August 2, 2021
But there are other times when he reaches out. I’ve had experiences when I was really down and feeling awful and suddenly he’s in my awareness, holding me, nurturing me and taking care of me like he always used to. I confess that I like being dependent on him and being taken care of. There's a part of me that never wanted to grow up and live life for myself because he was always there for me, doing everything. He’s just a naturally giving person, much like my current husband, Kevin.
Like I mentioned in my very first entry in this soul journal, though, there’s a reason I’m here in this life right now and why Griffin is not physically present with me. I needed to learn how to live life for myself. My soul needed to learn and grow and that wouldn’t happen if he were here tending to my every need. As frustrating as it is to be apart from him, it is also the best thing for both of us. I am curious to see how my experience of him changes over time. Will we grow closer?
When Griffin is awake, my ability to ‘travel’ is enhanced. He acts as an anchor and a catalyst, both keeping me tethered to the ground of Being and giving me the oomph to voyage into different realms. I can voyage without him being fully engaged but it’s more difficult and the experiences don’t last as long.
This past week, probably because of all of the inner work I was doing in the retreat, I had another experience of meeting a lost soul and helping him along on his journey. I didn’t realize that he was dead at first. In fact, I thought that I was meeting up with Griffin again. This guy was red-haired much like Griffin but he was older, probably in his late thirties. He was also leaner. And wealthier. For a long time, I thought that he was somehow related to Griffin and I because he looked similar to both of us. I wasn’t expecting him to be dead.
He was sitting in a brightly lit apartment, probably somewhere in Europe. It felt like it was an old building, perhaps dating back to the 17th or 18th Century. It had been renovated and was well appointed. The walls were white, painted paneling. It looked it could have been Salzburg or Hamburg or Vienna in the old part of the city. It was modern day or at least not that long ago. The man was very handsome, well coiffed and wearing expensive but casual clothes. He wore an expensive wrist watch and appeared to be flicking through a tablet computer, reading. Everything about him screamed rich guy, someone who lived a life of leisure and enjoyed the best of everything.
Why was I here with him?
I was puzzled because, other than the fact he looked kind of like Griffin and I, there didn’t appear to be any connection. You already know how much I dislike rich people and part of me didn’t like being there with him. Why was I being called into a rich, white, ostensibly heterosexual guy’s experience? It didn’t fit.
He continued to flick through the tablet or the magazine or the book that he was reading, oblivious to my presence. I grew impatient and longed to get back to my meditation. (I’d been in the midst of meditating when I felt myself pulled here.) In my boredom and irritation, I looked around, trying to discern the surroundings as best as I could. It felt like it was probably early evening. The lights were on and the room felt cheery and bright. I paced over to the balcony where there were narrow French doors and looked out on the streetscape below.
Then I got it.
There was only white blankness outside.
No street.
No evening sky.
Nothing.
Just blank.
I’m dating myself here but suddenly I felt like Bruce Willis’ character in the movie, ‘The Sixth Sense,’ when he finally realizes he’s a ghost.
This guy was dead.
More than that, he didn’t realize he was dead.
I had been pulled into the protective bubble that he’d created to keep himself from realizing he had died. I closed my eyes and felt into his experience. I could detect faint memories, chaotic thoughts and feelings from his last few moments of life. He had died quickly and suddenly. I still don’t know how but I could see/taste some sort of chalky white substance. It was like the stuff was filling my mouth and lungs and I was unable to breath. I suffocated. I died. I was terrified...and then I was here in this safe, white, bright, familiar room.
Right then, I was pulled out of his protective hallucination and was surrounded by utter blackness. It was both the proverbial death space, an empty, eerie black space--and it was the black intimacy of the Absolute. I could still see into this dead man’s protective bubble. It was like looking into it from outside, from the blackest night.
I waited.
There was no need to do anything. It was not my place to pull him out of his denial; he had to make the decision for himself. I was just there as a bridge, as someone to help him make his transition. Despite the fact that I don’t like rich people, my eyes filled with tears as I felt his terror and confusion and awful regret as he realized his human life was over and that he was leaving a lot of unresolved things behind. He was not ready to die. He did not want to die. And yet he was dead. I felt really bad for him and was very sad.
I held out my arms and waited. It took him a while but he eventually made up his mind and stood up and stepped out of the bubble. He launched himself out of the bubble and into the black space and I caught him in my arms as he did so. Of course, I don’t mean my actual arms; it was more like my soul received his soul. I was a little startled to realize that he changed as he entered the black. No longer a tall, handsome man, he shrank and became almost larval. I realized that this is what a soul looks like that hasn’t evolved much. It’s basically still a larva. Nonetheless, I held him.
He became nonverbal in this larval form but I could tell he was frightened and unready to continue his journey. That was fine. There was no rush. He could stay with me as long as he wanted. I felt him settle on the left side of my heart and there he stayed, falling into a contented slumber.
He remained there for another day or so. I think it was two days later that I was meditating when I felt the presence of one of the souls I assisted several months ago. He’d been making an appearance in my consciousness from time to time over the past several days. I enjoyed being reunited with him (he was one of the Gnostic Christians that I encountered in the ruins of an old church somewhere in the Levant) and discovering that we could still be in contact. I felt a certain bond of brotherhood with him, although I’m not sure why. Perhaps we are destined to meet regularly? Perhaps he will be accessible to me going forward, maybe not quite like Griffin (because, well, Griffin resides inside my soul, you know) but nonetheless on a more or less regular basis?
In any case, I didn’t think much of it when he initially appeared again. I didn’t question it or expect there was anything behind the meeting. I just enjoyed the intimacy with him. There is a way that two souls can mingle, interpenetrating one another in an exquisitely erotic and pleasing way. This was how we met and I quite liked it.
Anyway, that was before I met this dude who was dead without realizing he was dead. After a couple days of the dude (in larval form) being nestled against my heart, savoring the warmth and union almost like a baby does with his mother, this other guy, the Gnostic, appeared in my experience. He showed up on my right side and announced that he was here to guide the larva onto the next part of his journey. I agreed and, more importantly, the soul larva agreed. I noticed that when I handed him over to his guide, he now appeared less like an unformed larva and more like a human infant. The guide took him into his arms and they departed. Since then, I haven’t had any contact with either of them.
I am left wondering why I had this experience. Of course, I feel compelled to overlay my morality on top of it. There are millions of people who die every day, many of whom are in far more dire straits than this guy. Why, out of millions, was I called to help this privileged white dude? It doesn’t sit right with me...but it’s not like I am in charge of deciding whose experience I get pulled into. I am just sitting there, minding my own business, and suddenly I open my eyes and I’m in their experience. True Nature is vague on the details. I am thrust into the dead person’s experience and have no background, nothing to go on. All I can do is sit there and observe, waiting for information to reveal itself, waiting to perceive enough to allow me to figure out what is happening and who I’m with. Even then, I still only know a little bit and am left with questions like what was that white chalky stuff that was somehow connected to the man’s demise? Who was he? How long ago did he die?
It does seem like the original laws I observed all of those months ago in the Bardo hold true: Being doesn’t let anyone fall through the cracks. No one is left behind. Everyone who dies is supported in their journey. It’s mysterious to me why I get called to help the souls I meet. I just know it happens and I don’t have any control over it. Maybe someday I will understand?
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