Inner Guidance (9 page)

“I see a small, black spot hanging in the middle of the room. It’s not my eyes. If I look away I don’t see it.

It’s right
there
,” I said, pointing in front of the stereo cabinet.

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Jon squinted and said, “I don’t see a spot. Do you mean there’s a spot
on
something?”

“No, Jon. It’s a
thing
! It’s a small black thing, shaped like a spot or a circle. Try to focus and just look. I’m sure you can see it.” I urged him to try harder as I stared at it even more closely. There was no doubt that it was real. I then glanced at Jon, wondering how I might help him see this strange thing. He was not even looking at the spot. He was staring at me.

“What’s the matter? Can you really not see that?”

I asked insistently. “Just
look
at it. It’s right there in front of you. Please just
try
.” But Jon was looking at me intently, as if he didn’t know who I was. “Look at this with me,” I pleaded again.

To get a better look, I tried to stand up and cross the room to gaze at it more closely, to really examine it. But I couldn’t. My body suddenly seemed heavy and unable to move. At the same time, I felt that I was being pulled in the direction of the black spot—pulled out of my own body, straight into it. Not wanting to let go, I held tightly onto Jon. But holding on with my physical body did not stop the pulling sensation.

Certainly, nothing like this had ever happened to me before! I rapidly entered into the blackness.

Dramatically and suddenly, I crossed a threshold into a dark tunnel of immense length—large at my end but receding to a small, distant pinpoint of light. Everything occurred at terrifying speed. I felt freezing cold and in great distress, and I struggled to tell Jon what I saw. “It’s so cold and dark. I’m going through a tunnel.

There’s a small bright light at the end, and I’m going toward it. I’m going so fast!”

I was aware of my body, shivering with the cold, eyes wide open, still sitting there on the living-room couch.

I could feel Jon holding my physical body. Simultaneously, Inner Guidance_CH 06-10.p65

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I was flying through the tunnel at great speed.

S
uddenly, everything changed. I now saw a brilliant light and, rocketing toward it, I felt great warmth as I approached. The feeling grew so intense that I became extremely hot. The heat seemed to penetrate every cell of my body.

All was dazzling yellow and then white, brilliant to such an absolute extreme that I was sure I was being blinded. Then an emphatic inner command flashed into my awareness: “Close your
physical
eyes.”

Obediently, I closed my eyes tightly, and they no longer burned. Instantly, in this world of light, I could see much more clearly. While my body remained sitting on my living-room couch, I was also somehow stepping consciously into a beautiful ocean. It was golden and white, a vast sea, gleaming with incredible bright light.

Giant, sparkling waves rose and fell around me in shimmering radiance. A sound of the sweetest music imaginable seemed to flow right out of the source of this great ocean, from the dazzling waterfall. Swells of this magnificent ocean of light flowed right through me, filling me with love, beauty, and joy.

I held out my hand to test the waters and made a startling discovery.

“They are not liquid!” I cried, as the gleaming golden and white light continued to flood through me. I experienced a sweetness that was far beyond anything I could remember.

Oh, if only I had known! I would have lived my life with so much more joy, so much more confidence. For in this ocean of resplendent glory and divine light, I felt perfect, whole, and wonderful. I was cared about deeply, loved, forgiven, caressed, and adored. Everything around Inner Guidance_CH 06-10.p65

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me was glorious.

My only desire at that moment was to stand in this pure ocean of love for eternity, to fill my being with the splendor of this setting. I neither needed nor wanted anything else. Standing alone in this radiant universe, I had absolute peace and contentment. Here, I would remain forever.

T
his reverie was interrupted abruptly. Another inner message came to me like a loud, deep voice, saying,

“There are ten things you must remember.”

At that moment, I started to ignore the inner guidance. I did not care about remembering any instructions. I did not even want to be told what they were. I was complete and entirely content and wanted nothing to interrupt this joy, this divine bliss.

Even though I knew that life is about so much more than our own self-awareness and gratification, I didn’t want to be disturbed from my experience. I knew that life is about love, service, and caring, and that if we don’t master those lessons, it is doubtful we can ever pass the true tests of life. Yet, in that moment, I didn’t want to put my attention on anything else. I had no intention of leaving this place. I did not want to hear ten things.

Surely I would not need them.

Even if I did hear them and was forced to leave this paradise, I felt certain that I would forget anything I had been told.

But just as suddenly, I realized that my every word, my every thought, my every feeling, was known here instantly.

“You
will
remember
everything
,” I heard.

And then, slowly, one by one, I received the following list of ten instructions. Each number was called out Inner Guidance_CH 06-10.p65

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clearly. The delivery was precise and intense. I both heard and
felt
the messages going through me:
1. Although you have absolutely no intellectual
knowledge of what is occurring, someone very
close to you appears to be dying.

2. In truth, there is no death—only the illusion of
death.

3. However, upon learning of this apparent death,
you must go at once to this person.

4. In order to help this person, you will be instructed and must follow these instructions.

5. You must tell everyone concerned, “This is not
death.”

6. After this experience, this person will be better
off than ever before.

7. However, it will not appear to be so.

8. You must leave here when you are told to do so,
although you will not wish to, for . . .

9. You have much to do. You must listen carefully
and do as you are instructed.

10. Remember, everything is always happening
exactly as it should, whether it appears that way
or not.

These words were flowing through the center of my mind, though my awareness was elsewhere. The voice was neither male nor female, but more like a mighty wind sweeping the words right through my being.

My heart was filled with confidence and joy, and I was moved to tears. Yet, as selfish as it may have been, Inner Guidance_CH 06-10.p65

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I still found myself indifferent to the message I was receiving and the ten things I was supposed to remember. As profound as they were, none of it mattered to me.

I had decided to stay.

Despite any higher understanding of life’s purpose and my potential responsibilities, I could not help myself.

Regardless of the clear directive I had just received, “You must leave here when you are told to do so,” I absolutely did not wish to leave. As to the idea that there was much to do, I just wanted someone else to do it! Compared to this sense of fulfillment and bliss, instructions meant nothing, no matter how clear, no matter how important.

Like a childish Soul with only self-satisfaction as a goal, I shamelessly sought to think only of the beauty and wonder around me and the ecstasy flowing within me.

A
s I continued to stand in this grand ocean, I again heard the message resonating clearly through my head: “You must leave now. There is
much
to be done.”

“Please, please, let me stay,” I pleaded brazenly.

Desperately I promised, “I won’t ask for a thing. I will just stand here forever. Someone else can do the ten things. I won’t remember. Just let me stay.”

Yet, no resistance was possible. I experienced an instantaneous and abrupt sensation of being pulled away from where I was standing. A deep, primordial longing filled me. With every fiber of my being, I resisted the force so that I might stay in this place, in this serenity, for even a moment more. Yet, any effort was futile.

The last thing I heard was message number nine.

Benevolently, it resounded in my head and heart: “You have much to do. You must listen carefully and do as you are instructed.”

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I
was being sent back into the physical world, and the pain of expulsion from this magnificent and wondrous paradise was unbearable. I struggled to look straight into the sky of hazy golden light, to gaze at the brilliant waterfall, to cling to the feeling of joy and stay just a little bit longer, to remember the ecstasy I was experiencing. But I was being sucked back through the tunnel, traveling suddenly at breakneck speed into its freezing, constricted, shadowy depths.

The tunnel was as terrible as the ocean was glorious. Even the split second that it may have taken for me to pass through this black and frigid abyss was dreadful. The bone-chilling cold hit me once again. It was sudden and shocking, and for a moment I felt I had lost consciousness.

T
he experience of returning through the tunnel was so intense that my physical body began to shake violently. I was still shivering from the cold of the tunnel when I realized I was again sitting on the couch with Jon, who was gasping in disbelief as he held me in his arms.

“What’s happening, Anne?” he asked.

On the verge of tears, I could not speak. Teeth chattering uncontrollably, I shook my head from side to side to indicate that I couldn’t talk and moved even closer into the warmth of his body. After a few moments, I looked up at Jon and managed a faint smile.

This experience had shown me my true identity as Soul—the true, highest self that we all are—and I would never forget it. As Soul, we are radiant spiritual beings of love. I was so grateful for what I had just experienced.

I now knew firsthand that there were wonders within the universes of God that exceeded anything I might ever have imagined.

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Trying to comfort me, Jon gently patted my shoulder. Then he looked at my face closely and frowned.

“Anne, something’s wrong. What’s happened to your eyes?”

He led me to the bathroom mirror so that I could take a look for myself. I squinted as he turned on the light. My eyes were light sensitive. Then I focused, and what I saw staring back at me was quite a shock. There was no white to the whites of my eyes. Just bright red!

My eyes appeared to be completely sunburned, like after a day on the beach with no sunglasses.

If I needed any evidence of my spiritual experience, it was right here before my blood-red eyes. I heard the echo of instruction from just minutes ago: “Close your physical eyes.” Now I understood its importance. It was to protect my physical eyes from the intensity of the extraordinary light in that tumbling waterfall of pure love.

As I slowly found my bearings and reconnected with familiar surroundings, I explained to Jon that I had somehow moved into a world that was more real than this one; that it made this world seem like a hollow reflection of all that life could truly be. Yet, I had also experienced a physical change while in this place, and however it happened, it was real, and my eyes bore the unmistakable evidence.

Jon was quiet and thoughtful. Collecting myself as best I could, I told him I was given ten things to remember and that I could still recall them clearly. I went to my desk and jotted down the messages I was given—

one through ten—and I showed Jon.

“This is incredible! But I wonder how this could even be happening, Anne. And who is dying? Do you think you can figure out who is dying?”

“Whoever it is, the person is
not
dying. It’s only the Inner Guidance_CH 06-10.p65

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appearance of death,” I faithfully reminded him, “only an illusion.”

Jon slowly nodded his understanding. This incredible experience had actually been about death, dying, and the illusion of death. My thoughts turned to concern about the person whose life was in peril, but the thought was disconcerting.

Still struggling to focus, I said, “I don’t know who this person is, but I’m confident I’ll find out, and then I’ll just do whatever I can.” Jon reassured me that he would help me if he could.

We talked for a few more minutes, but I could tell Jon was restless and ready to go. I couldn’t really blame him, and anyway it was time for me to leave for my evening class. I reasoned that this would help me shift my attention and feel more grounded. If I hurried, I could just make it to class on time.

As I drove past the airport, a large jet flew over my car. The airplane, having lifted its great bulk at takeoff, zoomed overhead and soared into the night sky. I felt a surge of energy go through me, and I began to cry gently.

I pulled off the highway, parked the car on the shoulder, and allowed my tears to flow for just a few minutes. The tears provided a release from the intensity of my out-of-body experience.