loved. It custom tailors its messages to us so we cannot doubt they are ours. All we have to do is pay attention. In a mystical experience at Costco this week, yes, Costco, the temple of discount consumption, I received my most recent notification that I am the Beloved. I don't really care where I am when Spirit tells me that I am loved. I experience delight wherever it is and whatever form it takes.

Wow. One. There is one copy of Leila Meacham’s paperback at Costco, on top of one of two tables of books on display. Just to be sure, I circle then circle again, both tables, Doubting Thomas that I am, looking for another copy. Nope. None. Nada. Just checking. . . There’s only one, the one that is a love message of support from Spirit to me. It’s near the front, right by the aisle as I pass, unmistakable. The title, Roses, embossed in gold letters, is surrounded by a profusion of pink and red roses.              

        

How do I know it’s a love letter from Spirit? There are no accidents. It is a symbolic synchronicity, or “coincidence.” I encountered the author and book two weeks ago in person at the University of New Mexico (UNM) Writers Conference. Leila Meacham was the keynote speaker, her appearance another love letter from Spirit to me. She and I have so many things in common we could be twins. Both of us are retired teachers of similar age with first books who consider writing their job and follow spiritual practices.

Spirit told me, several times, starting with a bumper sticker, “Move forward confidently in the direction of your dreams.” At the regular, monthly meeting of SouthWest Writers, Spirit let me know about the UNM Writers Conference. Brochures were distributed and an announcement made that early registrants would receive a free, 10-minute “book pitch” with an agent or editor of their choice from New York. My book pitch was scheduled at the same exact time my writing teachers were presenting a workshop on their new book, Find Your Story – Write Your Memoir. My book is a self-help memoir. Nudge-nudge, wink-wink. Spirit keeps saying, “You are loved and supported." Keep moving forward.

Now, about that book pitch. As a spiritual mentor likes to say, “There’s one thing I am perfectly clear about. I don’t have the foggiest notion how to do that. But I didn’t know how to do puberty either. . . . .did you?” No. Fortunately, Spirit loves me through a fabulous, retired reference librarian friend who, without being asked, emails me thirty pages of the best information available on how to prepare a book pitch. It is totally relevant. Try selecting that sometime from 549,237,091 google hits on the topic. I email her a copy of the two-page pitch I labor on for seven hours. “I love it, outstanding,” she pronounces. This is high praise from someone who, for years, read book synopses and purchased books for her library. Spirit does indeed love me.  

Leila Meacham is a delightful keynote speaker - authentic, unassuming, charming and inspirational. She tells us it's her first writers conference and first keynote address. She tells us her story. She shares how the multigenerational family saga manuscript she worked on for twenty years almost ended up in the trash, rescued at the last moment by her husband when they moved. When the book is finally finished, a friend asks to share a few pages with someone. The someone “just happens” to be a very successful literary agent. The literary agent “just happens” to obtain a book contract two weeks later. The book “just happens” to make the best-seller list within eighteen days of publication. I’ll bet she didn’t know how to do puberty either.

After Leila’s talk, people of all ages thank her for being such an inspiration. Now Spirit has presented me with her book at Costco. For 624 pages, I can immerse myself in the consciousness of the 70-year-old, retired schoolteacher from East Texas, whose first published book easily and effortlessly reaches The New York Times Best Sellers list. For hours and hours, I can enjoy reading a dream come true. “If it can happen for her, it can happen for you,” Spirit says. “Here. Hold it in your hands as a tangible reality. You are my Beloved.”