Note: This is a continuation from my previous blog titled, “Souvenirs, Keepsakes, And Mementos.”
After a fun morning chatting online with a friend who is soon coming for a visit to Guatemala, I return to normal routine, arriving at Keith’s porch to help set up for what turns out to be a large group or around thirty people.
On this Sunday afternoon, February 10, 2013, I am a little off … not feeling totally connected to my process. My heart feels open, and I get the intuition that I am reading the pains of others in my abdomen, but I feel blocked and slightly confused … not fully in a state of trust as fears tell me I really do not know what I am doing, and that my mind needs to do something to resolve the confusion.
A Subconscious Visitor
Soon, Keith guides a woman across the porch into her subconscious mind. As she walks down a set of inner stairs, arriving at a room where Keith tells her that someone will greet her, I follow along in my own way.
To my shock, as I step into my own room, I strongly sense a clear visual image of my dear mother a few years before she passed away. She is in her mid eighties, no longer having Alzheimer’s. Intuitions clearly tell me that even though I see my mother’s personality-self image, that it is her Higher-Essence awareness flowing through her. This mother in this room of my subconscious mind is NOT the personality-self mother that taught and disciplined me as a child – she just looks like her.
This mother knows she was playing a role for me in this lifetime. She wants to love me with pure unconditional love while I visit with her in this room; I clearly understand this. But when I look at her, I resist with fierce intensity. I am incapable of imagining her love, even though I know it is pure and available. I try to visualize myself hugging her. For a second or two I manage to feel glimpses of this unconditional love, but then floods of emotional fear and resistance consume me.
This resistance makes no logical sense, but I trust it as a part of my process. Nevertheless, I feel very confused, not knowing what to do or how to proceed with this unexpected encounter in my subconscious mind. I feel deeply deadlocked in these inner blocks – in an undeniable resistance toward connecting with my mother.
A Teasing Mother
Suddenly, I feel her holding a squirt bottle in her hand, and I know she wants to squirt me with water to make me laugh. This is a profoundly appropriate metaphor, because often in the last year or so, I have been given images of how I metaphorically perceived my mother as constantly nagging me to conform and to do things correctly – of constantly following me around with a spray bottle to squirt me each time I began to swerve off course.
In the past this squirt bottle has always been negative … a control and manipulation thing. But today, it is silly, teasing, and humorous as she tries to provoke me to giggles while smiling and squirting me repeatedly.
I see that my mother’s Higher Essence wants to play with me, but as I imagine myself trying to laugh with her, I suddenly feel deep raging emotion beneath that laughter. Quickly I put the lid back on. I hesitate and resist the idea of going into this intensity in a public way. I am clear that what lies barely beneath that laughter is extremely deep and confusing pain. I actually consider going home to release this emotion in a raging pillow-punching way.
Suggestions Please
For a while, I ponder asking Keith for help. Several times, I hold my finger up when he briefly glances around the room, but he ignores me. Soon, as he works with someone else, he glances at me, and I let out a long sigh.
“Wow, you’re in a state of confusion today,” Keith speaks unexpectedly.
“Yeah,” I respond as I quickly fill him in. “I feel totally confused, unsure of how to proceed. Could you watch my back a little and suggest any ideas?”
“Yes,” Keith responds. “Close your eyes. Go back to age six and imagine that you are with your mother and that part of your magic is flowing out of you. She feels it and initially accepts it, but suddenly she stops and rejects that magic.
“What happens?” Keith then queries.
Within seconds of pondering this scenario, I am near the point of sobbing. My belly shakes as I try to contain the deep emotion that consumes me.
“Any suggestions on how to proceed here?” I whimper through the pain.
“Just follow your guidance,” Keith smiles as he moves on.
Emotional Walls
As I go back inside, facing a temporary stalemate, I suddenly get the idea to have my mother and I leave this subconscious room, and to instead go together to the temple of light in my eighth chakra.
I then try to imagine myself staring into her eyes. Ouch, that attempt creates huge inner resistance and rejection on my part.
I spend an hour, gradually allowing small waves of emotion and tears, before I finally reach a state of understanding that my anger, sadness, and feelings of betrayal are the emotions that cause me to continue to refuse my mother’s Higher Love.
As I go back into a lifetime of memories, I cannot remember a single time of ever feeling genuinely hugged by my mother during the last fifty-three years – not since around age four. I am quite clear that most of the reason for this is that I blocked her out of my energy space as a self-protection mechanism. During those years, I was frightened by the thought of emotional intimacy. I craved it, but was terrified of it. The anger, guilt, shame, and sadness blocked out all possibilities, creating huge walls around my heart as I tried to hide and contain such emotion.
Waves of Laughter-Based Emotion
“Wow,” I ponder, “these emotions are my ammunition … the souvenirs and keepsakes that I am cherishing as memories against her … causing me to refuse to allow her love, even though it is readily available now. These mementos from the past are safely guarded as proof of what happened to me. I want her love, but refuse to allow it, even now, because of these safely-preserved and distorted treasures.”
Finally, as I listen to outside conversations on the porch, I am clearly reminded that my mother also felt deep guilt and sadness about the huge emotional gulf of separation that kept us apart. She was probably extremely confused by why I so subtly blocked her out of my life.
“She craves this connection too,” the intuitions flow. “She did the best she knew how, even in her physical personality self.
I want to love her … I want to dissolve this insane resistance … I want to feel her love for me.”
Again, I imagine my mother standing in front of me, with a giggle in her eyes and a squirt bottle in her hand. As she repeatedly sprays me with her laughter potion, I bend forward in agony, sinking deeply into ten seconds of dry-heaving, gut-shaking emotional release, mixed with simultaneous muffled laughter.
Then I sit up and bring in the light, momentarily feeling happy and free. Over the next hour or so, I continually repeat this process as new waves of this emotion surface every time I try to laugh.
Soon, in addition to the squirt bottle, I feel this subconscious version of my mother put on a funny set of old eyeglasses – the kind with the big fake nose – the kind that an old-time comedian might have worn. I really see this as the type of humor my mother might have used in trying to be silly – trying to make me laugh.
A Crumbling Wall
Eventually, after this long meditation of constant cycling through laughter and pain, I begin to feel a new presence of “lightness” surfacing around my abdomen, and my heart feels increasingly stronger.
As I continue these waves of release, the laugher turns into more feelings of giggles, without as much pain. Nonetheless, the emotional release continues.
Finally, I imagine myself hugging my mother’s Higher Essence in her physical personality-self body. As I do so, I am actually hugging, sending her pure and genuine love from my heart. Soon, some of this new level of love begins to tingle warmly in my heart.
As I sit integrating my process near the end of the chocolate ceremony, I clearly recognize that I am not yet done.
“But I made huge progress today,” I silently giggle. “I now realize that a major part of my God drama is the unhealed emotions for my mother, projected onto Higher Love. This is a huge wall still surrounding my heart – but part of it definitely came down today.”
Gradually, as I continue meditating and filling with light, I feel much more stable. But a continued sensation of wanting to wallow in this sad emotion persists. Finally, I ask the light to transmute this “wanting to wallow in the sadness” feeling – and as has been the case many times recently, that emotion does vanish to nothingness. I feel quite happy and stable as the ceremony finally concludes.
Switching Roles
Meanwhile, a young woman seated next to me is sobbing uncontrollably. Keith has her sit in the middle of the porch while the rest of us support her. But she continues to experience layer after layer of intense emotion, and it is time to reconfigure the porch because we will be bagging more chocolate this evening.
I have already stayed too long, cutting my quick dinner break to a minimum, but I feel guided to stay even longer to talk with this young woman. She was shocked by the emotions that surfaced today, having believed herself to have already healed all this stuff. Now she is sobbing, feeling weak, judging herself as a loser.
With ample experience in this area, I gently encourage her, helping her to understand that where she is at right now is perfect … that she has broken open a dysfunctional belief system that is now on its way out.
“Just give yourself permission to cry,” I hug her and keep talking. “The most important thing you can do right now is find to self-love and self-compassion for what you are going through, and to focus on bringing in as much Higher Light as you are able.”
“But if that does not work,” I add, “give yourself permission to lovingly flow with whatever happens, and then come back tomorrow to go deeper into this.”
Bruised Pride
As I hurriedly rush home to eat, I forget to watch the street below me, and unexpectedly catch my toe on a speed bump. I watch myself in slow motion as I dive forward, floating toward the hard cobblestone road below. Sharp stinging, followed by almost instant numbness, consumes the palms of my hands as I pick myself up off the ground. A quick glance at my hands, obscured by the darkness, reveals two numb, bloody red spots on the palm of each hand. A bruise on my left knee also gets my attention – as does a bruise to my ego as several young women in front of me turn around to ask in a concerned voice if I am OK.
Intuitions tell me I have scraped a large portion of skin off each hand, so I try a mind technique once taught to me by a mind-body therapist. Quickly, I revisit the events in my memory, and I rewrite the outcome in my imagination, doing so several times. When I arrive at home to clean my wounds, I am quite shocked to wash the two spots of blood from my left hand and see that absolutely no skin is broken – and that wherever the blood came from is now a mystery. The right hand, however, has two large deep lacerations where three-quarter-inch circles are missing the skin. (Note: I am amazed when only seven days later the skin has completely returned and only the tiniest of scabs remain.)
In spite of the unexpected encounter with embarrassment, I giggle all evening as we later bag chocolate on Keith’s porch. I do not remember giggling this much in a VERY long time. Something beautiful is shifting inside of me. The wounds do not affect me in any way, other than requiring the occasional bandage change.
A Silly Riddle
Monday, as I set up for the afternoon workgroup ceremony, I am delighted when the young woman who was sobbing so intensely at the end of ceremony yesterday comes to me, thanks me for my support, and shares her magical experience. She had gone down to a nearby dock, stuck her feet into the lake, and continued sobbing, feeling hopeless. Finally, in a moment of surrender, she had felt energy flowing out of the lake, up her legs, and spreading throughout her body. In just an instant, all of that emotion had vanished. I love how that works.
I am quite delighted by the small group today – with only eight of us at the beginning. After drinking our pure, traditionally-processed Guatemalan chocolate, we talk and banter for a while before going into meditation.
“Brenda,” Keith suddenly interrupts the silence, “have you figured out what is different on the porch yet?”
As Keith asks this unexpected question, I quickly recall a strange conversation we had during ceremony yesterday. It was one where he had asked me if I noticed anything different today on the porch,
“The energy is nice,” I had responded. “And there is no rational mind chatter today.”
Keith then hinted that he had physically changed something on the porch – something that had been needed for a very long time – something that would affect the energy on the porch.
“When you figure it out, it will be obvious to you,” Keith had giggled at me.
Emotions Of Resentment
Yesterday, when this riddle was first presented to me, I had mostly ignored it. I realized that I was in my own process, that whatever was different was not obvious to me, and that I was in no mood to go into my head to try to figure it out.
But today, as I ponder Keith’s question for the second day in a row, I clearly recognize that I am creating this – even though Keith tells me that he is just funning with me to see if I will notice what changed.
As I tell Keith that I still do not see anything different, he gives me several more abstract clues, but makes it very clear that this is not something I will see with my eyes – even though it IS a physical change to the porch.
Strange emotions of resentment begin to surface. I start to ponder these unexpected emotions, seeing them as the beginning of my process today.
Pattern Search
These emotions are taunting me … deeply triggering me. Then I begin to notice that I am quite disconnected from Higher Energies as I ponder this riddle at the rational mind level.
“Ha ha,” I IMAGINE Keith teasing and taunting me, “we have changed something that you won’t be able to figure out with your mind … any person with a real connection would easily figure this out.”
I begin to feel stupid and annoyed, starting to sink into frustration. I ignore these emotions for a while as I look for other things to work on. I observe a woman across the porch who is in deep and obvious distraction. Everything she does is a call for attention from Keith, and she seems incapable of focusing on meditation for more than a few seconds at a time. As usual, I see this distraction as a mirrored part of my own process. This “riddle annoyance” is causing me to feel deeply distracted too.
Finally, I surrender to my own process and explore more deeply into what I am resisting. I recognize that there is anger surfacing. I am feeling teased and made-fun-of for not being able to pick up the energy difference, or to intuitively know what is different on the porch. As I feel these emotions, rather than repress them, I instead ask them to get bigger while I search in my mind for past patterns.
Riddled With Resentment
Suddenly, I remember my deep resentment and frustration during the “Sun Course,” – my three month meditation course at the Pyramids meditation center here in San Marcos back in 2010. I remember how we spent the first fifty days immersing ourselves in deep rational-mind absorption of facts and knowledge about tarot, astrology, numerology, and the Mystical Kabbalah, etc…, and then we were guided to spend the last forty days in silent meditation, searching for the secret, hidden, inner mysteries related to all of this stuff.
I clearly remember how intense-but-easy the rational mind portion of this journey had been. But when I focused on the hidden mysteries during the final forty days, I had felt quite resentful and angry, while keeping all that emotion bottled up inside. I could not fathom why no one would give us clues or assistance in that inner quest. I felt abandoned, helpless, and resentful that those who knew the answers were not allowed to help us find them – that we had to find them for ourselves or we would not understand them. While silently fuming inside over the riddles that were, for me, unsolvable, I instead spent most of that final month doing my own quiet (and very productive) inner work, not even trying to find what I knew I could not find.
“This is exactly how I feel right now when pondering the riddle of what might have changed here on Keith’s porch,” I ponder with clarity. “I hate it when such an unsolvable riddle is presented to my rational mind.”
There was no doubt in my mind as I struggled with those Sun Course riddles, that if someone, anyone, would just give me enough clues and point me in the right direction, that I could figure it out. At that point in time, I still saw the “truth” as something to be figured out and/or understood in my head.
I now understand that such answers do not come via the tool of rational mind – but I remain quite frustrated because a deeper heart connection to that Source of experience continues to elude me in many ways.
Curious Exploration
“Wow,” I ponder, “this flashback of emotion from two-and-a-half years ago is so real. This silly porch riddle today is triggering deep frustration and anger – not just from the Sun Course, but from a lifetime of being on the outside of my magic, looking in, no longer believing that it is even real.”
I sit with this unexpected realization for a while, profoundly experiencing the emotion, but NOT biting any hooks. Rather than sinking into this old emotion and making it real, I observe it with curious exploration.
Soon, I search for older patterns of these emotions – perhaps patterns all the way into childhood – patterns that might be precursors to what I feel today. It does not take long before the answers are obvious.
Right Brain Freak Out
“Wow, this is the same emotion I felt when I was asked to give a talk in church as a child.” I ponder with clarity. “I was so stuck in my left brain logic … so terrified of expressing creativity … that when asked to prepare and give a talk in church I threw huge tantrums until my mother would finally write it for me. Then, when I actually gave the talk over the pulpit, I was frozen in terror that someone might judge me if I did anything wrong.”
“My creative confidence was so destroyed that I was terrified if anyone asked me to use it,” I continue this thought. “And it was not just creativity; it was any expression of my self that did not have a clearly-defined rational-mind recipe. This same thing happened in repeated situations – with school papers, book reports, arts and crafts, cub scouts, boy scouts, sports participation, and especially leadership roles that I was asked to perform – just to name a few.”
I was so shut down in my connection to inner magic, that the left-brain, rational-mind, logical world was all that remained in my realm of possibilities. The only way to please people was if I “did things right” – and the only way to safely do things right was if I mimicked how others had done them before. If anything was different or out of line from the recipe, I absolutely knew that I would be judged or ridiculed by someone. The very thought sent panic through my soul.
“As a child, my right brain access was fried to a crisp,” I ponder a deeper level of what I already knew. “I literally freaked out and went into panic, confusion, chaos, and energetic tantrums every time I was asked to use it.”
Inner Tantrums
As I ponder this understanding – seeing it more clearly and agonizingly than ever before – I begin to experience deep anger at how my mother (and others) killed my creativity and right-brain connections. But it is not only anger that I feel. It is confusion, betrayal, frustration, and chaos. I feel helpless to undo what was done – having no clue as to where or how to begin.
It is almost humorous how Keith simply teasing me about ‘what changed on the porch?” has so quickly taken me to the core of my shutdown. But in the midst of this uprising emotion, I cannot find many reasons to smile.
The emotions are intense. I begin to experience deep distractions. I feel sharp resentment projected onto Keith – very convincing emotions telling me that I do not trust him any more.
“How dare Keith do this to me,” I feel the inner chatter raging, making up stories.
With complete detachment, I am observing a very real and extremely vivid inner temper tantrum as it unfolds. It is just like the ones I used to have with my mother. These emotions are real and present in the now. This is an agonizingly intense regression running through me. I find it quite challenging to remain unattached and unidentified with the emotion.
Synchronized Comments
As if on cue, Keith, while working with someone else, turns to speak ABOUT me.
“Brenda has written about this a lot in her blog,” Keith tells the porch. “She talks about allowing old emotions to run through you without attaching to them or identifying with them.”
“Yeah, I giggle back, “that is exactly what I am doing right now. It is really intense and hard NOT to identify right now.”
I am blown away by the timing. I have not even been paying attention to the rest of the porch, having no clue what they were talking about. And Keith has no rational-mind way to know what my current inner journey is about. Yet right in the depth of this childhood regression of raging emotion he turned to make these perfectly synchronized comments – comments that again give me the confidence and courage to keep going.
A Magical Moment Of Clarity
Keith immediately moves on and I return to my process, more confident than ever that what I am experiencing is just old emotion on its way out.
I then glance down at the palm of my right hand. I took the bandages off this morning to give the wound a chance to get some air – a chance to scab over a bit.
“My body knows how to heal itself,” I ponder with perfect awareness, “and so does my emotional body. I do not need to know HOW or WHEN this childhood pain will heal. That is not something my rational mind needs to understand. I just need to stay out of the way without reenergizing or irritating the wound. If I trust and surrender without attaching to this emotion that IS now leaving me, it will heal all by itself.”
“Wow,” I giggle silently. “Now I know why I injured my hand last night. I needed this open wound right now to remind me of this great wisdom – to give me this magical moment of clarity.”
Dipping Into Distraction
I sit in this inner combination of craziness and clarity for a half hour or so. Finally, my emotional journey begins to slow as I experience the feeling of allowing a little Higher Energy connectedness starting to balance me. I feel quite confident in what I am doing, deeply trusting my journey and inner knowing.
Finally, Keith turns to me and offers guidance.
“Brenda,” Keith encourages, “whatever you are working on right now, pull up the floorboards, go down a level, and see what is underneath it all.”
I quickly fill him in on parts of my journey, letting him know I feel quite complete, but he again tells me to go deeper.
As I attempt to follow Keith’s guidance, I feel the emotions of confusion and distraction raging through me – the same childhood stuff I have been working with for a while now. But suddenly, as I follow Keith’s instructions, I get distracted and attach to what I am feeling as if it is real in this moment, and I begin to work with it as if I need to do something with it now.
I quickly start to get lost in the distraction, confusion, lack of confidence, and the inner temper tantrum that is again raging through me at an even deeper level.
When I mention this intense distraction to Keith, he tells me I have found my answer. I am so distracted that I do not even remember if I asked a question. What is clear for me, as I later ponder, is that after “pulling up the floorboards,” I was only experiencing a stronger flow of the same childhood regression I was feeling earlier – but that in following Keith’s guidance, thinking I might be missing something in the now, I had gotten momentarily lost, giving away my power, and getting distracted by trying to please someone else (in this case Keith).
Journey With Distraction
Meanwhile, a woman across the porch – the one who was deeply distracted earlier, has meditated just enough to come up with a beautiful inner metaphor to help her process, but is then too distracted to go inside to follow it.
As I observe, I deeply relate, seeing myself in both the past and in the current regression that continues to flow through me. I again need to remind myself that the distracting inner temper tantrum that I am feeling is not present-day emotion. This woman’s external journey with distraction provides me with a profound mirror of my own continued inner distractions.
When this woman, and then another have beautiful breakthroughs of insight, I again get distracted and start to forget that the intense emotion flowing through me is just a regression. I find myself doubting, wanting validation, strongly desiring help, etc…
“This is not me, now,” I repeatedly have to remind myself. “These self-doubts and need for validation are no longer who I am today.”
Head Triggers
Finally, near the end of this crazy journey, I achieve a state of nice peaceful energy where I can simply sit and observe. I no longer want or need Keith’s validation or agreement. I clearly see the tiny bit of help he did provide for me earlier was perfectly designed to take me to another level of understanding about how easily I sink even more deeply into this confusion and chaos of distraction.
“Wow,” I ponder while still in a state of semi-shock. “Head riddles are a HUGE trigger for my God drama … making me angry at the shutdown of my creativity and right-brain confidence. Head riddles tempt me to go further into the rational mind in a furious attempt to solve an unsolvable problem … to find an answer that cannot be found in the head.”
At the end of the chocolate ceremony, after briefly explaining my crazy journey to Keith, I again ask him about the riddle. He responds that he is quite serious that something really did change physically on the porch … that I will not see it with my eyes … that he just wants to see if I can pick up on it … that it is not important … and that it IS having a major influence on the energy of the porch. But several times Keith tells me that this is just a fun silly thing that does not really matter … that if I do not eventually figure it out that he might just tell me.
Resenting The Light
As I walk home, I repeatedly remind myself to just disengage and not think about the mysterious riddle.
To my shock, I feel more deep angry emotions brewing beneath the surface – more layers of deep resentment and frustration toward “secrets.” The emotions repeatedly tell me I am a stupid loser, blah, blah, blah. As I sit down to eat, the emotions just will not quit.
“I don’t know what to do!” These old feelings complain. “I don’t want the light. The light won’t help me anyway. The light has betrayed me. I am angry at the light for keeping secrets from me while giving the answers to others who then rub it in my face, making me feel stupid!”
Realizing that these emotions are nothing to toy with – that they are deeply related to my God / separation drama – I step into my bedroom to further access them. Using a new technique, I force myself to laugh. As I do so, I immediately sink into intense, repeated, long-duration emotional release. The process is quite agonizing, interspersed with brief spurts of light and peace before another intense layer surfaces.
No More Stories
Finally, after twenty minutes of exhausting release, I am overcome with a hopeless layer of overwhelming sadness regarding what happened to my childhood magic. It is a layer that tempts me to wallow … to dig a hole, climb in, and pull the lid on top … possibly for days. Remembering several recent experiences, I ask the light to fill me once again, and to show me what it would do with this sadness.
Soon, the sadness vanishes into a feeling of peaceful higher energy, but I remain quite overwhelmed by the intensity of the experience. It is one so strong that I do not fully trust myself to remain out of the head chatter and stories, so I quickly call a dear friend back home, share my journey, and commit to her that I will not get lost in the inner storytellers that are sure to come knocking on my door.
Sure enough, that head chatter does come and go during the night, but I simply observe it, not giving any power to it.
The Rush Of Surrender
After a head-chatter-filled night, I wake up Tuesday morning feeling quite rested. I survived the chatter without reenergizing it, and enjoy a delightful day writing, “The Mojo,” regarding one of my favorite experiences in a long time.
Wednesday, as another thirty people crowd Keith’s magical porch, I focus on complete surrender. It is increasingly obvious that my most powerful ceremonies are those where I show up with no preconceived expectations – none whatsoever. Instead, I show up with what Keith often calls “expectancy” – a total space of trust knowing that something magical will happen.
I imagine myself floating in a river – a metaphor that quickly causes some anxiety and panic to surface. A minute or two later, I ask the light to transmute this emotion if it is not needed. Almost immediately, I feel more relaxed and comfortable. Continuing in this flow, I feel mild pains in the top of my head. I soon overhear Keith tell someone else that her head pressure is energy that wants to flow out of her third eye.
I wonder if this might be advice for me too, but when I imagine opening a door in my third eye to let some of this magic out, the process does not intuitively resonate with me so I remain an observer in my flow.
Suddenly a memory floods my mind – the memory of an intense waterslide in the county where I used to live. It is a waterslide called “The Jagged Edge,” – a slide with a freak-out vertical drop during the initial few seconds of the ride. Following intuition, I imagine myself sitting at the top of that waterslide. Immediately I experience the fear of going over the edge – of taking that initial vertical plunge.
Again, I let go of the fear, repeatedly imagining myself going down the waterslide.
“It is the journey itself that is the fun,” I remind myself. “The beginning and ending do not matter, it is the rush of letting go, surrendering, and trusting.”
An Inspired Invitation
By this point in the meditation, I feel much more connected to Higher Energies.
Suddenly, I realize that this waterslide is a part of my very own Magical Theme Park. As this knowing settles into being, another idea floods my guidance.
“I am going to invite my mother to join me here in my theme park.” I ponder with a giggle.
Throughout my life, I have no memories of my mother ever going swimming with the family. She participated in picnics and camping trips, but she always sat on the sidelines when it was time to have fun. I have many vivid memories of wishing she would hike, play sports, swim, ride a bike, or physically play with the family – but she never did. She supported me in many ways and showed up at most activities, but she almost never participated in anything of a physical nature. The pain of these memories – the craving to have her join me in childhood fun – only serves to make this unfolding inner journey even more magical.
I begin to smile inside as I imagine my dear mother playing in my theme park with me. I see us going down that “jagged edge” waterslide, riding on roller coasters, and enjoying a wide variety of Disneyland-type rides. I literally feel us giggling together. But when I imagine her wrapping an arm around me, pulling me tightly toward her as we walk and laugh together, the emotions swell inside. We are holding hands, deeply connected at the heart, freely able to talk about anything and everything with the most magical and pure unconditional love and acceptance – with no fear of rejection or disapproval. I see myself as her daughter, having the type of relationship I always craved but did not have (or could not allow).
The memory that brings the most joyful tears is when I imagine us sitting at a table in an outdoor restaurant, still in my theme park. We are laughing, giggling, and talking together as we munch down on hot dogs. I find this scene fun but surprising, given that I love hamburgers. I feel so much magical love. This meditation is bringing real and profound healing, rewriting history, creating fun emotions with a mother that I love deeply.
A Magical Motherly Connection
Repeatedly in this process, I cycle into intense emotions of joyful sadness as I feel joyful love in my heart, mixed with the deep sadness of what could have been. I begin to cry and sniffle a great deal as these emotions ebb and flow like intense ocean waves.
As Keith works with a woman sitting next to me, I am deep in a very tearful moment. Soon, I feel Keith’s hand warmly pressing on my high-heart region, just for a minute or two, sharing energy. I feel his support and validation – the only validation I need right now. I know he is aware of what I am doing – and I know that he knows I am empowered, doing quite well in my process. He later confirms this knowing in a short conversation.
Literally every time that I imagine this deep, playful, fun, and intimate connection with my mother, it triggers another intense wave of emotion. The emotion is so powerful that I wish I could just burst into overwhelming and uncontrollable sobs, but I hold the emotion in, feeling it but not letting myself blubber all over the porch. I later feel the result of this “repression” in the form of a mild emotional hangover – a slight headache telling me I should have allowed myself to feel the emotion more deeply.
As I prepare for bed, still nursing a slight emotional hangover, I clearly know that I want to revisit this meditation repeatedly. I found some inner happiness and fulfillment as I imagined that healthy connection with my dear mother – a connection I never had in physical reality. I felt her loving me unconditionally, both as Brenda and as my then-male self. We deeply communicated as she emotionally supported and accepted me without condition, encouraging me to follow my inner guidance, to be my true self, and to embrace my magic. In fact, she was having a delightful time playing with me in MY Magical Theme Park.
Typing Traumas, Not!
Thursday morning, I cannot help but giggle as I sit down at my computer to begin typing an email. It seems that three very important keys on my keyboard have suddenly decided to stop functioning. Following is what I type in my notes. Perhaps you can figure it out.
“LOL.my.keyoard.stopped.workig.with.ee.ad.mm.keys… ad.space.ar…. ordered.ew.oe.from.amazo. for.greg. to.rig.. after. checckig. iteret.ad.learig. how.to.remove.ad.replace. my.ow.which.i. did. this. morig…”
With the “B,” “N” and “Space Bar” keys not working at all, it is quite difficult to type much of anything. I love how easily I resolve an issue that might have once induced panic. I have several friends coming to Guatemala in three weeks, and I immediately focus on their assistance. Going online, searching various sites and reading numerous reviews, I order a new replacement keyboard for my laptop computer, even watching a youTube video to learn how to do the mechanical side of the replacement – even taking my old one out and putting it back to make sure I know how to do it. Within an hour, I have a new keyboard on order that will be hand-delivered to Guatemala on March 5. And within two more hours I have tracked down a small, portable, external keyboard that I can borrow from a friend, for free.
Wow, that was easy.
Deeply Grateful
The afternoon Valentines Day chocolate ceremony begins like any other. But as soon as the setup is complete, I find myself focusing on a new friend who is deeply struggling in feelings of abandonment, rejection, and fear. In fact, I focus on her for much of the ceremony – remaining in a state of trust as I observe her manifest an amazingly beautiful ceremony, just for exactly what she needs.
I relate deeply to elements of her process, so much so that the afternoon feels as if it were manifested specifically for me as well. I will not share details of my friend’s process, nor the ways in which I worked with her – other than to say that my heart warms with deep loving gratitude for the pain through which I have struggled. My own journey gave me so much compassion and ability to help a magical soul in beautiful ways, and for that, I am deeply grateful.
Profoundly Magical Meditation
At perhaps mid afternoon, I begin to focus on my own inner journey, quickly finding myself back in my Magical Theme Park. But this time I am not on the rides. I find myself in a central park area. My mother is sitting beside me, repeating over and over the following words:
“Brenda’s got the mojo … Brenda’s got the heart … Brenda’s got the magic … Brenda’s got the truth.”
Soon, I feel my father join the fun as a great deal of compassion and love flow through my heart. I have felt this incredible love throughout the ceremony, but it is especially strong as these images come to me. After a while, I imagine the Higher Essences of all of my extended family surrounding me, sharing their love and support in the same way … brothers and sisters … children … grandchildren. Soon, I am joined by friends, and former friends, even those I had once perceived as betraying me.
This entire meditation is profoundly magical, filled with joyful emotion, mixed with occasional tears. As with yesterday, I find myself resisting a great deal of external emotional expression, but I do permit myself to let a few layers flow in a visible way.
A Perfect People Pleaser
Soon, I note with deep interest as five different men on the porch begin doing their own deep emotional work, each in their own way. I observe with pure love as my heart increasingly expands. There is one beautiful young man that strikes me with an image of purity and innocence. I suddenly begin to imagine him as my own sixteen-year-old self. At age sixteen, I was an awkward young man, hating myself – make that loathing myself. I was withdrawn and filled with shame on the inside, while being the excellent student and perfect people-pleasing young man on the outside.
Even to this day, when I look at a photo of my sixteen-year-old-self – one published in a local newspaper, showing me in my boy-scout uniform as I prepared to receive my Eagle Scout award, I continue to cringe with feelings of self-hatred and loathing.
I begin to imagine this young man as that sixteen-year-old boy, sending love to him while repeating, “Bob’s got the mojo … Bob’s got the magic … Bob’s got the heart … Bob’s got the truth.”
I then repeat this process with various ages of my masculine self, frequently glancing at the men on the porch before closing my eyes again. I take this process all the way up to sixteen years ago, when I finally transitioned and officially became Brenda, once and for all.
I do this intensely emotional process, not only with me repeating the words, but also imagining those I love the most as saying them to me as well. Through it all, I gradually find new levels of love, self-love, and compassion for a beautiful young man that always followed his heart as he struggled to find a place to be his true self.
Innocence And Love
I sit with this beautiful inner meditation until the ceremony nears completion, even imagining myself on a stage with all of my friends and family congratulating me on my genuine heart.
“Brenda,” Keith eventually interrupts. “How many people would it take to tickle you right now?”
“I don’t know,” I giggle back. “Maybe ten or twelve.”
As I tell Keith that I have been receiving another round of magical love today, he praises me on my energy,
“Brenda,” Keith interrupts the silence a few minutes later. “I’m guided to suggest a new meditation for you to try … one that you might want to do frequently.”
Keith then guides me to invite an unspecified grandchild, whoever happens to show up, to come to me in a meadow, or some other special place. The grandchild will bring me a gift of something … perhaps a piece of my heart, or a fuse for my power etc…
“Let them bring whatever you need,” Keith guides me.
He explains that imagining my grandchildren will really help me to do this with someone to whom I have a deep connection – a connection with no associated negative pain to get in the way – a connection with lots of innocence and love.
A Magical Metaphorical Meditation
As I begin this meditation, I feel a granddaughter bring me a box with a heart in it. At first, I get the impression that this is some beautiful love for me, but then I realize that it is an actual energetic piece of my heart – some of the magic that was pushed out of me for safekeeping when I was small.
I giggle with this visual for a while, after which I imagine other grandchildren bringing other things, including more pieces of my heart. Some are decorated with glitter and silly things. Others are drawings on construction paper. All are pure and innocent giggling love.
I sit in this final meditation until the ceremony dissolves. It is indeed a beautiful experience. I look forward to further exploring this magical metaphorical meditation.
Tradition
Before bed on this beautiful Valentines Day, I feel guided to watch “Fiddler on the Roof.” It has been years since I watched it. As I take in the story, deep understanding filters into my soul. In my life, I have been the one to break free of deep and old family and religious tradition. The movie gives me another magical understanding of my own journey, and of the emotional difficulties of the journeys of my precious family. I know my path must be difficult for some to accept, but I also know that I would not be alive today if I were forced by tradition to follow any other.
A Giggling Heart
Wow, what an amazing five days these have been – five magical days of breaking down the thick walls that have blocked Higher Love from my mother, father, family, and friends – five magical days of rewriting and literally changing the past using subconscious journeys in meditation.
I was totally caught off guard when my mother showed up in that subconscious meditation on Sunday – by how, even though I knew it was her Higher Essence, that I was unable to connect or receive her pure unconditional love. This journey alone proved to point out how thick my walls have remained all these years, still resisting pure love, even when it is readily available, all because of old pains that increasingly surface every day.
And who would have thought that a painful wound on my hand could carry such an intuitive message – a reminder that the body and emotions can heal themselves if you get out of the way – and then heal so quickly once the message is received.
I was completely caught off guard by how a silly little porch riddle could trigger such profound inner understanding, combined with a process that still blows me away when I think about it – a process taking me back to the childhood confusion, chaos, and terror-filled temper tantrums that invariably resulted when anyone asked me to do anything creative by myself.
Through it all, however, the most profound growth of these magical five days has been the receiving of another level of Higher Love through beautiful meditations of unfolding metaphors – meditations rewriting the past, helping me to finally connect and feel a deep bond with my dear sweet mother and father, and to strengthen already beautiful bonds with other family at a deeper, unconditional level.
I cannot wait to begin using those grandchild meditations to further explore the magic that just keeps unfolding, week after week, ceremony after ceremony. With so much returning magic, things like nonfunctional keyboards simply create a giggle in my heart.
… to be continued …
Copyright © 2013 by Brenda Larsen, All Rights Reserved