Elsa Marshall

Rendezvous with Destiny

2007-05-09T00:12:00.000-07:00

I was living in Switzerland when Nietzsche and Jung came in a series of dreams and told me to write about my spiritual experiences. The book’s intent, content, and writing style were given as well as a cryptic title. When we apply the ancient truths of the Pearl of Wisdom to our everyday problems our inner frozenness will melt.

The Great Pearl of Wisdom - Antifreeze of the Soul

Rendezvous with Destiny – From Tragic to Magic

I was born in Perth, Australia, December 1949, but remained the living, breathing, walking, dead until the afternoon of August 27, 1992. Winter, my least favourite season was almost over, and spring was just around the corner. But that morning a far greater storm was raging in my heart.

My life as I had known it had just fallen apart. My husband of twenty years was in love with another woman and would soon be leaving the family. I was shocked at how distraught and overwhelmed I felt. It seemed as if huge waves of grief were pounding me against rocks of heartache and despair. I couldn’t see anything but a looming dark and fearful unknown.

In a blur of pain I saw the children off to school and walked into my home office. I loved my job with Wordperfect, the software company that pioneered telecommuting and was riding the crest of an international wave of success. But today there was no chance of concentration. The emotional pain had become unbearable and as dramatic as it sounds I literally thought I would die.

It is a cosmic law. The things we most fear will eventually come to pass. The story of Job is one of the more profound metaphysical truths; and if I was honest I’d say that although my husband’s announcement was devastating it really came as no surprise. We loved each other dearly, but our life had been was built on superficial levels of interaction. We were both play acting although to the world we were the perfect couple. We had little true intimacy, and in the depths of my heart, and no doubt likewise for him, I often wished the weak foundations of our marriage would collapse and set us free. I wanted a bigger experience of life. The old adage ‘be careful for what you wish’ came true two weeks earlier when my husband’s infidelity came to light.

We had bonded through our children. We adored our daughter and son and believed in the sanctity of family life, but from the very beginning our relationship had been based on friendship and respect rather than sensuality and intimacy. I had shocked a future sister-in-law on our wedding day by admitting that neither of us was in love. I now understand we each hoped to bury past unresolved relationships with family and ex-lovers, and this we did very effectively in the frozen wastelands of the years that followed. My heart had almost congealed, and yet sometimes a quiet hope whispered heart that the house of cards would tumble down. Sadly we did not have the insight or tools to authentically address our issues.

It is odd though that no matter how often I imagined welcoming change, nothing could have prepared me for the tsunami of emotional pain. As I’ve said before I thought I would physically die. It was only in my later study of family dynamics I came to understood how such crises reawaken long forgotten childhood memories of abandonment, which to a child does equate to death! No wonder as a traumatised child from a cruel and unconscious culture I was now experiencing a resurgence of these fears. And I was in full panic!

However, as it always does, life had already provided a safety net. When we are required to make the next more difficult trapeze manoeuvre the Infinite is always one step ahead. This time the safety net had been introduced a few months earlier and I knew it was time to consult the metaphysician again. I asked my secretary to cancel my appointments and left the house, little knowing within hours my life was to be profoundly and irrevocably changed.

“I’m just biding my time…” song lyric

Firstly some background to make sense of what was to happen. My father’s family migrated to Australia from Greece in the 1920’s when he was a child. My mother’s parents also migrated from Greece when they were young adults and she was their first born. Their families were stuck in the myth that life was to be hated and feared. They belonged to generations gripped by church-fuelled collectivism, where any hint of individualism was fiercely opposed. Tragically many of them acquiesced to the belief that it was impossible to face life alone. Most relatives unwittingly succumbed to the unspoken options of depression, insanity, and early death by suicide or illness. Even from the youngest age I could not understand their obsessive sense of duty and mindless patriotism, and their fathomless elitism that excluded everything non-Greek. What a terrible fate for a xenophobic people in a country not their own.

Our home was a nightmare of insanity that included physical and emotional violence. My earliest memories were a deep sense of disconnection from my family of origin and country of birth. I knew my destiny was not in this family and culture, nor in Australia. I knew we were spiritual beings having a human experience and so I made the decision at eight years of age to leave home as soon as possible. My future belonged literally and metaphorically in America, the ‘land of the free’, and since there I have not had one moment of uncertainty about this; there is no doubt my destiny will unfold in the United States. My true family and tribe are there. They are the pioneers of consciousness whose books and works I have devoured. This has been confirmed by the extraordinary synchronicity of my meeting several such authors during my many visits to the States in the past ten years.

My mother’s father was the Greek orthodox priest which made things even worse. Our family was the benchmark for the community’s religious and traditional values. It was totally claustrophobic. I thought I would asphyxiate. I could not bear being with the most wretchedly stifled sheep in the pen. And nor could my mother. In fact she was too intelligent to maintain the status quo and in her early thirties she succumbed to depression and psychosis. As the eldest daughter it was my job to take over the management of the household and this even more intensified my decision to leave home as soon as legally possible. I wouldn’t, or more to the point couldn’t, accept what I then viewed as a badly thrown dice of the genetic lottery. My life was far too precious to sacrifice to their god of tradition.

“Someday I’ll fly away, leave the past to yesterday... Wise men go from dream to dream and dread the day that dreaming ends…” (song lyrics)

For the next ten years I bided my time. I sang these songs in my mind and visited the moon every day in my imagination where I would mark off another day. I saw a timeline of eternity, stretching endlessly backwards and forwards, on which I drew a parenthesis around a-one-hundred-year section. In it were hundreds of tiny markers, one for each day, until my 18^th birthday in December 1967 when I could legally run away. And from that wondrous cosmic perspective I waited. I love the metaphor of life … now I see why I chose to change my birth name from Elsie to the more empowered sounding Elsa; the lioness in Born Free!

All Truth is within and even as a young child I told myself ‘This too shall pass.’ And indeed it did. One glorious, liberating, mid-summer midnight, a week after reaching the legal age of freedom, and while the household slept, and before my mother awoke for her ritual early morning psychotic screaming tirades of anger, I escaped; and not just from an arranged marriage but from death threats for disobedience. I will never forget the intoxication of that moment! I was free! Such exhilaration! And in the almost four decades since that night I have not had even one trillionth of a second of regret. How could I not rejoice to be free of such a pitiful family and their crippling learned helplessness. Years later this was confirmed by my Jungian analyst who was dismayed at what she said was one of the more traumatic psychological family trees she had seen.

However what I didn’t know was my escape had been only a physical running away. All the while a deeply embedded fear of rejection and abandonment had been lying dormant in my psyche. It wasn’t until the marriage breakdown that Life offered me the opportunity to confront those fears and to learn the one great lesson of life; we are here to learn Self-reliance, the ability to become independent and to stand alone.

It hadn’t been hard to delude myself that I’d changed my life script by marrying my husband. He was a kind and gentle man, and our life together was the antithesis of the violence of our similarly ‘razed’ childhoods. We created a peaceful and non-confrontational life, but I often grieved at the emotional barrenness of our marriage. We appeared confident and sophisticated in our successful careers but our personas were built on fragile inner scaffoldings.

Of course during the preceding years there had been signs of growing alienation between us. However, as the saying goes, the wife is always the last to want to know. He was obviously going through some sort of crisis, and although I could see his emotional distress and tried to talk to him, our history of superficial communication made it impossible. I once even wrote him a letter, begging him to ease my fears that he was not in love with someone else. In it I could no longer manage the frenetic pace of our life without his emotional support, but he didn’t mention the letter and I didn’t have the courage to bring it up again.

And so we continued to veer away from each other becoming ever more separated by an ever-widening impenetrable barrier. I had never violated his privacy but after a series of particularly curt phone calls during a business trip I checked his hotel phone log. And my heart stood still. The terrible truth was confirmed in the many long calls to a number I recognised as the home of his young secretary.

It was late at night and thankfully the children were asleep as I needed to confront him immediately. Initially he didn’t say a word but the look on his face said it all. It spoke of relief, humiliation, heartache, and sorrow, and even in my own distress it was clear he was also deeply suffering. For the past two years he had fought feelings for this young woman. These feelings had been mixed with thoughts of confusion and self-disgust. As a man of honour he loved and respected his family and couldn’t reconcile thoughts of infidelity with his sense of ethics. He strove to make sense of his desires in the hope they would go away. But of course their suppression had the opposite effect, and he was now convinced she was the love of his life and nothing must stop the consummation of his passion. There was no choice but for him to leave and thus retain integrity towards the family. It was not negotiable.

In the two weeks since that night, as he searched for his own apartment, I became ever more paralysed by grief. My inordinate fear of abandonment now overwhelmed every aspect of my life. The sight of a lone walker on a beach sent shivers of fear through my body as did the news of the marriage breakdown of an acquaintance. I wondered why we the broken-hearted don’t die, and every morning was surprised to find myself still alive.

However in the days just before August 27 something had slightly shifted. Now my first thought on awakening was something I remembered from my voracious reading as a child. The world of ideas and thoughts had enthralled me, and now these words came to mind : “That which does not kill us makes us stronger.” I didn’t know who had written these words but they gave me strength. In a strange sort of way it was a relief to at last be living a real life with all its traumas. I had always felt disconnected from life, as if I was on the outside looking in at the lives of other people.

Interestingly life was to come full circle nine years later in Switzerland, when after a series of astonishing synchronicities, the author of these words befriended me in a series of dreams. His name was Friedrich Nietzsche and in those dreams he gave explicit instructions for the writing of this book.

I’d first heard about John Davies, the metaphysician, from my friend Alexia. She believed he had special healing gifts and had witnessed first-hand many his exceptional emotional and physical healings. Her neighbour had suffered incapacitating grief for thirty years after the death of her husband and nothing had eased her pain. She was deeply depressed and afraid to leave the house, and yet within weeks her frozenness had thawed and she began to experience previously unknown levels of happiness. Her postcard to Alexia shared the joys of hiking on the hillsides of Greece and all at the age of eighty!

Apparently he had been a Harley Street surgeon who, appalled at the recurrence of disease in his patients, had chosen to study with an Indian mystic in Northern England. As he began to observe more and more seemingly impossible healing phenomena he became convinced his vocation lay in metaphysics, and after abandoning conventional surgery he migrated to Australia.

I had visited him in the few months leading up to my crisis because of some first time stress-related-symptoms. Because I had effortlessly coped with the demands of childrearing and career I was caught totally unawares by my first panic attack on a long flight across country. This was followed by a distressing cough with no medical basis, as well as weeks of intractable night time diarrhoea. I later learnt the body is the barometer of the soul and seemingly my body was already unconsciously speaking the truth of my unacknowledged fears.

And so on August 27 I drove to John Davies’ office in the nearby port city of Fremantle in the hope he would offer some resolution to my problems. There have been many times since that day I have wished for the chance to relive the events of that morning. Are there signs on a day of simple beginnings of upcoming momentous events? My only memories of the twelve kilometre drive are of inconsolable sobbing, and choosing to pass by the city cemetery rather than my preferred scenic ocean road.

The car park was already partly full when I joined the small group waiting for him outside in the cold. He began consulting at noon but we had been well advised to arrive early. There was no appointment system and the wait was oftentimes long. Then just before midday a flurry of excitement announced his arrival; this thin, eccentric-looking Englishman who wore shorts, knee length socks, and open sandals in spite of the season. At any other time this might have seemed comical but needless to say I was in no such mood that day.

Nature, time and patience, are the three great physicians

Proverb

We sat in the small waiting area and waited. And waited. And waited! An eternity seemed to pass between each patient and once again my anger grew at the incompetence of his system. Or lack thereof. To a busy and self-important executive this was totally unacceptable! Or so it seemed. I later learned the lesson he was offering was patience and acceptance of that which cannot be controlled. And life similarly gives us such choices. We can either force things or let them unfold in kairos – God’s timing.

Adopt the pace of Nature

Patience is Her secret

Ralph Waldo Emerson

I almost stormed out a few times except for a small, still voice within that suggested the wait might be worthwhile. And eventually it was my turn. He stood at the door and beckoned me in.

The room was small and bare except for his desk and a chair to which he invited me to sit. On the wall behind him were shelves of ancient-looking vials numbered with Roman numerals. A pile of well worn books lay on the desk beside a modern ophthalmic instrument and the atmosphere felt as eerie and mystical as might the inner sanctum of an alchemist of old.

“How can I help you today?” he asked.

My demeanour, maintained with some difficulty in the waiting room, now broke down. “My husband thinks he is in love with someone else and wants to leave us. Please …..”

He gently interrupted by raising his hand for silence. He reached across for my wrists and after feeling my pulses nodded while peering into my eyes with the spectroscope. Then looking over his tortoiseshell glasses he said in his quiet English accent, “Yes, perfect, now you are ready. How wonderful this has happened.”

I was taken aback! My expectations of wondrous and instantaneous healing were shattered, but he ignored my reaction and again said,

“Yes, this is the best thing that has happened in your life. This is the purpose of life. You see it is only when our backs are against the wall that we can come to awareness. There can be no coming to consciousness without pain.”

Years later I was to remember this when I read that Carl Jung also said this to his patients. If they arrived with good news Jung would send them home. However if they came with setbacks and difficulties he would suggest they open a bottle of wine together to celebrate the opportunity for growth inherent in the crisis. But that day I didn’t want to hear such apparent nonsense. This was the best thing to happen! Please! Give me a break!!

“You are fighting what needs to be accepted. You are giving your power to the wrong thing. You must focus on the Creator and not the creation. Give all your power to the God-Presence Within and refuse to give power to conditions, circumstances and events,” Dr Davies continued.

In my mind I screamed at him. I did not want talk of ‘God’! For God’s sake I wanted my life back the way it had been before. I wanted to be free of this anguish.

But I said nothing. Somehow I knew this was the most serious moment of my life and I was to listen. “All human suffering is caused by us wanting things to be different than they are,” he said. “When we learn to accept everything that life brings there can be no suffering. When you focus on the Creator and not the creation you will have given all your power to God. Only then can your sublime, Divine Plan unfold.”

This was it! I’d had enough! “I have no idea what you’re talking about,” I replied bitterly, “and I don’t want any religiosity about this being the best thing that could happen.”

He smiled, “It makes no difference what you do or don’t believe. What I have said is the Truth. It makes no difference whether your problems are physical or emotional; they are but symptoms of the same thing. The problem is you are giving your power to things outside of yourself. Give power to no person, place or situation. Give all your power to the Creator and you will see miracles unfold. The price you pay for peace of mind is to relentlessly monitor your thoughts back to the Creator. And only then will you have peace of mind and find meaning in life.”

“Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed on thee …”

Again I felt a surge of anger arising. My husband and I had been attending church for years. We believed in God and family. So should not this have been insurance against such crises! And where was this God now in all this misery.

“You have created this situation entirely by your fears. If you are honest with yourself you will see you have been afraid of this very thing happening. Thoughts eventually become reality. You must change your thoughts from those based on fear to those based on love. Then you will see how different your life will become.”

His words took me by surprise. It seemed as if he had seen through me. It was then I remembered those years of visualising and hoping that Alan and I would either grow closer or separate. Perhaps there was more to his seemingly banal and inane homilies and forcing myself to focus listened as he continued,

“One day you will be grateful for this watershed. You will understand that the greatest tragedy of life is to not experience a tragedy big enough to awaken us. Most of us drift through life day after day in a state of drunken stupor. Habituation is death to the soul. Life’s greatest gift is to be slammed against either an inner or outer brick wall. And you will experience increasingly bigger wake-up calls until the final ‘big Mac truck treatment’ jolts us back to true consciousness.”

“We had the experience but missed the meaning”

T.S. Eliot

A memory flickered in my mind of my almost forgotten visits to the moon. I realised I had suppressed the memory of how my mother, between her visits to hospital for electro-convulsive therapy, spent her days sleeping in a drug induced stupor only to awaken in the early hours of the morning to scream venomous tirades against my father. Those imaginary lunar sojourns had offered an escape from the oppressive atmosphere of our home and comforted me with that higher cosmic orientation and perspective. Back then I held life’s transient events up against the timeline of eternity and known that even should we live for one hundred years it was but a blink in the eye of eternity.

My sense of impatience at having to wait ten years before leaving home had been attenuated by that knowledge. The universe had made sense then. As I watched the earth floating below a sense of awe and wonder would fill me. It spoke of something else bigger within me that was not dependent on my physical form. For days and nights I would marvel at this thing I couldn’t yet articulate as ‘consciousness’ that allowed me to be on the moon and yet be able to look down at my ephemeral microscopic body on the west coast of Australia. I would often venture even further afield and pretend to have danced for billions of light years amongst trillions of galaxies. It had been comforting to see how infinitesimal mankind was in the cosmos. I wasn’t trapped at all. Even should I have to wait for this entire lifetime my body would eventually ‘die’ and I would be freed to truly live in the spirit form.

My return to earth was always desolating, but I was consoled by sharing this cosmic truth with a classroom of imaginary students. I spent long and happy hours away from my siblings pretending to be a teacher of metaphysics in the laundry which was separated from the main house. With the only chalk on hand, a piece of dried laundry starch, I drew diagrams on the concrete wall to explain the complexities of the universe. I asked my students to raise their vision above the mere struggle for survival and remember watching the television news and mentally shouting at J.F. Kennedy and Kruschev as to why they also didn’t join us on the moon and see the triviality of fighting and discord.

Interestingly over the years clients have commented that my use of similar diagrams is my most effective teaching tool. It is suggested the ‘daemon’ – the acorn of our soul’s blueprint and life purpose – is always revealed in our childhood play.

Dr. Davies’ voice brought me out of my reverie. “You’ve been blessed with this opportunity to confront your fears and hand over your power to God.”

Suddenly the room was filled with an indefinable silence. Somehow a presence of peace entered the space between us and there seemed nothing to say and nowhere to go.

“Good,” he said. “Now we can start.”

My tears of sorrow were now mixed with those of awe. He referred to his books, made a mathematical calculation and chose six vials from the shelves. He placed several drops from each into an empty bottle and after adding water from the faucet shook it all together. He then filled a thimble-size paper cup with water and added three drops of the prepared solution.

“Here” he said handing it to me, “just touch the water to your lips but do not drink it. You need only moisten your lips.” I did as requested and handed it back. He poured the water into the sink and threw the cup into the wastepaper basket at his feet.

He then took a pink index card from his desk drawer and began to write. He asked me to close my eyes and to lean forward on my knees. An unexpected feeling of peace flooded my body as he quietly asked me to consider some questions.

In essence these questions were identical to those Buckminster Fuller asked on the day of his epiphany during his attempted suicide at Lake Michigan:

Could I not see that the universe needed an intelligence to exist?
Could I not see that a Master Architect – a Creator - had used incredibly precise structures of law and order to create and maintain the universe?
Was not humanity a part of that creation?
Was my mind capable of creating and maintaining the Universe?
Then who would better know about my life and the rest of humanity?
Did it not make sense to surrender to the Creator and leave the unfolding of the creation, including our personal lives, to this Higher Intelligence?

In the depths of my soul more memories were reignited. These were the timeless questions I had asked and answered on the moon. Once again as if to impregnate my subconscious he said, “Focus on the Creator and not the creation. There is no other way to peace of mind.”

“How can we not trust a universe that created the rose?”

Albert Einstein

“Did you know,” he continued, “that Einstein constantly asked his fellow man to consider if this was a friendly universe that could be trusted. He himself was convinced it was and based his life on that principle.“

Later his choice of quote struck me as curious for both Einstein and roses have been amongst the most resonant themes in my life.

“The Intelligence of the Creator is based on love and beauty. Everything in the universe is evolving and resolving according to principles of love. Surely the Grand Architect of such a creation would not fail to maintain it.”

Another ray of hope pierced the fog of my despair. If only we could truly believe and trust in such an idea – a benevolent Creator and a benevolent Universe.

“Here,” he said handing me the pink card, “take this and read these words until you believe them, until you know them. If you give all your power to God – to the Infinite Intelligence if you prefer that word - you will find the level you surrender and accept the Creator’s plan for your life will be the level to which your pain will disappear.“

His unusual scrawl was difficult to decipher but with his help I read aloud:

· “I am surrounded, supported and guided by the love, wisdom and peace of God.”

· “God loves me, governs me, guides me and directs me and I follow the lead that comes.”

· “Let my family be harmonious, happy and healthy.”

He stood to indicate the interview was over. I was to read these words as often as possible, touch my lips with the diluted homeopathic liquid each morning and evening, and return in two weeks’ time.

I walked to the car park. It had been a strange experience, one easy to discount as a ridiculous pantomime, but what to make of the inexplicable peace I felt in the room. The cell phone in my car rang. It was my husband calling because of my obvious distress that morning and also to say he had found an apartment. He would be moving out within the week. Any sense of peace dissolved into a new tornado of despair!

The intensity of my grief during the twenty minute drive home is now lost in the mists of time except for the pink tear-stained card that to this day remains my talisman. As I drove I repeated the first sentence over and again hoping to regain the peaceful feelings in the consulting room.

At the railway crossing intersection just blocks from home the traffic lights changed to red. Now I would be able to give my full attention to the words.

Galaxies and Atoms ...

I held the card and slowly and deliberately read each word out aloud. Nothing happened. Again I spoke each word slowly, willing myself to understand … but they made no sense … and again slowly repeating the idea to myself …

I am surrounded…

Suddenly into my mind’s eye came a picture of a cocoon or bubble in which I was enfolded and surrounded…

and supported…

The cocoon was now supported above the raging waves as if by huge invisible hands …

and guided…

These hands gently guided the cocoon through those treacherous rocks of heartache and despair…

by the love, and the wisdom and the peace…

How wonderful, I thought, it would be to have the love and wisdom and peace of a Higher Mind…

of God…

And then, as if in a trillionth of a second, as if a bolt of lightening had struck, the moment of despair gave way to grace. Everything made sense. I fell into a deep place of Nothingness. Everything fell away except for a feeling of love and inexplicable peace. All thoughts ceased and although it was non-verbal and non-visual it was as if everything I was or had been as a personality simply dropped away. There was nothing other than the Eternal. In the words of an unknown mystic I went from tragic to magic.

The enigma of life was solved, and my inner center of gravity that had previously floundered in external people, places and things, became rooted into the very core of my being.

Although I am trying to put this into words it was sub-verbal. The only verbal thought was something I whispered aloud. “Oh, is that all it is?” It was so simple. It was so very simple. It was simply a total surrender to what was. Thus it is.

Thoughtless-thoughts tumbled upon thought and the scattered images of everything past, present and future came together into one comprehensive picture. I had been the living, breathing, walking dead but now the fog had lifted and the wisdom of the ages revealed.

In that deep still place in the eye of the storm I surrendered, as I had as a child on the moon, the transient events of life to the Infinite Intelligence of the cosmos. I was in that timeless space of silence, the Nothingness, towards which gurus meditate for years. That one moment of understanding has flooded the rest of my life with meaning. The enigma of life was solved and I felt a tidal wave of unqualified love for everyone; pure and unadulterated love.

The next moment something astonishing happened. I exploded out through the cosmos and at the same time imploded into the fabric of matter. I heard the whistle of planets rushing past as I was hurtled to the far reaches of the universe where the trillions of galaxies were One, and at the same time fell into the fathomless depths of an atom where even supposed building blocks dissolved into the same Nothingness. It was all unmanifested Energy. And from the unmanifested came the manifested through the intent of the Infinite. In that unitive glimpse all was seen, understood, and revered as the handiwork of the Creator with inner and outer realities fusing into One.

HAST NEVER COME TO THEE AN HOUR

Hast never come to thee an hour,

A sudden gleam divine,

Precipitating, bursting all these baubles, fashions, wealth?

These eager business aims - books, politics, art, amours,

To utter nothingness?

Walt Whitman

It was as simple as that. The meaning of it all was not ‘out there’. It had been waiting all along to be fallen into. This was the Nothingness that contained the All. This was the Absolute from which all creation arises. In that moment my life was consummated. I knew this was the ultimate experience of life, the reason for our incarnation.

At the still point of the turning world. Neither flesh nor fleshless;
Neither from nor towards; at the still point, there the dance is ..
T.S. Eliot

Deepak Chopra’s description of the Ineffable is totally exquisite:

Behind the visible garment of the universe, beyond the mirage of molecules, the maya - or illusion - of physicality, lies an inherently invisible, seamless matrix made up of a nothingness.

This invisible nothingness silently orchestrates, instructs, guides, governs, and compels nature to express itself with infinite creativity, infinite abundance, and unfaltering exactitude into a myriad of designs and patterns and forms.

The struggle was over. There was simply nothing to strive, struggle, or fight for. All was in Divine Order.

This is the one Great Pearl of Wisdom. An Unspeakable knowing infuses our being; there is no here nor there, up or down, left or right, forward or behind … not even light or energy … nothing but bliss, nothing but the Divine Essence of That.

I am That

Thou art That

All this is That

That alone is

And there is nothing else but That

Hindu saying

A thousand thoughts continued to trip over each other and settled into one sure knowing. This was singularly the most real experience of my life. It mattered not if any other entity in the cosmos questioned it. It had happened. I needed no validation or confirmation, no, not even if Christ himself appeared before me.

‘Life is a solitary journey taken in the company of others'

Sam Keen

One of the greatest joys of my life has been to discover ‘this most common and yet uncommon experience is our birthright and has been in mankind’s experience since time immemorial.’

This was the consummation of life. I had connected with the inviolate centre of my being, the rock within that withstands all storms. It is 'the inner patch of solid ground’: the Self, the True Essence, Higher Self, the God Within, the Soul, or the Unconscious. My centre of gravity, previously placed in externals and vacillating in response to the actions and expectations of others, has now settled into my own core.

I knew in that moment that every minute of every day of my life had been leading to this. I was astonished to realise I had been the living, breathing, walking dead. Although it had taken half a lifetime to rip the veil aside at last the scattered and chaotic images of the past were now focused into one inclusive picture. And it could not have happened one moment too soon.

"I exist as I am, that is enough,
If no other in the world be aware I sit content,
And if each and all be aware I sit content.
One world is aware, and by far the largest to me, and that is myself,
And whether I come to my own today or in ten thousand or ten million years,
I can cheerfully take it now, or with equal cheerfulness I can wait."

Walt Whitman

Nothing had changed and yet everything had changed. In the coming weeks and months the emotional storm did worsen, but everything was now witnessed from this inner place of peace. Life is just a series of natural and spontaneous changes in the external situations of life. Epictetus said things not in themselves trouble us but the opinions we have about those things. And everything is but a passing disturbance – for nothing can affect the soul.

At that moment I accepted the inevitability of my marriage breakdown without fear or reason to fight. Nothing is random. The Infinite who ordered the stars and the heavens and the galaxies was undoubtedly guiding every step of our lives with love, and wisdom and peace. I no longer hoped and wished to believe in God. No … I did not believe in God… now I knew God.

My understanding of the personal anthropomorphic God of religion became the knowing of the Absolute who exists within. I saw how Infinite Intelligence permeates every space and non-space in the universe and resides within every cell of our bodies. It is That which formed us within our mothers’ wombs and which breathes our every breath.

A lifetime of pain and suffering would have been eased had I known this experience was to be in my future, but even that was accepted as in perfect divine timing. In another flash of insight I saw all humanity revealed as sparks of Divinity, each infused with attributes of the Source. The metaphor came that as a teaspoon of salt water shows the composition of the ocean, so do we each have infinite capacities for the creativity, love, wisdom and peace of the Source.

Then a wonderful thought came to me. “If the Infinite would but glance at me for one trillionth of a second I would be sustained for eternity. But no such favour is required. The Divinity we seek isn’t external. No. It exists within our every cell. It needn’t be called from without for it has always existed within the imperishable centre of our being.”

Truth is within ourselves; it takes no rise

From outward things, whate’er you may believe.

There is an inmost centre in us all,

Where truth abides in fullness; and around,

Wall upon wall, the gross flesh hems it in,

This perfect, clear perception - which is truth.

A baffling and perverting carnal mesh

Binds it, and makes all error; and to KNOW

Rather consists in opening out a way

Whence the imprisioned splendour may escape,

Than in effecting entry for a light

Supposed to be without.

Robert Browning ‘Paracelcus” Part I

The deluge of thoughts continued and brought a clear understanding of the words of Jesus. I had attended theological college after running away from home where biblical prophecy had been my passion. Now everything was revealed with infinite clarity and metaphorical understanding. Jesus was not Jesus Christ but Jesus a man known as The Christ. And we too become Christed when we follow his dictate to seek the kingdom within. It became clear why the dogma of religion had so appalled me in the orthodox church of my childhood. How can we be expected to worship anything or anyone external when God is within. The second coming is not a literal Jesus returning in the clouds. I saw how literalism is death to the soul and that the ‘second coming’ is a metaphor for each individual connecting with Self. This resurrection is from our living death to our own Christ consciousness.

I now understood why Jesus had said, ‘Forgive them for they know not what they do.” Until we have connected with our Higher Self how can we be held accountable for our mistakes. We are acting from conditioned consciousness, and not the innocent unconditioned consciousness of our souls. I knew my ‘wrongdoings’ prior to this moment could be viewed and judged as sins or mistakes, but such judgements would be as futile as judging a slumbering two year old child who thrashes in its sleep. Forgiveness is the only balm and just as I would ask forgiveness for my pre-awakened mistakes, so too must I forgive those who are yet asleep.

I could no longer attribute malice to anyone’s actions. How can we be held accountable for things we don’t know. Even the word ‘forgiveness’ has connotations of judgement. It was a moment of magnificent realisation; every action is conceived from a lack of awareness and unresolved pain, and everything can be resolved with love and acceptance.

If we could read the secret history of our enemies,

We should find in each man's life sorrow and

suffering enough to disarm all hostility.

Longfellow

A lifetime of anger towards my parents dissolved into compassion. My mother and father had endlessly spun their wheels in unconsciousness. How could I judge them when they hadn’t experienced such a moment of clarity as this.

The act of forgiveness restored my soul. ‘We are not punished for our anger but by our anger.’[9] But the sad paradox is forgiveness is not humanly possible - it is a gift from the gods – although freely given to those who seek and ask.

My heart had been broken but it was now open to love. Now I could truly love my parents and my husband and his lover. This was not the need-gratification of so called ‘love’ that easily turns into hate and vindictiveness, but the impersonal, unconditional love of God. I loved my husband for the first time in that moment, and knew that true love is when we do not begrudge the happiness of others, no matter where they find it.

Then in a near-death-like scenario a review of my life took place. A semi-circle of transparent bubbles appeared before me, each one attached to my heart with cords and threads of varying thicknesses; the more painful events connected by ugly twisted cords and the joyous scenes with exquisite silky threads.

In each was a chapter of life that awaited re-enactment, and one after the other they unfolded in fast motion. I saw my conception, gestation, birth and every event of my childhood. I felt each nuance of my parents’ pain and understood the reasons for their choices. They had been conditioned by previous dysfunctional generations as had those before them been wounded. No one knew how to break the cycle. I no longer judged both my grandmothers’ vicious castration of their husbands and sons. I was no longer angered by the men’s disempowerment by the matriarch or how they later took out their anger on their wives and children, thus beginning the cycle of violence all over again. My abhorrence of their lives was now replaced with understanding. Without divine intervention how could they have known of this endlessly spinning dysfunction when I too had looped into the painful dysfunction until this moment.

My mother had not chosen her insanity to hurt me. She was coping as best she could with her own pain. My husband had not purposely fallen in love with another woman to abandon me, but was simply striving to fill his desperate need for love and intimacy.

Shakespeare was one of mankind’s greatest metaphysicians. He understood the exquisite design of the plot and characters of each life and how everything has been chosen for maximal growth. We cannot evolve without challenges, and by necessity someone must choose a “Judas card” as surely as we choose such roles in the lives of others. Antagonists are our greatest teachers. We are not here to be loved but to love. It is easy to love the lovely. The test is to love those who hurt or revile us.

Clearly humanity is evolving psychologically and spiritually and every family and generation has its changelings of growth. This new perspective brought even more gratitude for every past moment that had brought me to this moment of awareness.

“If the only prayer you ever say in your entire life is thank you,

it will be enough.”

Meister Eckhart

As each life scene was reviewed it was released. The years with my husband, the situation with his lover, the joys of motherhood, my reputation in the corporate world, our beautiful home, our possessions; everything was blessed and released. I gently cut each cord and tie, gnarled or beautiful, and affirmed to each chapter as it floated out of sight: “Thank you. I let you go to your good. The Creator who created you maintains and sustains you, and I release you to your good.”

I was no longer defined by any of these roles. They were all but scaffoldings of the human experiences my spirit needed for growth. And now they could be dismantled. I remember thinking then, and have said many times since, that I would volunteer ten times over to re-live the trauma of my childhood and marriage … no, one hundred times … for the peace this moment had shown. And if no one else in the entire cosmos – if even Christ himself should come and say this was a figment of my imagination – I would have to say it mattered not. This was the most real experience of my life. It is the only reason we incarnate.

I could now agree with one of Dovtoyevsky’s characters, who having had a moment of clarity, is told he must walk a quadrillion miles before he can have another and joyously shouts out he will begin the journey immediately!

The lights changed to green and I was stunned to find myself in my car at a set of traffic lights at the railway crossing. Some years later I was delighted to read Sam Keen’s wonderful book The Passionate Life in which he used a metaphor for awakening; “The stop, look and listen of a railway crossing.” I drove home and knew the literal and metaphorical stop, look ,and listen had changed my life forever. I also know it will take me the rest of my life to fully explore and excavate the depths of that glimpse.

I had been reborn spiritually, emotionally and even physiologically. That night my husband noticed a change in my appearance. “What happened to you today?” he asked. I could say nothing except: “Something extraordinary happened today.” How does one speak of the Ineffable. It took me weeks to begin to articulate what had happened.

Forever changed

In one trillionth of a Universal second

Miraculously transported to a place sublime

Beyond the earthly fringe of unimportant things

To a vast Nothingness that holds the everything

Where eternal love melts into exquisite peace

For one sweet moment of surrender

My life became transformed, my vision was complete.

Forever changed  into a newborn living splendour

EBR – Switzerland 2002

The day after my awakening I visited my parents for the first time in years. During our childhood neither parent had once lovingly touched us children. There had been no bedtime hugs or kisses or words of love. We were only touched in anger and violence. That day, for the very first time, I hugged them and shared the experience of the day before. My mother seemed little moved. Sadly she continued her descent into psychosis and today at eighty still requires full time care. However before he died, my father forgave my rebellious disgracing of the family, and expressed pride in my achievements.

Others also began to see changes in my appearance and behaviour. After my experience in the car an IMB client didn’t recognise me although we had seen each other a week before. He was not convinced until he heard my voice for it seemed to him twenty years had been erased from my face. As indeed it had. My greatest fear had been confronted and now I was free to truly live.

I visited Dr. Davies a fortnight later as planned, but this time felt no annoyance in waiting. He greeted me with a smile. We said nothing to each other. He felt my pulses and examined my eyes and said:

” Ah, yes. Now isn’t that better. I see you have given all your power to God. No doubt you have been recruited for God’s work.”

I wondered how such a brief check could have revealed my inner state of mind.

“Yes. Now your true purpose can unfold. Your old life was not serving you or those around you. You are one of many thousands here to raise humanity’s consciousness in these evolutionary times. This is the time of the prophecies when God would be pouring His spirit upon the earth.”

He didn’t need to explain for in the past fortnight I had revisited my theological studies of the prophecies of the end times.

“You have the gift of articulation be it in spoken or written form. You are here to place your total trust in God and to share your personal experiences of Perennial Truth.”

A shiver of recognition shuddered through my body. In the past year I had become besotted with the lyrics of a musical gift from a friend’s young daughter. Terence McKenna and the group The Shamans introduced me to McKenna’s Re: Evolution. I had been deeply and profoundly moved to recognise some words that seemed to speak of my life mission when McKenna paraphrased William Blake:

“If the truth can be told so as to be understood

it will be believed.”

Dr. Davies then suggested several books he felt would impact my future. “Peter Erbe’s God I Am speaks of mankind’s evolution from the mass mind of collective altered perception to individual true perception. Read it and you will more understand your own experience.”

At that time I had no idea within a year I would spend a fascinating day with Erbe on his property on the east coast of Australia and that story comes later.

“Another book you will use in your work is the I Ching. This is an ancient and difficult Chinese text of which there are hundreds of translations. However Joseph Murphy’s simplified Secrets of the I Ching explains it eternal verities in simple language. Do not concern yourself with its machinations. Just open it at random and the oracle will speak to you. Be prepared to see the incredible power of the subconscious mind of God working through synchronicity.”

The I Ching has indeed become my most especially beloved guide and was confirmed in the dream instructions by Nietzsche and Jung to be the basis of these writings.

I was also to study ‘The Essay of Detachment” in The Gospel of the Essenes[11].

Dr Davies’ final words were, “You have surrendered to the Divine and found the kingdom within. You will be astonished at what the future brings. Eyes have not seen nor ears heard the wonders you will be experiencing. When we follow the immutable laws of wisdom we are assured of great peace and happiness.”

The consultation was over. We both knew there was nothing more to say. I did not think to question the part he had played in my awakening. Had he used vibrational medicine, or homeopathy, or was it something even more mystical.

I saw him again several years later at a public lecture but all attempts have since failed to locate him. He seems to have disappeared although his legacy continues.

In less than a year I felt there was no choice but to abandon my highly paid career and embark on a deeper exploration of spiritual life. It took courage to leap into the abyss with no visible means of support, but the universe has provided more abundantly than ever I had imagined.

It has been a time of great marvel and mystery. Dr Davies’ words often came to mind particularly during ten synchronistic journeys to sacred sites around the world; the Big Sur in California, the nine-hour train ride across Peru to Maccu Piccu, slip-sliding on -20c degree streets in Siberia, weeping with joy in Jung’s tower on Lake Zurich, or visiting profound and mystical India.

One morning six months after my awakening, in February 1993, I awoke and decided to call my friend Clyde. I had been resisting his invitation to attend his motivational sales meeting for a year but somehow it now felt the right time to go. As Victor Hugo said : “There is nothing more powerful as an idea whose time has come.” I was beginning to never second guess myself, and although Clyde believed the following week’s guest speaker would be more interesting I wouldn’t be dissuaded.

The excitement I felt while driving to the meeting the next morning augured well. The speaker was a man from Los Angeles named Drew Lawrence. He had studied the ancient Indian scriptures, the Vedas, and used its parables and metaphors to illustrate human nature as it relates to business practices of today. We were introduced after the meeting and he shared the true nature of his work. He was a Vedic astrologer. In the past my fears, which were born of ignorance, had made me disdainful of ‘soothsayers and fortune tellers’ but things had changed.

I gave Drew my birth date and place and we made an appointment for the next day. Apparently the accuracy of such readings is dependent on the time of birth but this information was lost in the darkness of my mother’s mental condition. Nevertheless the chart reading the following day was nothing less than spectacular.

He first handed me a three-page printout of astrologically significant days in a possible life span of 120 years beginning on the day of my birth. My eyes were drawn to a highlighted date at the bottom of the first page which left me stunned and speechless. The highlighted date was August 27, 1992!

“What is this date?” I gasped.

“You know what this date is,” he replied.

“Of course I do,” I spluttered, “but how did you get that date!”

“In astrological terms this was the day you went into double Saturn. Saturn is a hard taskmaster. It means if you are not willing to give up that which is not good for you it will be taken from you. Whatever was taken from you then no longer served you.”

It was astonishing that this stranger with no previous knowledge of my life would have chosen the one day in more than 100 years that had so impacted my life.

And then quietly and almost reverently he said: “My dear, that day had been earmarked for you for eons of time. It was simply your rendezvous with Destiny.”

Jolimont, Perth - Western Australia

2006-10-10T23:46:00.000-07:00

Elsa Marshall
Attuned to the Universe

http://elsamarshall.com

Jolimont, Perth Australia
July 2005 ...

A few months ago I returned to Perth to finish writing my book. If we are in the right place we find things flow according to the metaphysics of life. The Law of Intent and Imagination promises we will become magnets and attract to us what we visualize.

I needed somewhere to live and began to imagine the perfect abode. It had to be conducive to the creative process; a tranquil and sunlit place; set near parklands where it would feel like living 'as if in the treetops'; and where only the songs of birds would disturb the serenity. And it had to be within a few kilometers of my son Ben.

Incredibly three days later all this appeared literally as if my thoughts were translated into a holographic image!

As I write glorious winter sunshine pours into the room. I can hear the sound of children playing in the wooded parkland opposite and see black swans sailing serenely on the sparkling lake. And best of all, apart from birds that come and sing in the paperbark trees just outside the window, is the unexpected sounds of frogs croaking at night!

I followed my intuition and through an ‘effortless, unhurried and unworried’ series of synchronicity found this apartment - and all this just two kilometres from my son and the hub of the delightful suburb of Subiaco!

If all this sounds too good to be true perhaps I should also be sending you photos!

This is how metaphysics works. Whenever we hold an inner picture in our minds it will eventually manifest in outer reality. It’s a bit like asking the operating system on a computer to go to the hard disk and bring us the required program. We really do live in an interactive universe.

If you would like to learn more about metaphysics or dreams, or perhaps understand why something keeps popping up in your life, be it a person, place or thing, please let me know. Many of us are at crossroads in our lives and there is an explanation for that as well.

Keep well …and remember a dream that is not understood is like a letter from the soul that is not opened.

Elsa

Jarod and Eminem

2006-09-17T00:22:00.000-07:00

JAROD AND EMINEM

Thursday September 14, 2006

Last weekend I went to a Christopher Howard Breakthrough Weekend. It was spectacular! The man is a master presenter and linguist. His ability to articulate spiritual depth and transformative insights is exceptional.

There were many highlights during the weekend. I saw a couple of old friends and met several new ones, but the thing I most enjoyed was meeting Jarod on Sunday morning. I really love seeing people’s reaction when they first see how the Universe sends messages through synchronicity.

Chris encourages his audience to mingle so after the break I moved from the front to the very back of the auditorium. I had a strong feeling to sit there even though there were only a handful of people in these back rows, and the session was just about to start when a young man came and sat directly in front of me. Even though I couldn’t see his face I felt one of those strong resonances that always match up when I eventually meet the person.

He was a well built, young man whose woollen beanie completely covered his hair. I guessed he was probably in his late teens and wondered if my feelings of tenderness towards him were because he reminded me of my nephew. Whatever the reason I couldn't stop sending him wave after wave of love.

The day before we had explored the limiting beliefs that kept us from our heart’s desires before we paired up with someone to share those dreams. Later we listed the values of someone we admired for having achieved those dreams and now Chris asked us to find someone and spend a few minutes convincing them how we planned to ferociously pursue these role-model-based dreams. I loved how he constantly used the word ‘ferociously’.

I tapped the young man on the shoulder if asked if he would join me. He climbed over the seat and stood next to me and looking into his eyes I knew my intuition had been was right. He was a really beautiful soul and when the music started we began sharing our stories.

Jarod was at the seminar with his father because he was going through a really hard time. He felt lost and confused and had no idea how to pursue a career in music. But something interesting had happened yesterday during the sharing exercise. He told the woman he was talking with that the music playing was his hero, and she happened to be looking for someone who knew this artist’s lyrics for a gig she was organizing!

‘So things have already started moving for you!’ I said. ‘That’s wonderful.’

Jarod agreed and gesturing with his hands said the music now playing was also the same artist! He seemed moved by this and I asked who it was not really expecting to know him. But it was Eminem! A couple of years ago my son Ben introduced me to Eminem and so I was able to share some of Eminem's poignant video clips that had moved me to tears.

‘Jarod, these coincidences are significant. This is called synchronicity. Isn’t it amazing that two Eminem tracks would be playing during these exercises? This is your sign from the Universe. Whenever you hear Eminem take note of what you were thinking, and you’ll be amazed to see you are being given the go ahead to do something for your future.’

He started to tell me about having heard Eminem recently on the train when he interrupted himself.

‘Is that your name?’ he said pointing to my name tag and shaking his head in disbelief. ‘Your name is Marshall? That’s Eminem’s name!’

‘Yes, I know his name is Marshall,’ I said. ‘And this even more confirms you are on the right track! This is another sign to follow your heart and to go into music. These coincidences come with emotional hits so we learn to recognize them as messages from the Universe that wants us to keep going.’

He listened all the while shaking his head and looking at my name tag. We both had goosebumps. It was a wonderful moment. I told him I would write this blog and felt really honored at the end of the day when Jarod sought me out to say thank you. After a final hug of reassurance he was gone, but not before I congratulated his father on what a fine young son he had.

I have a feeling this is just the start of our friendship and that one day I will be telling people about my first meeting with Jarod, the world famous rapper!

PS - a few days after posting this I was delighted to hear from Jarod. See blog ... Jarod's Story Continues ...

Elsa Marshall

Perth, Australia

www.elsamarshall.com

Jarod's Story Continues ...

2006-09-16T21:56:00.000-07:00

EXCITING NEWS FROM JAROD - THE RAPPER !

Don’t you just love synchronicity!

Spring has arrived here in Australia and it’s no coincidence so many wonderful things are happening for me and those around me!

Spring is the season of new budding, blossoming, and blooming. It’s when our winter impatience and confusion at last give way to wondrous new possibilities.

One of the benefits of journaling is to see recurrent themes in life. For the past fourteen years I’ve noticed just when my patience seems about ready to run out springtime brings wonderful new opportunities.

The metaphysical Truth is we can trust that it's always darkest before the dawn.

This year it’s been about my book. I’ve been slogging on it for years and really felt quite depressed this winter when suddenly two international publishing houses are showing interest in the story.

And now there’s good news from Jarod too. I had just posted the blog about how we met and the synchronicities with Eminem that meant so much to him when this email came through.

Hi Elsa,

Just writing to say hi and thank you again.

When I returned to work last week I went down to see one of my workmates Mitchell to catch up and another piece of my new exciting puzzle fell into place.

As soon as I had said hi and how you going he told me about a music production course to become a producer.

Mitch is African-American and is also very much into rap and he would be into producing rap records.

I told him about my experience and you and he was amazed as well. We both seem to think that we will team up in the future to make albums.

I just thought you might like to know how things are developing.

Thanks,

Jarod

I really liked the way he said ‘… and another piece of my new exciting puzzle fell into place’ and feel a real vibe that one day I’ll be celebrating with him and Mitch on the successful release of their first album.

So thank you Jarod and keep in touch!

Elsa

Perth, Australia

28^th September, 2006

All Solutions are Spiritual

2006-09-15T20:20:00.000-07:00

Biblio-therapy and Meta-psychiatry

“All problems are psychological, and all solutions are spiritual."

Dr Thomas Hora

I’ve known many people, myself included, whose life work was revealed in the trauma of childhood. My mother’s psychosis seeded my lifelong interest in all things psychiatric and metaphysical, whereas the son of a friend became a medical researcher into renal failure because of his mother’s reliance on dialysis.

Life often brings a string of related synchronicities as if to get our attention. In the past few months I’ve been struck by the references to psychiatry, philosophy and spirituality, and as the purpose of synchronicity is to tell us we are on track, this has been very thrilling!

The first connection to psychiatry and philosophy was reading Irvin Yalom’s The Schopenhauer Cure. He had been in the process of writing this when I visited two years ago to share the impact of another of his teaching novels.

The Schopenhauer Cure is an enthralling story about a psychiatrist who learns he is dying of melanoma. He wants to know if he had really helped any of his patients, and decides to ask a former patient with a sexual addiction who had prematurely left his practice. The former patient says this was because he was receiving little, if any, help, but had gone on to heal himself by reading the ideas and thoughts of the philosopher Schopenhauer.

Yalom refers to this as ‘biblio-therapy’. How I love that word! The first and only time I heard it was from a psychologist during my decade long study of psychological and philosophical literature. After a very interesting conversation I asked if psychological analysis with her would benefit me, and was surprised when she said,

“I don’t think you need to see me because you have already biblio-therapised yourself. ‘Biblio’, Greek for book, and ‘therapy’ cure or healing. You have healed yourself by reading.”

Naturally I felt a resonance at seeing Yalom’s reference to biblio-therapy in The Schopenhauer Cure, and this connection between psychiatry and philosophy was soon followed by a related synchronicity.

I had just finished reading Schopenhauer when a dream told me to Google a man named David Hawkins. I would discover he was a quantum physicist and metaphysician whose work would compliment my own.

In reality I hadn’t heard this name before and asked if I wasn’t confusing him with Stephen Hawking, the author of A Brief History of Time. The telepathic dream voice was emphatic. This man’s name was ‘David Hawkins’ which I was to remember and Google first thing in the morning.

You can imagine my surprise to discover he really did exist! And just as the dream said he was a pioneer of metaphysics and teacher of consciousness. It was also interesting to see he was a psychiatrist in view of my fascination with psychiatry since childhood.

I immediately ordered his audio tapes on enlightenment as well as his book Power vs Force. His work is thrilling and clearly underlines my own experiences. Hawkins has calibrated what he calls the Map of Consciousness and teaches that no healing is possible without surrender to a Higher Force.

No doubt the Intelligence of the Field of Consciousness that offers messages through dreams and synchronicity brought us together for my higher learning, for which I’m most grateful!

This dream about Hawkins with its psychiatric/philosophical/spiritual resonance seemed to magnetize me for within several weeks other links flooded in.

Firstly I went to Melbourne to visit my daughter and son-in-law and noticed a delightful little book on their bookshelf called The Consolations of Philosophy by Alain de Botton. What a wonderful title and so much in keeping with the tenets of Yalom’s Schopenhauer Cure.

Consolations is a great read and one I highly recommend. De Botton has taken the works of well known philosophers and used their ideas to solve everyday human problems. I was pleased he chose my dream mentor and friend Nietzsche as having said he ‘wrote a daily anecdote about his observations of life’. I love finding new parallels between myself and Nietzsche and have also written daily journals for the past fourteen years.

An Amazon review of Consolations refers to de Botton as ‘a medicine man for the soul’. Both my Jungian analysts said my life’s work was as ‘a spiritual midwife’ and ‘doctor of the soul’ and although I’d intuited this since childhood it was good to be positively mirrored. Those of us dealing with low self-esteem borne of parental neglect often need healthy doses of validation.

As I’ve so often said, the thing I most love about living life from the-inside-out is to have moved from literalism to holographic unity. When we have a glimpse of unity perception our lives are changed, as psychiatrist Ruben Feldman Gonzalez says it is the great leap of the mind.

The physicality of people, places, and things each represents a metaphor of a collective deeper picture. I often think of it being like those Magic Eye pictures. When we first look at them they are just a jumble of colored spots, but when we de-focus – and that’s the operative word – a three-dimensional image miraculously appears.

Botton paraphrases Epicurus to explain this; “Objects mimic in a material dimension what we require in a psychological one. We need to rearrange our minds, but are lured towards new shelves. We buy a cashmere cardigan as a substitute for the counsel of friends.”

An example of an inner and outer metaphor is a friend who is feeling trapped by his life. The other day he said he wants a new car and sees a particular vehicle wherever he goes. He even dreams about them! When I asked what sort of vehicle it was I wasn’t surprised when he said a 4-wheel drive named Discovery! Cars symbolize how we move through life, and his soul is saying he needs to metaphorically hit the road and make new discoveries! This is the fun and pun of the multi-dimensional inner life!

I can’t remember now how I found the next link on the web but there it was – another book on the consolations of philosophy! It was the brilliantly titled Plato not Prozac! – Applying Eternal Wisdom to Everyday Problems by Lou Marinoff, a professor of philosophy in New York.

The title was wonderful, but its sub-title even more resonant because it is identical to the purpose of my book as given by Nietzsche and Jung in that series of dreams. I suddenly felt at home with these authors who felt like my literary friends and peers. The profound medium Martin Sherlock (I’ll post a Blog about him soon) and my Jungian analysts all encouraged me to see this aspect of myself. They believed the day would come when I would stop revering those who were in fact my peers.

Lou Marinoff had also written about the power of philosophy to give meaning in life, to gain self-knowledge, and to find inner peace. He says it often helps to articulate these issues and to bounce them off another person, and this is the role of what he calls the ‘philosophical counselor.’ They are there to facilitate people’s examination.

What a great phrase – ‘philosophical counselor.’ This has even further helped clarify my future role with people, as my lifelong mantra has been Socrates’ maxim that ‘the unexamined life is not worth living’.

And then today the culmination of all these coincidences came into one wondrous word. Meta-psychiatry!

I received an e-newsletter from Nancy Rosanoff, a New York based expert on intuition, who was offering a course on the work of Dr Thomas Hora. Although I’ve never heard of him before I recognized by the intensity of my reaction that this was important.

A bit of fun and digression as always with the words Marinoff and Rosanoff! I have strong connections with Marin County in California and also with roses. My lifelong vision to live in the States has been confirmed by profound solicited and unsolicited readings with astrologers and mediums one of whom even suggested Marin County. And last year I became known as ‘The Rose Lady’ in the San Francisco Spiritualist Church. So I’ve often visualized that when my life takes off I will live in semi-rural Marin County in a house with a beautiful rose garden.

Talking about ‘taking off’ – not long ago I had an amazing dream in which a space shuttle attempts to take off here in Perth but flops back to earth destroying everything from my childhood up until now. In reality my life in Perth is a flop. However in the next scene a similar space shuttle takes off in the United States and lifts off spectacularly! It’s often said when we reach for the stars we will attain our highest destiny, or as Nietzsche said:

“One must have chaos and frenzy within oneself

to give birth to a dancing star.”

I found this photo of Nancy and because I think we look alike have put it on my desktop to continue to impregnate my subconscious with the image of sitting in a similarly beautiful garden in America. I have seen too often how our lives undoubtedly become the out-picturing of the sum of our subconscious beliefs.

 Nancy wrote:

Metapsychiatry is a method of healing and truth realization articulated by Dr.Thomas Hora.  
Dr. Hora was a psychiatrist who incorporated the teachings of The Buddha, Jesus and
metaphysics out of his desire to relieve the suffering of his patients.


It approaches mental, emotional and physical health from the perspective that we are
spiritual beings with the capacity to discern who we are and the purpose of our life.


Metapsychiatry provides a non-dogmatic, understandable method which, when understood, relieves
every kind of suffering through individual realization of what is true.


His book; Beyond the Dream, is recommended reading for this seminar, but not mandatory.

I researched Hora and was moved beyond words. He was a Hungarian born and trained psychiatrist who migrated to the States in 1945 with his devoted wife Madeleine whom he called ‘my beloved companion on the path.’ He established a private practice in New York, interestingly just as had David Hawkins.

“He began to see that orthodox forms of treatment did not always bring healing of the ills of mankind and in seeking to gain a deeper understanding of these issues was led to spiritual literature.

His spiritual quest included the contemplation of the literature of the world’s great religions. He also read and assimilated the elevated works of individuals such as Plato, Shakespeare, Carl Jung, Teilhard de Chardin, Kierkegaard, Krishnamurti, Mary Baker Eddy, Joel Goldsmith and Alan Watts.

(It was exciting to see these names, all of whom are among my favorite metaphysical teachers, particularly Joel Goldsmith and Alan Watts whose biography In My Own Way is a funny and profound account of the spiritual journey.)

In his comprehensive studies Dr Hora was said to have attained a profound spiritual understanding of the healing work and teachings of Jesus, and these illumined teachings became a cornerstone of his Metapsychiatric discipline.

By 1967 he was acknowledged as a seminal thinker and pioneer researcher of consciousness, and had trasncended the practice of traditional methods of psychiatry. He came to see there can be no healing without God.

In his own words: "All problems are psychological, and all solutions are spiritual."

Essentially, he became a "physician of the soul", increasingly interested in guiding individuals to a spiritually centred and abundant life through which wholeness could be realized. He withdrew from participation in professional societies and focused all his time and attention on responding to those who came to him with their suffering.

His appeal was broad. He drew students of all faiths and backgrounds from throughout the world, many of whom grew sufficiently in understanding to be redeemed and liberated, leaving their 'patient' status behind them to become authentic seekers in search of higher levels of spiritual wisdom. Some of their individuals have gone on to become spiritually-oriented counselors and teachers, in addition to those counselors and therapists whom he had already trained or whose work he had supervised.

Others continued to study with him for fifteen to twenty years or more, remaining with him long after experiencing healing and an improved over-all well-being, in order to allow this, by now, enlightened master to guide them further along the spiritual path. Thomas Hora described the revelatory nature of Metapsychiatry in the following way:

"Metapsychiatry is a gift of God to our time. We have built a new road which is neither religious, nor materially scientific, nor political. We have come to understand it as an epistemological method of truth realization. Metapsychiatry came into the world to put soul into psychiatry and to breathe the life of Spirit into the 'valley of dry bones.'

Dr. Hora was actively engaged in his work as a spiritual guide and was teaching classes until shortly before his passing, which occurred on October 30, 1995. He left a legacy of four books, twelve booklets (short essays on specific topics) and many classes and conference tapes, as well as many grateful students whose quality of life has been transformed through their work in Metapsychiatry.

The back cover of Deepak Chopra's wonderful book Synchro-Destiny says: "There is no such thing as a meaningless coincidence. Coincindences are messages about the miraculous potential of each moment and, if you understand the forces that shape them, you can start to transform you life."

Nietzsche advised us to “Amor fati – love your fate” and these synchronicities have made me fall even more deeply in love with my destiny. I hope you will also begin to see the coincidences in your life as signposts on the road, and use them to fulfill your deepest desires.

Elsa Marshall

August 2006

Perth Australia

www.elsamarshall.com

David Hawkins

2006-08-09T00:14:00.000-07:00

JULY 2006 – DAVID HAWKINS

Those who know me have seen the impact of dreams in my life since a defining moment fourteen years ago.

Some have even been affected by dreams that have taken me at different times to Siberia, Greece, Switzerland, California and Bali. Just recently a dream of a school friend was followed the very next morning by an email that connected us for the first time in 40 years!

While some dreams have forewarned the events of 9/11, the tsunami in Indonesia, and hurricane Katrina, others have brought news of the births, deaths, and important events of family and friends. I have even had visitations from dream-mentors who came to offer guidance and inspiration for the writing of my book.

But the first and only time a dream introduced me to anyone by name was on the night of April 5, which also happens to be my daughter’s birthday.

In the dream I go into a new book café. I am drawn to a magnificent old book with soft thick pages beautifully worn at the edges, and exquisite hand drawn images. It is a well loved copy of the ‘I Ching’ and inside the front cover is the previous owner’s handwriting; David Hawkins.

I am told he is a quantum physicist and teacher of metaphysics whose name I was to Google the next morning. Because our experiences are similar I am told to incorporate his deeper understanding of metaphysics into my own writing.

I ask the unseen presence had I got it wrong. Wasn’t this meant to be Stephen of the big bang theory? No. This was definitely David and the Hawkins had no ‘g’.

The next morning I was stunned to discover he really did exist and that he fitted the dream’s criteria! David Hawkins is a psychiatrist, quantum physicist, and teacher of metaphysics who has calibrated what he calls the Map of Consciousness using kinesiology.

The mention of the word kinesiology reminded me that just the day before I’d been thinking about my one and only experience with kinesiology.

I needed my birth time for an astrological reading, and when the practitioner asked me to resist different times before confirming 7.31 pm I unexpectedly burst into tears. At the time this had confused me, but now I understood I was feeling my mother’s distress at giving birth to her lover’s child, her husband’s brother, and that I also hadn't wanted to come into this lifetime.

I have learnt in my Jungian dream work that dreams are initially to be taken subjectively, so I felt the dream that introduced me to David Hawkins was talking about my own inner David-Hawkins-like-author-teacher. This augured well as I am hoping my book will be published soon so my teaching work can start. The reference to the I Ching was wonderful because its ancient Truths are already a big part of my journey and the basis of my writing.

Of course it was delightful to meet my inner David Hawkins, but somehow I felt it could also mean I was meant to meet the real life David.

In the past I’ve often experienced intense resonances to people, places, and things that later manifest in reality in direct proportion to the intensity of the original psychic zap.

For instance I knew at first glance the man introducing the speaker at a lecture would be part of my future. We didn’t meet until nine years later, and when we did I instantly connected with him and his wife and we have been family ever since.

I was intrigued by David Hawkins’ work and immediately sent away for his tapes on enlightenment and bought his book Power vs Force. I highly recommend you do the same!

It has been thrilling to hear David's experiences some of which are similar to my own. I resonate very deeply with his work and agree when he says he was only a witness to the writing of Power vs Force. I also agree with him that the karma of mankind was changed with its writing because for the first time in all of human history we have a way to discern truth from falsehood.

He says: ‘Until now, nobody, nowhere in time, has been able to discern truth from falsehood except advanced mystics and they stayed in safe places. They didn’t go to the front lines.’

This excerpt from the Nightingale website clearly describes his work:

For thousands of years, men and women have been seeking enlightenment - that state of absolute clarity, understanding, and deep inner peace.

Now this age-old spiritual quest has been united with science, and the result is being hailed by everyone from Nobel Prize winners to world leaders as the most critical spiritual breakthrough in decades!

David Hawkins, M.D., Ph. D. conducted a 29 year study that demonstrated that the human body becomes stronger or weaker depending on a person's mental state. He created a scale from 1-1,000 that mapped human consciousness. Furthermore, he demonstrated that this "Map of Consciousness" can be used as a blueprint to reach higher states of consciousness, states that can be identified simply by applying a small amount of pressure on an outstretched arm!

I also felt a strong resonance to the fact that David was a psychiatrist. In the weeks surrounding the dream there had been recurrent themes of psychiatrists and philosophers who incorporated metaphysics into their work.

At the time of the dream I was reading Irvin Yalom’s The Schopenhauer Cure. Yalom is a professor of psychiatry at Stanford University who writes teaching novels. His book When Nietzsche Wept was the catalyst for an amazing synchronicity in Switzerland that culminated in Nietzsche appearing in my dreams. The inference and outcome of those life-changing dreams have been part of the most heightened time of my life.

I had emailed Yalom with the story and he invited me to visit. We spent a delightful hour together in the garden cottage of his home in Palo Alto where at that time he was writing The Schopenhauer Cure.

The Schopenhauer Cure is about a psychiatrist whose former patient reads the philosophy of Schopenhauer to heal himself. Yalom uses the word ‘biblio-therapy’ to describe this. I love this word. The first time I heard it was from a psychologist who felt I had read myself to health and so there was no need for me to become her client.

I had also recently come across the fabulously titled Plato not Prozac by Lou Marinoff, a professor of philosophy. Its subtitle, ‘Applying eternal wisdom to everyday problems’ sent chills down my spine because this was the intent of my book as described by my dream mentors Nietzsche and Jung.

Life sends its clues in clusters. The coincidences continued with an introduction to Alain de Botton’s Consolations of Philosophy, and to Thomas Hora, a psychiatrist who incorporated the metaphysical teachings of the Ancient Masters in what he called ‘meta-psychiatry’.

The more I learnt about David’s work the more intoxicated and grateful I became. Imagine being introduced to this wonderful teacher in a dream!

I once read that when wondrous things happen in our lives it is God showing off!

I wanted to contact David and share my excitement. I wanted to share my story and ask if he would connect me with a publisher in the States. And I wanted to say how much fun it was listening to him during my daily walks in glorious Kings Park when I would often laugh aloud at his infectious laughter.

But the FAQ’s on his website were clear and precise. He asks people not to write for the very reasons I wanted to, and so with some disappointment I handed it over and invoked the Prayer of Increase or Decrease.

To see what happens next see the blog: Eddie Would Go!

Elsa Marshall

Perth Australia

July 2006

www.elsamarshall.com

Eddie Would Go!

2006-08-07T23:43:00.000-07:00

August 1, 2006 - Perth Australia

Eddie Would Go!

How the Universe sent a message with an Eddie Would Go! bumper sticker.

Because he’d been introduced in a dream I felt an inner prompting to contact David Hawkins. Then I read the FAQ’s on his website and changed my mind. He asks people not to write asking for help which is exactly the reason I wanted to contact him.

(See David Hawkins blog)

I've often noticed that when the Universe wants to get our attention it will knock three times by sending those coincidences we call synchronicity. Synchronicity is a coincidence that has psychological meaning and after the third synchronicity I usually feel it’s time to take action.

The first thing was David Hawkins uses the example of tuning forks for entrainment in his book Power vs Force which is the reason I am holding tuning forks in my website photo
Just after the dream I listened to Wayne Dyer’s Power of Intention for the first time and was delighted to hear him speak of Hawkins with deep respect.
While driving in an unfamiliar part of town and telling a friend about this I glanced up just in time to see a restaurant named Veritas, the same name as Hawkins’ website and publishing house.

I wanted to share the dream and its message to incorporate his work into mine, but I was afraid to intrude and expose myself to David’s rejection so I handed it over and invoked The Prayer of Increase or Decrease.

The Prayer of Increase or Decrease says God-given desires will increase while those that wither and die have more likely come from the ego.

The more I listened to David’s tapes the more I resonated to his work. I felt it was clear he had been brought into my life for a reason and although I tried to push him from my mind the daydreams started.

I found that during my afternoon walks a wonderful scenario began to play out in my mind. I would write to David and he would be intrigued by our introduction via the Field of Consciousness, the Field that knows all and orchestrates everything and he would offer to help make my dream come true.

However the more I thought about writing to him the more my inner critic rampaged. Who did I think I was! Why would someone like David Hawkins be interested in me! I vacillated between being amazed by the dream and then telling myself to just forget about it all.

Then a couple of things happened. The first was more synchronicities around Wayne Dyer and then a message that came from the I Ching.

Around the time of the dream I was writing about diverse things including my difficulty in finishing my book, some experiences in Maccu Piccu, and a chance meeting with Wayne Dyer in Perth that reminded me of a remarkable synchronicity with one of his books in Switzerland that had been the catalyst for the spiritual awakening of my friend, when twice randomly selecting Wayne Dyer tapes heard him talking about these very things!

I couldn’t help feeling that Hawkins and Dyer, who know each other, are part of my spiritual tribe; the tribe that sustains me from afar and with whom I crave to be in the United States.

The other thing that happened was when I opened the I Ching and read that I was to stop vacillating and to make the decision to follow my heart. But I was still a scaredy-cat and so the Universe pulled out a biggie! It sent Eddie ...

This afternoon, as usual while walking in Kings Park and listening to David’s tapes, I fell into the reverie of the fairytale sequence of events should I write him. I remembered Nietzsche’s words that we are never to trust any thought that doesn’t originate whilst out in Nature, and I wondered if these thoughts were somehow related to several recent Big Dreams.

Big Dreams, unlike their less intense ‘interim-report' counterparts, are those that come with such a heightened sense of realism we know we are being given a sneak preview into the future. They are the sorts of dreams that stay in our minds for years and are never quite forgotten, and because I've had dozens of such dreams that have come true I’ve learnt to not take them lightly.

In the first dream I am in Perth where a space shuttle flops back to earth and destroys everything from my childhood home up until my most recent of ten visits to the States. In the next scene I see an identical shuttle take off in the United States and this time it lifts off successfully!

In the second dream ‘an enormous tidal wave blots out the sky and rips the earth asunder,’ and wipes away everything. However there is no anxiety or fear just happiness that the past has been wiped away and I am now standing on higher ground.

On the drive home I was still thinking about all this when a personalized car license plate took my attention. I guess this triggered my memory of 'Eddie the Eagle.'

Eddie Edwards was the first British competitor in the Winter Olympics. He barely qualified; he was short, inexperienced, overweight, and wore thick glasses. He could barely see without them and yet there he was, flying like an eagle, at the Calgary Games in 1988!

He won the hearts and minds of the world for his courage and daring. He became known as ‘Eddie the Eagle’ and soon afterwards ‘Eddie Would Go!’ bumper stickers appeared on cars.

If Eddie would go, then why would we not also dare!

A few years later I saw a more delightful version. This time it was ‘Eddie Went!’ Not only would Eddie dare to go but Eddie actually went! I happened to be in Bali at that time having just jumped off the Grand Canyon with no visible means of financial support, and was discovering that baby eagles always learn to fly.

Come to the edge, he said
They said : We are afraid
Come to the edge, he said
They came He pushed them … and they flew.

Guillaume Apollinaire

Because I’ve seen how every thought has potential significance I wondered if my remembering Eddie was meant to be the final push to contact David Hawkins.

Now at that moment – and I mean at that precise moment - a large 4-wheel drive vehicle on my right sped up, overtook me, and then slowed down again. I instinctively looked across and because the back bumper was directly in line with my vision the first thing I saw was a small sticker with the words Eddie Would Go!

I gasped aloud and did one of those double-takes you see in cartoons. I turned away to make sure it wasn’t my imagination. But no there it was in black and white!

It’s been almost twenty years since I’ve seen an Eddie Would Go! sticker so the timing and ‘centimeter of coincidence’ is truly breathtaking.

The four attributes of synchronicity are:

Acausality
Comes with strong psychic hits
Arrives at times of crossroads in our lives
And brings deep symbolic meaning

One doesn’t have to be an Einstein to see the message - it couldn’t have been any clearer.

If Eddie would go, and Eddie went, and Eddie soared like an eagle then it was time for me to again dare to follow the inner whisperings of the gods.

I emailed David Hawkins …

Elsa Marshall

Perth, Australia

August 2006

www.elsamarshall.com

The Pearl Pendant

2006-08-06T21:11:00.000-07:00

Give Us This Day Our Daily Omen

The Pearl Pendant

There is no chance, accident, or coincidence in a world ruled by law and order. As Emerson said “Every experience fits you like your skin.”

So-called chance is the working of unseen power in your life based on the contents of your subconscious mind.

Coincidence means two things happening at the same place or point of time. Two things are always occurring – your thought and the reaction of your subconscious to your thought. Coincidence is the action of your conscious mind and the correlating reaction of your subconscious mind.

The outside experiences, conditions and events of your life simply mirror the inside: hence the great truth ‘As within, so without.’

I've seen the truth of this too many times to remember and it happened again this morning when I found a pearl pendant lying on the road just after I had been talking about pearls with my friend.

The synchronicity was the timing of finding the pearl. The serendipity was the psychological effect this had on me in view of the significance of pearls in my life.

Lynne lives in the country and was having a day in town so we arranged to meet for coffee. Because she is deeply involved in my life I took along the exquisite photo of the cubes of ice and she agreed. It was exactly what we had envisaged for the cover of my as-yet-to-be-published book.

I had received instructions to write this book in a dream and Lynne and her husband Tony spent an exhilarating afternoon helping me decipher the meaning of its cryptic title 'Peggy Melts Ice'.

The book was to be written 'in the vernacular so people could easily understand that problems will effortlessly melt away when we apply ancient Truths to our lives.’ I understood the concept well, but what did the metaphor actually mean?

Lynne and Tony are longtime lovers of cryptic crosswords and were up to the challenge! And we soon discovered the meaning was as simple as the writing style was to be.

When they looked up the name Peggy in the Oxford dictionary they found that Peggy is the diminutive of Margaret which is Greek for pearl. This was the clue I'd been waiting for and in that moment the rest of the metaphor was made clear!

Ever since childhood I've loved the analogy that spiritual understanding, the Great Pearl of Wisdom, is something so valuable that no man who finds it would barter all the trinkets of the world. That’s how simple it was! The Pearl of Wisdom is the anti-freeze that will melt all inner frozenness to reveal the soul!

That afternoon we sat around the kitchen table and watched a pearl on a cube of ice gradually melt it and agreed this should be the image on the book. In my mind I saw a turquoise-blue cover, blue being the symbolic color of the Law of God and our subconscious minds as well as wisdom, clarity, truth, and freedom of expression.

Naturally since then any reference to ice or pearls always comes with a strong psychic hit and reminds me to stay focused on my writing.

Shelley had brought the New Scientist magazine to our Salon of Serendipity meeting to share its cover article ‘Water’s Quantum Secret’. The secrets of water were fascinating but it was the photo of the exquisite turquoise-blue cubes of ice that enraptured me. This was the closest thing to our vision and Lynne agreed. All we needed now would be a pearl to complete the picture.

I felt that finding the photo was a sign that my published book was getting closer in reality as I’ve recently connected with several publishing houses.

After coffee we walked up the hill to the store where Lynne wanted to look at new towels and we hugged goodbye. I crossed the street and was just about to step up onto the pavement when something on the road took my eye.

It was a pearl pendant! It was amazing to be holding a pearl so soon after our conversation, and when I took it back to Lynne she also immediately saw the connection.

Here was my daily love letter! The Universe sends us encouragement in the form of synchronicity and with a heart bursting with gratitude I drove home.

I’ve noticed the Universe often sends something else as if to underline its messages. I live in a quiet tree-lined street opposite a park where new visitors are obvious and so couldn't help but notice this distinctive number plate: YEA 03.

My mind immediately went to Ralph Waldo Emerson who exhorted us

“To say a hearty yea to life!”

and to Pythagoras who believed every life event has an accompanying number.

The number 3 is the number many writers and poets are born under as it relates to the ability to express oneself through both the spoken and written word. It is the first number of my composite birth number.

What a wonderful message from the Universe!

'Keep saying a hearty yea to your life's purpose

which is to communicate through the written word!"

The last time I found some jewelry it was returned to its owner through the power of intent. (‘Ring on the Beach’ - Stories on my website)

The moment I picked up the pearl pendant I put out the intent to return it to its owner and have a feeling this might somehow be connected to my book.

Only time will tell and in the great adventure of life I can’t wait to see what happens next!

Elsa Marshall

Subiaco, Australia

www.elsamarshall.com

The Pearl Pendant - A Happy Ending!

2006-08-05T21:13:00.000-07:00

The Pearl Pendant - a happy ending!

Friday 25^th August 2006

Last week I shared the story of finding a pearl pendant on the road, and what that meant to me.

Today a woman called to say she had seen my ad in the Post Paper. She had lost a pendant outside the Post Office last Friday and hoped it was the one advertised. She described it in perfect detail and went on to say it had been a 25th wedding university gift from her husband. At the emotion in her voice tears filled my eyes and I was delighted to say her precious pearl was right here on my desk!

Jan came over right away and within minutes we were each sharing our sides of the story. She hadn’t noticed the pearl was missing until that night and she was devastated more because it was the first and only piece of jewelry her husband had bought her. In his words all jewelry is trinkets.

The word ‘trinkets’ resonated. I usually describe the Pearl of Wisdom as being something for which no man would barter all the baubles in the world, and yet in the first blog unconsciously chose the word ‘trinkets’ instead. (And as I write this a couple of kookaburras in the trees outside my window seem to be in on the joke!)

Jan had given up hope of finding the pearl and her family was surprised at how badly she had taken its loss. However her daughter Tania felt it would be returned and had constantly reassured her mother not to give up.

The next day Jan retraced her steps and even went into the Post Office where I had left my phone number. We worked out the pearl had been lying on the road for over two hours, so it was even more coincidental I should have found it before anyone else. We also marveled that none of the many cars that come and go in the 5-minute bays had driven over it.

It was interesting to see some common threads between her husband and my son. Her husband who works in the oil and shipping industries had bought the pearl in Dubai, and later this year my son who works in the oil industry is planning to visit his friend Oliver in Dubai who works in shipping!

Jan was fascinated to hear of the significance of pearls in my life and of my having found it just after talking with Lynne. We had a delightful time chatting about metaphysics and the symbolism of my book's title. Jan hadn’t known Peggy is the diminutive of the name Margaret, which was all the more surprising because her middle name is Margaret!

She wanted to offer something to say thank you, but the experience and its message to continue writing had already been my greatest gift. “But if you really want to do something,” I said, “why don’t you get a lotto ticket we can share.” Jan agreed as in the past she has shared a couple of substantial lottery wins, so perhaps the story isn’t over yet!

I was surprised at my feelings on handing back the pearl. Of course I had often visualized this moment, but somehow I had fallen in love with the pearl. Was this because I have never owned a real pearl or was it because it would have been the perfect pearl for the cover.

It seemed as if Jan was reading my mind because at that moment she happily suggested I could borrow it when the book is ready for publication!

I called Lynne and Tony as soon as Jan left and shared the happy ending. It had taken nine months to return previous lost jewelry to its owner (see Ring on Beach story on website) and so hopefully this quicker manifestation augurs well for the fast appearance of a publisher so this pearl can be put to good use!

And as one thing leads to another within a few days two other women called in with stories of their lost pearls.

Although from my advertisement Amanda knew this wasn't her solitary pearl she felt the need to call. I suggested she read the story of the lost ring and invoke the Law of Intent for its return. Celeste called in with a similar story. She knew this wasn’t the pendant she lost two months ago but also felt the need to share her sadness.

I have a strong feeling both these women will find their pearls or more significantly find the greatest Pearl of all – the knowledge of cosmic law that gives deeper meaning to life! I have asked the Post Paper to run the story so that Amanda and Celeste will find their pearls and I will keep you posted of their happy endings - pun intended!

Elsa Marshall
Subiaco Western Australia
www.elsamarshall.com

Yellow VW Bugs ... and fellow, mellow serendipitists!

2006-07-19T00:24:00.000-07:00

Yellow Volkswagens and fellow serendipitists!

Serendipity: finding something unexpected and useful while searching entirely for something else

Synchronicity: meaningful coincidences

We’ve all experienced coincidences that have sent shivers up our spine. These ‘psychic charges’ happen because they’ve tapped into something meaningful in our lives. And whether we know it or not, synchronicities are actually messages from an interactive universe that wants to share information to guide us.

Einstein believed synchronicity was God wanting to stay anonymous!

One of the secrets to a deeper and more meaningful life is the ability to recognize and interpret synchronicities. You will be delighted to see that your life becomes a Magical Mystery Tour with exciting signposts embedded at every corner.

Deepak Chopra writes about this in a simple and profound way in his book “Synchrodestiny.” Take a look … it is fascinating!

Here are a few stories of synchronicities from my own life that revolve around VW Yellow Beetle Bugs, but first let me share a little background.

Fourteen years ago my life was completely different to today. I was a happily married mother of two with a successful corporate career when an emotional crisis blew my world apart. My husband of twenty years was leaving for his young lover and although I didn’t know it then I was being awakened to an amazing new life.

I agree with the philosopher who said the greatest tragedy in any man’s life was to not have a tragedy. Often this is the only way we come to consciousness. When I slammed into the metaphorical brick wall and was roused from my slumber I realized I had been sleep-walking all my life. I had no choice but to leave mainstream corporate life and devote myself to spirituality and metaphysics.

The thing I most love about metaphysics – ‘meta’ meaning beyond - is that everything in life is actually a metaphor for something far deeper. There is only one Truth, one Knowledge, in our holographic Universe, and everything is an analogy for everything else.

For instance I can now see why in my teens I chose to replace my more infantile birth name with the name ‘Elsa’; Elsa being the lioness in the movie Born Free. I ran away from home at that time because from a young age I knew had been born free and needed to escape the prison of my family of origin.

It’s also been fun seeing the correlation between having once worked for a software company named WordPerfect and now spending my days trying to be word-perfect in my writing!

‘Give us this day our daily synchronicity’ Sam Keen

My love affair with signs and omens began just after my spiritual awakening in 1992.

It was obvious the Universe was sending daily love letters and I could share dozens of stories, the two most endearing being roses and canary-yellow VW New Beetle Bugs.

When Yellow Bugs first came into my life it seemed that every time the Universe wanted to give me the go ahead for something one of these funky little cars zipped in and out of view. As cars are the metaphor of how we move through life the symbolism was clear. If I went with the flow my life would be as bright and cheerful, and as modern and funky, as a yellow Beetle Bug. And I loved the symbolism of the flower on the dashboard!

It’s been amazing how many times this has been shown to be the case. Yellow Bugs have guided me literally and metaphorically; on Australian roads, American freeways, Swiss highways, and Canadian byways.

There are dozens of stories, including the night I met my friend Anita in Liechtenstein. I needed to leave Switzerland but wanted to continue studying in Zurich so I asked the Universe for a contact in Liechtenstein. That afternoon I met a woman on the train who gave me Anita’s number and when I rang was delighted to learn she had just returned from visiting a friend in Perth!

We arranged to meet and the moment I saw a yellow Bug parked outside the hotel I knew that things augured well. We connected instantly and within minutes Anita had invited me to rent a room in her apartment. We are soul mates and our friendship continues to lovingly impact our lives. She lived near a Greek restaurant outside which the owner parked her yellow VW Bug. This woman also became my friend and on my daily walks I often gave thanks for yellow Bugs. The day I left Liechtenstein Anita drove me to Zurich airport and we were amazed to be led most of the way by a yellow Bug!

Another example is the time I was driving alone across Canada and became lost in the eight-lane highways of Quebec City. Without thinking I began singing the lyrics of the Jane Siberry song ‘Calling all angels’ when suddenly, as if from nowhere, a yellow Bug sped up on my right before slowing down right in front of me. It guided me through several highway turn- offs and took me most of the way to my destination in Ottawa!

So because yellow Volkswagens have played such a big and happy part of my story, it will be easy for you to imagine the impact of what follows.

There is great power in sharing, for where two or more are gathered the connection to the Divine is far greater than the sum of the parts. I learnt the truth of this when I used to hold groups in my home several years ago in which lives were changed.

So when my friend suggested I start another group we brainstormed and came up with the name Salon of Serendipity. I’ve always loved the notion of 17^th century French salons, meetings where people got together under the roof of an inspiring hostess to share ideas.

As my focus is on my writing I decided to wait for a sign, and as always, when we put out the intent for a definite lead, the universe responds.

The next day the thought came to Google the words “Salon of Serendipity. A specific search showed it was still a unique name. Then a non-specific search of those three words left me speechless!

On the first page of the 78,000 hits (there are now over 500,000 hits) the fourth entry on the first page read:

Welcome to The Salon Serendipity … serendipity is a Yellow Volkswagen: ... We like to think of the Serendipity Spirit Salon as a kind of virtual gathering of good friends ...

My inner Geiger counter went off the scale! I clicked and read: ‘As you cruise life’s road see serendipity as a yellow Volkswagen.’

There was even a photo of a little yellow VW key ring whose identical mate was sitting on my desk! Because many of my friends know about my connection to yellow Bugs, when Mary was visiting Scotland last year she felt she just had to send me the little key ring.

The synchronicity of finding this site is amazing, particularly as it is so much more difficult to find it now. Take a look, its fun!

http://www.serendipityspirit.org/salon/salon3.html

I immediately emailed in great excitement, and the next morning received an equally excited response from Bob Boyle the founder of the Serendipity Spirit Salon. He lives in a part of Washington State I have visited and we felt like old friends delighting in the synchronicity that brought us together. However the serendipity was yet to be revealed.

In the four years since dreams instructed me to write I’ve struggled to stay focused. It’s a lonely and difficult task and I’ve often wished for a writing mentor. It’s always that simple: Ask and you will receive.

Now keep in mind there are six billion people on the planet, so even meeting a fellow- mellow-yellow-VW-serendipitist is a wonder in itself! But more was on its way.

One day I was telling Bob about my struggles to finish my writing when I heard him laugh at the other end of the phone. He said his PhD had been based on that very subject; why people find it difficult to finish large theses or dissertations (and he described all the issues I’m facing!)

Here’s an interesting aside in light of my recent experiences with David Hawkins and Wayne Dyer.

I wrote this about three months ago but am checking it before posting it on my website. The power of synchronicity has again been delightfully shown when I stopped here for lunch.

I hadn’t listened to Wayne Dyer’s It’s Never Crowded Along the Extra Mile and randomly selected a disk and put it into my player set to shuffle. It wasn’t surprising to hear Dyer talk about synchronicity, but what did take me aback was him speaking about three specific things I’ve been writing about today.

I wrote about my prophetic dream of 9/11 and Dyer also mentioned the impact of 9/11. Then he spoke about thinking of someone even after many years and how they miraculously appear. He was at Madison Square Gardens when he thought of a colleague from twenty years before from St John’s University. He turned around and there was Bob Doyle. For a moment I thought he said Bob Boyle and had to replay it to make sure.

If that wasn’t enough, St John’s is the name of a hospital here in Perth that has been a major vortex in my life, and soon I will be writing about a re-connection with a friend after 40 years that was predicted in a dream the night before an email came in with her contact details!

But the clincher was when Dyer began to speak about the power of visualization and used an example that stopped me in my tracks!

“The reason people don’t achieve their goals,” he said, “is because they don’t visualize the outcome. Statistically nine out of ten people who enter a PhD program cannot finish their dissertation.”

Life is strange and it’s fun to see things repeating. This was my second synchronicity with a randomly selected Wayne Dyer CD over lunch. Last week he spoke about his visit to Maccu Piccu in a context that reminded me of my own visit that gave me a missing piece of the puzzle about something I was writing at that time!

Bob Boyle and I laughed at the synchronicity of the subject matter of his dissertation. He also believed lack of support is a major problem for writers and offered to mentor my writing. It would be a win/win situation. I needed a mentor and he is passionate about metaphysics. It’s always wonderful seeing the myriad ways in which the Universe can fulfill our requests.

Meeting Bob is a stunning example of how our lives are orchestrated by cosmic law, and just as Rick said of Ilsa in Casablanca so too can Bob say of Elsa:

“Of all the web sites in all the world, you should Google and walk into mine!”

The message was clear. The Salon of Serendipity was to go ahead and I was to continue my writing. I love the words of Meister Eckhart who said the most profound prayer we can utter is a simple thank you.

So thank you, Universe, thank you!

Elsa Marshall
July 18, 2006