What do you do when you and somebody in another part of the country have the exact same vision at the exact same time? Well, if you’re me, you sit up and pay attention.
I’d been praying recently for guidance on what’s next. And rather than trying to figure it out with my thinking mind – which, experience has taught me, pretty much always comes up with the wrong answer – I just say to Spirit:
Show me.
Point it out to me in a way I’ll understand, and I swear I’ll head in that direction. But I’m flying blind, here. I need to be told which way to go.
So I’d been praying that way for a week or so. Then on Thursday morning, out of nowhere, I woke up that day knowing clearly what sort of book Fran (of InnerVision fame) and I should write together. I understood wordlessly the book’s format, what it would be about, and how I would write it.
And then I clearly saw the book’s cover. Or, more accurately, I saw the bottom third of the book’s cover. The title and cover artwork were hazy, but I could read the bottom part, plain as day. The background was a dark chocolate brown, and I could even describe the typeface for you, although I’m not going to.
It said: By Fran Duda, with Carrie Triffet.
Fran was flying that day (in an airplane, I mean, from one city to another), so I made no attempt to reach her to tell her of my vision. I wasn’t sure how she’d respond, anyway. She’s always known she’s supposed to write a book, but the idea has seemed far too daunting for a variety of reasons.
I’ve always been pretty sure I’m supposed to help her write that book (since I’m the translator she trusts to put her ‘beyond words’ experience into language). But I also always suspected the project was likely to be a hugely frustrating pain in the ass.
Fran is a brilliantly gifted intuitive; so gifted that it’s always been hard for her to blend into society and ‘pass’ as normal. (For more about Fran, if you haven’t already read about her in my book, see any of the previous blog posts under the topic heading of ‘Sedona’s spiritual connection.’)
She’s always been terrified of going public. And especially afraid of going public through the written word.
She’s fine when speaking one on one or to groups of people, but when it comes to writing things down and letting those statements be set in stone and seen by the world, she freezes. When I first knew her, she would spend weeks obsessing over the wording of a single sentence. These days, she’s far more trusting, much more surrendered and willing to let the connection flow as it does, from Spirit through her and through me simultaneously, so that I can put the essential meaning behind her ethereal experiences into words for her.
So the collaborative writing process would be far less torturous now than ever before, but I also knew it could still have its very sticky moments because she would be writing down her deeply personal stories. The desire to endlessly edit might still rear its head if the information in the stories got too close to home.
Yet Spirit’s message had been perfectly clear, so I knew I needed to put aside all my own doubts and just agree to do it.
But Jeez Louise, I already have one book in the works and another in the hopper. And little time to work on either one. So although I accepted this vision as an answer to my request for Divine guidance, let’s say I wasn’t altogether on board with it.
The next morning, Fran called out of the blue, apologizing for the short notice and asking if she could come here for a visit the following day? We sometimes go months without talking, so I knew this request was purposeful. And she’s a delightful houseguest, I always love having her here. So of course I said yes.
After she settled in, our first activity together was a walk on our favorite beach. While walking on that beach I told her of my vision that we would write a book. She stopped walking and turned to stare at me; I could tell she was having one of those time-stop moments of recognition.
I told her the book would be a series of recorded conversations between us, in which she verbally tells me the story of her extremely fascinating life, as well as a full description (language limits permitting) of her gifts and the nature of her InnerVision work. And that I would then fashion those audio conversations into a written book.
And then I reported what the bottom third of the book jacket would say, reading the words off to her.
And she told me then that she had had the identical vision of the book cover on Thursday morning, and I had spoken the exact wording that she saw on that bottom third.
So that’s it, then. I guess I’m writing a book. It’ll be by Fran Duda, with Carrie Triffet, and it’s bound to be a barn burner.
No idea when it’ll come out, I just know that it will. And I’m good with that.
More postcards from the cutting room floor
Here’s another piece that didn’t make the final edit. This was originally the last story in the book, until something came along that I liked better.
Interestingly, this one mentions my next book, which I just started writing yesterday…
SPEECHLESS
A spontaneous prayer in the middle of the night:
I will trust more and take the next step in faith, whatever that next step may be.
Leave words behind when you listen to my Voice.
Note: For more than a year now, I’d been hearing Spirit not as an audible Voice inside my head (“When you’re ready, you’ll write books,” were the last words actually “spoken aloud”) but instead in much richer, broader, more abstract concepts. Whole ideas were presented at once, complete with references to my own experience so I’d grasp the specific, along with the general meaning.
But as these concepts came into my mind, I automatically searched for the most accurate words I could find to express them, and compulsively put both my silent questions and Spirit’s abstract answers into common English. I did this to make sure I understood everything about the message being conveyed, but also to ensure I’d be able to recall the conversation afterward. I have a notoriously Swiss-cheesy memory* and I was afraid these precious communiqués would slip right out of my mind if I didn’t nail them down into human language while they were fresh.
*Kids, don’t do drugs.
Spirit had asked me several times recently to try to hear without shoehorning the communication into words, but I had yet to take the request seriously. I did remember how glorious it felt to communicate without language during that Dinnertable Awakening so long ago, but that time I was a passive sightseer. A tourist. It seemed awfully scary to consciously choose wordless communication now as an authentic state of being.
This is your next step in faith and trust. Put your ego mind aside and bring only your awareness into our exchanges; trust that I know your questions before you ask them. And have faith that My answers will stay within your mind until all need for questions and answers has been transcended forever.
Do this and notice the difference it makes. At first it will feel as though you’ve ‘lost’ your communication channel, but the opposite is actually the case; abstract thought is what you are in truth, so your attempt to return to this form of thinking will actually help remove another of the blocks that keep your communication channel narrow. In truth, limitless communication is what you are – there is no boundary or channel.
To the degree that you are able to allow your obsessive need for language to recede, your ability to hear and understand Me will deepen and become more profound.
Think back to those earlier days when you first began the Barbara Brennan meditations intended to connect you with your “guides”. At that time, you were able to receive only visual symbols, remember? You knew you were obsessively grabbing these images and forcing interpretations onto them, so eventually you stopped doing that of your own accord.
And at first, without those habitual egoic efforts at jumping the gun, you were unable to see any images at all and it seemed as if you’d lost all ability to communicate. But you didn’t lose it, did you?
“No. Definitely not.”
This will be the same. Trust in Me. Let yourself fall into the abstract unknown and I promise I will catch you.
“I believe you. And I’ll do my best, really I will. But what about writing books? How will I be able to relay your words if I’m not putting any of what you say into words?”
Just trust in Me. When the time comes for the next book, you’ll know what to write and how to write it. But you needn’t worry about that right now. That’s a long way off.
“Yes, of course. The next book is a long way off. But what about this book? How do I write the rest of this one?”
My love, you just finished it.
Learning to communicate with Spirit
I’m pretty sure we all have spiritual abilities we’re not tapping into; I’m also pretty sure we can all develop those skills if we work at it. The unused 90% of our brains, and all that.
But then there are those few individuals who are born with those talents, and they seemingly don’t have to work at it at all. Those are the ones we call psychic or clairvoyant or whatever.
I’m not one of those. (Or at least it doesn’t feel like it from the inside. On the other hand, I’ve been described as ‘an open window between worlds,’ so what do I know.)
I guess what I’m saying is, when it came to communication skills, I definitely had to work at it. I’m still working at it.
In 2005 I was studying Barbara Brennan’s book, Hands of Light, and found in it a workbook exercise designed to strengthen communication with one’s Guide:
Ask a question in your mind, write the question down and then be still to meditate. Write down all images, words, feelings, smells, sounds, whatever, as they come to you. Don’t judge any of it, just write it all down.
So I did. I’m a visual person, so at first I got only pictures. Then I started getting pop tunes of the 60’s-90’s to go with the images. (I left that part out of the book – some of those music stories were amazing, but it’s a book, not a 10-part miniseries. Not everything can make the cut.)
The pop tunes were forever sending me to the computer to google the lyrics, because I often only knew the title or chorus. Every time I read the full lyrics in light of my question asked, it was a revelation – who knew Nights in White Satin could be so deep?
Or that Landslide would play a role in causing me to leave behind my 20-year practice of Buddhism forever? (And I never even liked Fleetwood Mac, really.)
The musical interlude was short lived; I think its function was probably just to get me more accustomed to listening. Within a month or two, the music faded and the Voice began to speak more frequently in those meditations.
Up until then, it hadn’t occurred to me that the Voice and the Guide and the pictures and the music could all perhaps be coming from the same place. Or could even be the same thing.
We were still a year or so away from long, free-flowing conversations. Those began in July of 2006, on the same day that the Voice (which by then I called Spirit) delivered this little shocker:
WHEN YOU’RE READY, YOU’LL WRITE BOOKS.
My immediate reaction was more or less unprintable; sort of a peacefully surrendered WTF, if you will. But I was highly motivated to learn how to communicate back, after that. And motivation is really all it takes.
For you, me or anybody.