August 2, 2025
The Woman in White found me today, not willing to wait for me to take the initiative and see where she takes the souls I bring her. It turned out to be yet another teaching from my Shizun, whether I felt I was ready or not. Of course, she knows me better than I know myself so I was definitely ready; she’d never force me to do anything I wasn’t prepared for.
I started out in a familiar place, not the Crossroads but close by: The realm of the Soul River. It feels familiar because I’ve visited it countless times before, both in this lifetime and numerous other times before. Each culture has its own equivalent to this realm which makes me wonder if it’s the same realm perceived differently by people from different cultures or if there really are multiple realms? Given my experiences so far, it’s likely the former. The reason I say this is because the Woman in White and her compatriots–as well as me–appear differently to different people, depending on what they expect or what will make them feel the most trusting and comfortable.
As I perceive it, this realm of the Soul River is creepy but not hostile or dangerous (to me, at least.) It’s dark like it’s nighttime and there is a pervasive blue light. The souls of the dead stream past me, more like a wind than a river. They are diffuse and vaporous, drained of most of their memories. They only have very subtle impressions left to mark their individuality. I know they will lose all memory of their past life before the next stage of their journey.
What I don’t know is how those memories can subsequently be unlocked like mine were four and half years ago? The soul must retain the impressions of its past lives somehow, otherwise they could not be retrieved. But where these impressions lie is beyond me. They seem to be encrypted such that the soul has to develop in a sufficiently complete manner before they can be unlocked. Is this related to the development of the Personal Essence/Pearl Beyond Price? Probably. It’s still mostly a mystery to me, though.
I stood among the souls, their wind whipping past me and ruffling my hair. My heart pulsed with a golden light that was attractive to the souls and they crowded around me, eager to get close and be warmed. Soon, my whole body was glowing golden and there were thousands of souls swarming around me.
I blinked and I was at the Crossroads. The Woman in White materialized beside me, saying, “Well, hello, Golden Boy.” She smiled and took my hand in hers, pulling me onward. I barely had time to acknowledge her presence and we were standing before the so-called White Void (my term.) This void is a devouring kind of white nothingness that feels like the inverse of the Black Void of the Absolute. Both appear to be two sides of the same Absolute but their purposes are slightly different.
The Black Absolute is pitch black and austere, yet it has a feeling of intimacy embedded within it. It feels like the soul’s true home which is paradoxical because it annihilates everything. The Pearl emerges ‘on the other side’ after the annihilation and you learn that dissolving into empty nothingness is a beautiful experience you can trust.
The White Absolute–if it really is the same Absolute–is equally as annihilating but feels scarier to me, more alien and less intimate. This is probably because I have less experience dissolving into it and therefore haven’t developed the trust I have of the Black Absolute. I got the strong feeling that, once your soul passes through it, you are fundamentally changed. This could be the case with the Black as well but, as I just mentioned, I’ve had so many experiences passing through it that I no longer notice a change; it’s just who I am now.
The annihilation of the White feels stronger, more complete, more utterly permanent. I get the sense that, when a ‘normal’ soul passes through it, it can’t go back through. It’s permanent, like a wall or a one-way street. I’m pretty sure the Woman in White and her kind can pass back and forth, though. (It’s important to note that there is no traveling anywhere in the White and you’re not really passing through anything. Rather, the White comes for you and annihilates you.) My question is how the Woman in White and her kind can do this? The White seems like a barrier that one shouldn’t go back and forth across, almost like doing so is cheating death in some way. I am probably wrong about this, though, and am willing to have my mind changed.
There is another difference between the White and the Black: The Black feels heart-centered whereas the White feels belly-centered. This is an important distinction as you’ll see in a moment.
We didn’t do anything. The Woman in White didn’t force me into the White and yet I dissolved into it nonetheless. Similar to dissolving into the Black, I felt my mind get wiped into a blank slate. On the other ‘side’, my historical mind came back but felt like it was in a different place from the rest of me. I looked into the White and realized that I still had a body as did the Woman. Her body, like mine, was all white. So, a form can exist within the White!
The form that my soul took was both different and similar from that in other realms. I had a human shape and I was wearing clothes. My body was human. I possessed all of my usual senses. The difference was that this body existed only in the present moment; the past was annihilated in each moment, leaving only the present, only the present, only the present. Now, the Pearl Body is similar in that it exists within Being and is therefore also present-centered. The present-ness of this body, however, felt even more obvious. And this knowing of its present-ness was coming from the belly.
This was the teaching that the Woman in White intended for me. She stood next to me smiling as always, watching me closely and noting my reactions. She also sought to underscore the subtleties of this experience, pointing out the supremely present-centered nature of it as well as the presence of my body. It was possible to enter the White, be annihilated, and still have form, have a body.
We didn’t go anywhere. She just kept me there, instructing me to simply breathe and pay attention to everything. She wanted me to understand it as deeply as I could. This White Annihilation is part of a soul’s journey but she was showing me how a soul can experience it differently depending on its development.
I have no idea what comes after this White Annihilation. Does the Woman in White even know? Does she cross through it? What’s on the other ‘side’? All of these questions remain unanswered. Maybe I’ll find out in another meditation and maybe I’ll never know. If I do find out and have access to my physical body afterwards, I promise to write about it here.
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