It’s unusual to get cancer of the vulva at forty-eight. It’s a cancer that generally happens in later life. My attitude to that is this, the younger I am, the stronger, healthier, and more able I am to deal with this.

I am blessed with wonderful parents, a devoted father who is unfailing in his support, fierce protection and love, and a mother who told me thought my life, and importantly as a child growing up, that I could do or be anything I wanted to be. That I was intelligent and capable. This along with her strong Christian attitudes and beliefs shaped me into what I am. I believe my personality and Karma have also played a part. As a learning Disability and Mental Heath nurse for thirty years I have seen many permeations of personality and the influence of parenting upon individuals. My mother gave me the right from wrong guidance and the confidence to be myself.

I found my spirituality though nursing, then healing and later developed my medium ship, before going onto train as a hypnotherapist specialising in past life work. I’m not sure as to why I got cancer, (there are a few theories) all I was aware of, was my need to stay alive. To be here for my family, to continue to work with, and for spirit. So my journey through cancer began. Shock! That was my first emotion and physical response to being diagnosed with cancer of the vulva. This was not easy to talk about, being such a personal and intimate area of the body to be effected, and being a more rare cancer that people are less aware of. So I did what I always do when feeling the strain, use my resources, acupuncture being a long-standing one. Since a GP friend who was training to be an acupuncturist used me as a guinea pig back in 1990.

I found the benefit and was used to the effects acupuncture could have on my well-being. This wasn’t going to cure me, but help me get to a better place to deal with it. As I was in a state of shock, and the meridian around my tumour was ‘draining’ my spleen energy, this was partly why I was so tired and emotional. I felt like the rabbit in the headlights. My dear friend treated this; I went back to weekly treatments, which miraculously gave me some control over my emotional state, calming me enabling me to deal with life and the process ahead. It lifted the heavy blanket of tiredness for the first time in months I felt normal.

I am a spiritual healer, as is my mother, my nurse friend; I have a relationship with a man who is also a healer. So I received hands on healing regularly, I was also lucky and grateful to my friends in the spiritual movement who put me in their healing books, prayed for me and sent me healing. Hundreds of people both here and abroad sent me healing, often through the work of my partner, medium friends I have through my work and the churches I know and serve. This powerful tool was amazing; I still feel the love that I have been sent through the hearts of these souls. The power of knowing and feeling that support kept me in the light and the power of God.

I use the practise of prayer and meditation, I ask the angelic realm for help and support and remember to tell them I am thank- full and accepted all healing being sent to me. My family and guides in spirit came through strongly to help me, making regular appearances whenever I am able to attend church.

I have many good friends. God has blessed me with a friend who works as a Macmillan nurse, a friend who is a hypnotherapist and councillor, a nurse, a Shaman, a friend who has experience the loss of her mother, other friends who are supportive and there for me. I have two fantastic sisters with the strength and loyalty only sisters know and have. These people formed my care support team. They each played their part, and I thank God for them all.

I have always been drawn to Shamanism, and felt the need to work with my friend who has practised his art for some 20yrs, little did I know then it was for my own benefit. I have had 3 differing sessions, during which, both my friend and I journeyed and worked with our guides and helpers, this was an amazing experience for me. I felt the power and strength of my ‘Native tribe’, and my friend, while they tirelessly and continually work to aid my healing and recovery. I simply love the feeling of total relaxation and peace following the sessions; they place me on the right track. How do I know what to do and when? Which therapy and when? I simply listen to my soul, and the guidance I receive from spirit, I know I am loved, cared for and supported, so therefore go where I feel drawn.

My dear friend who is trained in hypnosis came to my rescue, after my first surgery. My blood pressure had plummeted and I struggled to get it back to normal. I needed help to use hypnotherapy to work on this, and we did. Through visualisation under hypnosis, I cleared the anaesthetic from my blood and got my blood pressure back to normal. This same friend gave me an invaluable C/D, one I think all surgical patients should use. It deals with surgery, using meditation and hypnotherapy. This helped me deal with blood loss from my first surgery. When I lost 600mls of blood. I didn’t want this to mar my second operation. The C/D introduces the thought of the body being able to remove blood from the surgical site during surgery to be returned after to aid healing. It helped reduce the effects of anxiety keeping the body physically relaxed, which has got to help the surgeon. Needless to say I had no problem with blood loss!

Part of the C/D was listened to straight after surgery, beginning the healing process, reinforcing the body’s ability to heal itself. I continue to listen to this daily as life starts to take over again. I feel I needed to maintain the positive benefits the time out, relaxation and healing the hypnotherapy give me. So making time between visitors and my lovely family is important to maintain this.

Throughout my journey with cancer, I fought and struggled with fear. I would not allow myself or anyone else to give a negative connotation to the cancer. I kept the fear behind a metal door locked firmly away, believing my first thoughts from spirit, I was going to be alright, I would come through. I am recovering from the surgery with many plusses, the radical vulvectomy was not so radical, my bowel and rectum were saved, the scan reviled no further cancers, and my removed lymph nodes were benign. I was and am so grateful, and so lucky. I am starting a new part of my life, a new beginning, and I am grateful and happy to be here to continue to serve spirit.

by Sue Phillips

Sueh7@sky.com

I did not have a particularly happy childhood which I believe had a large part to play in the emotional problems which accompanied much of my life. I don’t feel it’s necessary to go into detail about why these emotional problems occurred. My philosophy about healing is that it’s important to focus on solutions rather than causes and as a psychotherapist today, that is what I endevour to do with my clients.

I knew I had a significant problem in my early twenties. I was unable to hold down a job because at the first sign of criticism I would fly into a rage, storm out of the job and then spend the next few months deeply depressed shut off in my room.
This happened again and again but even though I knew something was wrong, I didn’t want to visit my doctor and admit that I thought I might me mentally ill.

I didn’t get an official diagnosis of depression until I was nearly thirty which was the point where I realized I needed to get help. My life just seemed to be going nowhere. I had by this time obtained and walked off numerous jobs and was still shut off from the world in a room in our family home.

I was prescribed anti depressants for the next few years which if I’m being totally honest didn’t make one iota of difference to my feelings of inadequacy or my thoughts about the futility of life. I still shut myself off from the world for the most part and lived my life one day at a time always believing, for some unknown reason, that somehow I would get better eventually.

And this is the one major piece of advice I would give anyone living with mental illness. If there is a part of you that really does believe it is possible to heal from your pain and live a better life, then you have to hold on to that hope. I truly believe that even in the depths of despair when I seriously felt like ending it all, that small still voice that knew there was a way out, an answer somewhere, is what eventually led to me healing and living a better life.

The turning point for me came when a throwaway comment from someone really hit a chord and resonated deep inside me. Someone made the observation that I had an “I’m not worthy” attitude about me. This was the “a ha” moment for me because this was the moment when I realized that this could be the key that would eventually unlock the door.

Those words ignited something in me and I started on a quest to find out as much as I could about self worth, self esteem, emotional healing techniques and anything that would help me understand why I had these problems but more importantly how I could heal.

It was not an overnight transformation but over the next few years I was able to make significant improvement in the way I felt about myself and my place in the world. I married, trained as a psychotherapist and now have a lovely life in Cambridgeshire.
My life is not perfect and neither am I but I don’t need things to be perfect for me to be content. That was an important lesson I’ve learned while healing. Being able to see myself, other people and life itself in a more understanding and accepting light has been a large part of my recovery. There are many ways to do this but I agree with Carl Jung who found that those patients who took on a more spiritual perspective of life made the greatest improvements in their healing.

I’m not a religious person in that I do not see the need for prayer to a supreme being or the need for ritualistic or superstitious behaviour. What I have come to understand is that there is an interconnectedness between everything in the universe and that there are such things as positive and negative energy. Being connected to positive energy allows us to disconnect from the ego which due to pain either sees itself as inferior or superior. Once we connect to the positive energy of our True Selves we are able to see ourselves as equal to everyone and everything. There is no need to gain the approval of others to feel good or any need to control others. There is just the feeling of oneness and contentment.

Now I know that this sounds like mumbo jumbo, new age nonsense to a lot of people but for me it has helped to make the transition from feeling worthless, useless and hopeless to someone who truly loves life, feels life has meaning and who wants to make a difference in the world. I sincerely hope that whatever you’re going through right now, you are able to find something to help you change your life the way I did mine. Namaste

Sagaren Pillay is an holistic psychotherapist in Cambridge, UK. He is the founder of theshiningmind.com and author of The 3 Step Solution for Healing Emotional Wounds and The 7 Beliefs of Highly Fulfilled People.

After I’d been walking for a few minutes, looking at the fields and the sky, there was a shift in my vision, as if someone had pressed a switch. Everything around me became intensely real. The fields and the bushes and trees and the clouds seemed to be powerfully there, even to have their own kind of identity, as if they were more than just inanimate objects. I also felt somehow connected with my surroundings. As I looked up at the sky, I could sense that somehow that the space which fills it was the same ‘space’ which fills my own being. What was inside me, as my own consciousness, was also ‘out there’.

This is an example of what I call an ‘awakening experience.’ In awakening experiences, the world becomes more real and beautiful, and an atmosphere of harmony seems to fill our surroundings. We feel serene and whole inside, and our normal problems and worries seem to fade into insignificance. The world seems like a benevolent and meaningful place, and we feel part of everything around us, with an intense empathic connection with other people.

At a higher intensity of awakening, we might become aware of a kind of force pervading our surroundings, a radiant energy which seems to underlie the whole world and to make everything one. Our own identity may seem to dissolve away, as we become part of this oneness. The whole material world may seem to fade away too, immersed in a sea of brilliant spiritual radiance.

Awakening experiences seem to happen when the ‘filters’ which limit our normal awareness of the world fade away. We ‘wake up’ to a wider and fuller reality, and in comparison our normal vision seems incomplete and even unreal. We feel that now we’re seeing the world as it really is, as if we’re seeing it in three dimensions rather than two, or in colour rather than in black and white.

Awakening experiences can sometimes occur for no apparent reason, but mostly they are generated by certain activities or situations. While doing the research for my book Waking From Sleep, I found that two of the most common triggers of them were nature and meditation. Many people I spoke to had awakening experiences while they were walking in the countryside, swimming in lakes, or gazing at beautiful flowers or sunsets. Other people had them while they were meditating, reaching a state of pure consciousness, outside of time and space. Others had awakening experiences after meditating, when the perceptions were sharper and richer and they felt a sense of connection to their surroundings.

Another common trigger is watching or listening to an arts performance. For example, the following experience occurred while a person was watching a performance of Turkish Dervishes:

The theatre fell silent, no babies crying, no movement or sounds from the audience, only the gentle swishing sounds of white skirts twirling and the soft sounds of felt gliding on the stage. There was a feeling of intense peace, happiness and tranquillity. Nothing else mattered in the world and outside the theatre. We all felt as one – it was a mesmerising experience and unforgettable.

Another person described an experience he had while listening to a concert performance of Brahms’ 4^th symphony:

It was like glittering petals of sounds exploded. I could immediately feel the stream of life flowing around me. It was as though I was experiencing heaven on earth. I felt a huge sense of euphoria, an intense sense of well-being. Life became idyllic, and it carried on for days. For five days I felt completely energised.

Some of you have probably experienced something like this during or after sex too: a feeling of well-being which goes beyond sensual pleasure, and is caused by a change of consciousness. Perhaps earlier you felt stressed and worried, as if your life was full of problems – but often after sex everything seems miraculously different. Your problems seem to have disappeared (proving that to a large extent we create our own problems by worrying), and you seem to be glowing inwardly, as if a kind of dynamo has been switched on inside you, filling you with a feeling of completeness and serenity. Here, for example, one person described how she feels after she has orgasms:

I feel as if I haven’t got any weight. There’s a warm feeling running all through my body…Nothing else seems to matter, problems cease to exist, as if the feeling takes you over so much that there’s no room for anything else. I feel capable of doing anything…

I also look at things more clearly, look beyond what I usually look at. The colours seem more distinct; if you look at, say, a tree, you see it for what it really is, not just as a tree. You see it as nature, not just as an object.

Many other everyday situations cause these experiences: sports like running and swimming, creative activities (e.g. playing music or dancing) or reading poetry. The experiences are sometimes associated with religion, or called ‘spiritual experiences,’ but I believe this is misleading. There’s nothing religious or even spiritual about them (although if you are religious, you might interpret them in religious terms and believe that you ‘seen’ or communicated with God in some way.)  I prefer to see them as a completely normal and natural psychological phenomenon – a glimpse of our true nature, and a peek into the meaningful and benevolent reality of our universe.

Following the open day I was lucky enough to attend the Ordination ceremony for 2008 where my friend was to be ordained, again this was affirming to me “do it!” Not long after this is sent in my application form 10/08/2008  and waited what seemed a very long time for my interview and of course in my mind I was still not good enough so wasn’t going to be accepted for an interview never mind the course  and my ego was having a fit with this and I had a very difficult summer while my brain went into overdrive reminding me how bad and incompetent I was, this was coupled with yet another ending in my relationship with my daughters father and him disappearing for a month or so (more on this later)  the end of this summer  I had become  paralysed with fear I was unable to sleep and resulted in me having to take some time off work with anxiety  and depression. My then 18 year old son Theo took it upon himself to book me an appointment with a hypnotherapist who really helped me take my finger of the panic button and I was then able to be more forgiving to myself and get back into “normal” living. Very soon after this returning to some kind of normal I got my interview which was obviously perfect timing and not too longer after that my reading list etc.

So here I am back at the first retreat with all these lovely people, singing, praying, chanting and walking out to stone circles doing “stuff” and being blessed from the water of a stream…these things were so bizarre in my life and looking back now I think how strange it was that I was there doing these things and I don’t recall being fazed by any of it even though it was all completely new to me. I loved it!

The first year started off looking at the different traditions at which I had to go in at a very basic level, I was helped by children’s books, films and music. It seems such a long time ago and without looking back im struggling to remember my experience, I know I cried A LOT, I really was the crier- when in year 2 I wasn’t crying nearly as much but others were now wanting the tissue box I felt quite happy with my tears which in year 1 I wasn’t at all, it was another great reason to beat myself up….i was sooo mean to myself and I remember this coming up with my mentor and I was so confused, I could see I was being mean but then the reaction was again to be mean to myself for being mean….and so on it went, I feel quite exhausted just remembering it!

I was also amused to watch myself not want to do what others were doing, I remember when we had a guest speaker come in and he was stirring people up and emotions were falling onto cheeks….no way would I cry if your all crying, this is when I would have a delayed response. I also didn’t want to drink herbal teas anymore, diet and food had been one of my first fixers when I realised some years ago that something wasn’t working right but now the rebel in me was not wanting to conform, (another fun game I played with myself).

Our monthly Study groups were a really special time and we had been very lucky in that we all lived reasonably close to each other apart from our lovely mentor who travelled a lot to be with us. I got a lot from these groups, I am used to groups from my days in 12 step programmes and I enjoyed learning, exploring and reflecting on my own stuff in this environment.

Im aware im going on a bit now, there are so many areas to reflect on but im going to stick with “my stuff” which has seen an amazing transformation in “my Self”

While exploring and being challenged by different belief systems and traditions my life at home was seeing serious financial problems which included a day in court with reposition order as I had fallen behind with my mortgage payments. Since starting the course my daughters dad had lost his job so I had no financial support from him and my son had moved out and he was a contributor to the bills. My daughters dad (my now ex after 12yrs) was also a drug addict and repeatedly coming in and out of our lives causing chaos, which of course I liked (or was comfortably uncomfortable with). The course had the content of what we were doing on the surface but there was magic being weaved underneath, a lot of which I will probably still have no awareness of….my point is, I was being challenged in these areas of my life, my low self esteem that kept me in an unhealthy relationship and chaotic patterns.   When I opened up to my study group about my financial worries the support I got was mind blowing. I then began going through a process of receiving, people were giving to me – love- energy- money, it was so painful accepting this and I cried and cried with each kind gesture that came my way, and it kept coming in different ways from different agencies and in different parts of my life, I was learning how to accept love into my life.

With my ex we ended up getting back together at the end of the first year and he was going back into treatment for the 3^rd time, this seems strange writing about it now but at the time  I totally believed that we were meant to be together and that he would “get it” this time. He went into the same treatment centre he had done some years previous and it was a very healing experience for me to go back there with a new head, the first time was awful and I had felt they treated me badly so this time with my growing self esteem and confidence I was able to speak about my concerns and upset. He got thrown out of the treatment centre 3 months later and this finalised the end of our relationship, but not my attachment…this would continue a little while longer!

Along with the support from my peers and mentor in year one I also began regular spiritual counselling, I chose I man for this as I was aware I had “man stuff” to heal. I also had to travel for these appointments and this again was so valuable to me to give myself the time it needed to get there and back and for the appointment.

The end of first year retreat was again amazing, I was still very emotional and leaving the retreat and the safe environment we were in was very scary and I struggled the following summer with my shadow but this time my experience seemed to be with the outer world instead of my inner, in my search for truth I was seeing the world quite differently and world government structures and fear really impacted me and I had a dark time that summer. At this time my ex was back in treatment and we had no contact which was difficult, I was in court with a repossession order on my house, didn’t know if I could continue with my second year training. I was attending 12 step meetings again, family group at the treatment centre and keeping contact with my interfaith friends and through this my faith was being challenged and strengthened at the same time.

The second year training brought ceremonies into my life, something that I wasn’t particularly  bothered about in the course content, but something which I have been amazed by, the process that has followed me through the ceremonies  has brought true transformation. Each ceremony was truly powerful but a few stand out, the ceremony I had to bring to my group was the rights of passage ceremony. I did this for my 16 year old niece and I knew when this was being done for her it was also for me, or I thought I knew! The affect this ceremony had on me was so powerful, hearing and speaking the words of love and encouragement unlocked something very deep within me and I cried a very deep and long cry while being held by my beautiful mentor. At home the process continued and I was beginning to sort out my house, having a huge clearout and giving old clothes to the charity shop, my appearance seemed to be changing.  My funeral which I did for myself was again vary powerful, to do my eulogy I contacted some friends and relatives and asked them to answer the questions we had been given as guidelines. My first response came from my son who did it for me even though it was an odd request, through this process I got to hear my friends and family reflect on the  person they knew,  my study group were really kind in making me read all these lovely words out loud to them –clever aren’t they!!  Through this process I was now able to say and hear nice things about myself-WOW!

Back to the beginning of the second year, we were sharing in our group about ministry and what it means to us and who in our life has ministered to us, it was a really significant moment when my partner shared with me about his ex partner buying him some socks, this person had noticed that their partner needed new socks. I heard this story on the day but I kept hearing it in my head, it was reminding me about worth and I was noticing how little I valued myself in my relationship(s). It was natural for me to do kind gestures for my boyfriend but my expectations from our relationship were on the floor. Shortly after this my boyfriend of 12 years was thrown out of treatment for using and our relationship was over-again but this time it really was. I knew I was worth more this time, the pain and the confusion about the addiction were still there but I was stronger I myself, my faith and with the support and strength from my group I have been able to move on even though life with my ex got a lot more difficult, his drug use got worse, I couldn’t trust him with our daughter, he was not supporting me financially and basically being as difficult as possible. He started a new relationship really quickly which devastated me but the strength I found in this pain has spurred me on it has also brought amazing opportunities, I have been through solicitors regarding access and we were referred to mediation and I contacted the local drug and alcohol team out of concerns for my daughter and the effect this was having on her. Both had an amazing outcome and I will be doing volunteer work with the family unit that helped me and my ex and I are now friends and Jasmyn has regular contact with her dad and my daughters confidence in speaking up for herself with her dad has grown.

My ex has been such a blessing in my life, he has been with me all the way through the training, in each of my counselling sessions  and a great lesson to me about distractions, although I felt I had done what I could to get him out of my head, counselling, figure 8, praying, praying, begging and praying he was finally released just before ordination, I had a 3 day retreat with my spiritual counsellor this was something I was absolutely dreading, the thought of being alone with my head for three days was causing a lot of anxiety and fear, my drive up there involved a lot of weeping and pain. However I arrived and had the most amazing 3 days, I worked hard with my counsellor and I had the most amazing and fun time with God, it was lovely. On my return we had our last study group before retreat and I had so many acknowledgements about how different I looked and seemed and I knew it. That weekend we all had a challenge and mine was to speak for 5 minutes about my good and positive qualities and I loved it, I could of even gone over the 5 minutes. Also this weekend saw another friend who was struggling financially and I with the help of our group raise almost £4000, we paid our fees and were able to put money to the bursary- again WOW!

There is so much more that I could write about but this is the essence of my experience through the last two years and I am so grateful to the Interfaith Seminary, the teachers, mentors, fellow students, my family and friends and the amazing process that has brought me home to myself. Thank you J

Reverend Sharon Austin

Though we may hate to admit it, it is usually simply a matter of our own laziness and lack of determination that sees us running in circles for most of our lives. When we live like this, I’ve always felt our lives become so small, so closed off from anything new, anything… better. We become a smaller version of ourselves, we lose our potential… possibilities narrowed because we do not make the effort to break free from these habits, to learn from these mistakes and grow and make our worlds a little bigger each time we do so. Instead we choose to live in a fishbowl, trapped inside the comfortable routines we’ve made for ourselves, looking through the glass at the wider world, seeing everything we could be and yet resigning ourselves to our current lot.

It’s not always easy – sometimes I’m tired, I’m depressed, I can’t see where my life is going… but often as not, these are just excuses I make to myself when I’m feeling too lazy, when I simply can’t be bothered to do what I should be doing. We are all, each and every one of us, making excuses to ourselves such as these… justifying our lives spent in the fishbowl.

But because I want more than that, I deserve more than that, am capable of more than that (and aren’t we all?), I will strive to break free from these habits. If I make a mistake, I will learn from it and move on – I won’t continue making the same mistake one hundred times over, banging my head against a brick wall. If I can see that a habit, or some other aspect of my life, needs to change – I will change it.

No excuses. Even if it involves forcing myself in the beginning (and it usually does), I will soldier on, knowing that in time things will get easier. An old habit will be replaced by a new one, one that I will consciously choose and control rather than allowing my habits to control me. It may be a two-step-forward, one-step-back process – I’m not saying I’ll get it right straight off the bat and I’m not saying I will punish myself, beat myself up over it if I don’t. I know I’ll slip up. I’ll struggle. I’ll falter. That’s an inevitable part of being human. When that happens, I’ll have enough self-love and self-discipline to get back up and carry on… for though I am human, I am not “only”. I hate when people give the excuse – “I’m only human.”

Another justification for their life in the fishbowl, for the choices they make but are too ashamed to admit responsibility for. Yes, you are human, but “only”? Why not be a magnificent, beautiful, exceptional example of humanity?

It’ll be a learning curve, and each step of the way there will be new mistakes to be made and lessons to be learned. Envisage it like this: the fishbowl is the centre of a spiral. Whenever I break my bad habits, learn from my mistakes and strive to do my best… I start to spiral outwards, my world getting bigger and bigger. In each layer of the spiral, new mistakes will be made and as I learn from each one, I continue spiralling outwards, expanding my life. This is a never-ending process – if anything, the bigger the spiral, the more mistakes I’ll make, the more I’ll learn…

“Making mistakes simply means you are learning faster”
Weston H. Agor

“The man who makes no mistakes does not usually make anything”
William Connor Magee

I will look within (and above) to find the courage, determination and will-power I need…

I’m not saying this is the right way to live for everyone. I can only speak for myself. But this is my philosophy, how I choose to view and live my life, what I believe is best for me.   Besides, whoever heard of a Cat living in a fishbowl anyway?

Growing up, people would tell me how talented I was because I am musical and could play several instruments. I don’t but I can. Also artistic, which in some ways I have kept up. Being “arty crafty” as my Mother would call it meant I was hugely visual and I believe this is at the core of my past life work.

I must pay homage here to Judy Hall for it was her book, “Deja Who?” which piqued my interest in past lives and started me reading as much as I could find around the subject, which back then, wasn’t much. I started in a tentative way, learning a regression technique which was part of an ongoing series or Holistic Retuning courses. Having learnt the basics, I discovered that I could go in and out of past lives almost at will. A lot of the time it was like living in a parallel reality except that it was always different. I took every chance I could to be regressed and to regress my friends and family, learning all the time.

It is one of my most deeply seated beliefs that to have got to this point in this life and to be questioning in the way that so many of us are, that we have to have experienced a lot of what this great school of life has to offer us. So we have had the good life but also the not so good. We have been victim. We have also been perpetrator. In everything. So over all these lives we have been lied to and cheated, for example but we have also been the liar and the cheat. And worse of course. So all the good stuff but also all the bad. How else could we learn all our life lessons? Sometimes we have come in and missed out on the lesson, after all we live in a free choice, free will world. And then we repeat, not a life but a learning experience. We have lived a whole gamut of things, of emotions, of wounds, disabilities, both mental and physical and we have come to this point. Here and now.

So how can these past experiences help us this time around? Perhaps what you are shown has some bearing on what is going on. Perhaps you received a wound that is impacting on this life. Sometimes we are just shown that there is a different, maybe better way to be. Possibly it’s just interesting. But what is amazing is the eternal journey of the eternal soul. For whatever happens to the mind, body and spirit, we are certain that the soul does go on.

For me, and again this is my personal belief, I think that I have lived hundreds of lives, often in multiples and in other dimensions. I’ve looked at lives going back to Lemuria, before Atlantis and throughout the ages and seen some wonderful things. I’ve also seen some pretty awful things. The trick is to remember that although these things happened you were someone else at the time and they have no power to harm you now. They might make you think but that’s a good thing.

Another of my abiding beliefs is that all of time is happening in this instant, now. After all time is a man made concept. So all our past lives are happening at the same time as this one. And so are our parallel and future lives in whatever dimension they are. So really all our lives are parallel, it’s just easier to think and talk about them as past or future, it makes things much less confusing.

I find that now when I give a reiki session, well that I don’t really do a reiki session as such any more, instead I work on the lives that present themselves to me or to my client. Often the lives we see in this situation are violent and bloody; after all in a healing situation it is an excellent time to heal the wound that has been carried through to this life or that is impacting on this life. This is where psychic surgery comes into its own with quite remarkable results making this a really brilliant way of using past life knowledge and giving my client a real informative healing session.

Using a regression technique can also have good results although sometimes people are disappointed that they weren’t Napoleon or Cleopatra, and that at first the regression can seem very mundane and the life viewed very pedestrian. Maybe somewhere along the way, we miss the point, or misread the life lesson. And then later, a few days or even a few months, the penny drops and something slots into place.

Another way of using past lives is in investigation, the beauty of this being that the work can be done remotely. Using Phoenix Cards as a starting point can be a help but is not always necessary. This way allows the client to send a list of questions to ask, for example “is my Mum in this life in any of my past lives”. It is always exciting when family members bobs up in a different body and it can be revealing about their character and life path. This in and of itself can answer a lot of unasked questions.

Past lives can be an emotive and interesting concept and one that is often pooh poohed by many, even those who walk a spiritual path. That’s not to say that they are wrong and the believers are right, it just means we’re different. For me and others like me, I know that this present life is richer and more fulfilling for me knowing about my past lives. I believe I give a better treatment because of it; the knowledge and experience of those lives can come to the fore at any time if you let them. Try it and see if you get the chance, it could rock your world!

Do you ever feel like you are on what I call the diet merry-go-round?  You lose weight then you gain it back.  You lose it again and it comes back again and again and again. . . .  Round and round we go, where it stop’s nobody knows.

My relationship with food used to be one big merry-go-round ride where I gained and lost several hundred pounds over most of my life.   My first attempt at losing weight began when I became interested in boys as I started high school.   Throughout high school I only allowed myself to eat one apple a day.  In the evening for dinner I ate small portions of vegetables, salad and lean meat and exercised at least four times a week for an hour or so.  It worked!  I lost thirty pounds and had my first boyfriend at sixteen.  Of course the boyfriend didn’t last long and to this day I don’t care to eat apples.

From my teens onwards, I went on many different diets including Weight Watchers (three times), the cabbage soup diet, the vegetable oil diet, Slim Fast, and finally the Atkins diet, where after six weeks, I actually gained seven pounds.  Also, from early adulthood onward, I intermittently joined a weight loss studio, several gyms, a Taikwando class for a few years and a Jazzercise class for another few years. I began power walking after my second son was born, and even tried jogging until I developed shin splints, which necessitated my going back to power walking.  All of these diet and exercise regimes were great in the short term, but over time I found myself gaining the weight back again and again and again.

This all began to change in 1996.  I had recently divorced after 18 years of marriage and again had gained back a lot of weight.   I was the heaviest I have ever been, weighing in at almost 220 pounds and for someone as short as me, that’s a lot!   I was living in Houston, Texas, when I met a Chinese Tai Chi Master who introduced me to the gentle movements of Tai Chi and Chi Kung.

Eastern and Western philosophies regarding weight loss differ greatly.  In the west,   the physical body is of supreme importance—how many calories you consume versus the energy you expend in any one day determines whether or not you lose weight.   Study after study has been conducted for decades to determine the best way to lose weight.   Scientists have created charts to determine your optimum weight for your height and how bone structure influences this; other studies look at your blood type to determine the best types of food to eat; still others measure your muscle/fat index.   Regardless of the preferred method of measurement, Western science still tends to focus primarily on the physical body in relation to the epidemic of obesity in our society.

In the East, the emphasis is on the whole person including the emotional, mental, energetic and spiritual aspects.  In the East the belief is that the physical body is only an outer reflection of inner balance or imbalance.   An imbalance of any of the inner aspects of a person can manifest physically in many different ways.  Some people develop physical illnesses, others take drugs, others become alcoholics, and of course others develop weight issues that run the gambit from anorexia or bulimia to extreme obesity.

In the West, most of us still do not realise how our emotional and mental states can affect our lives, including our eating habits and our weight.  As an example, let us imagine we are angry or fearful about a relationship in our life.  Maybe our partner is being unfaithful, our mother has just died, or our daughter has just left home.  Regardless of the precise nature of our emotional pain or hurt, it is very easy for many of us to turn to food for comfort.  However, what we are really trying to do is to suppress the painful emotions we are feeling.

If we turn to food for comfort, before we know it, our eating has turned into uncontrollable, unconscious binging that then leaves us feeling even worse about ourselves.   We realise we lost control again, consumed vast quantities of food that may have made us physically ill, not to mention the intake of calories, and then we mentally beat ourselves up for losing control and sink deeper into self-condemnation.

We have been on enough diets!  We now urgently need tools to help us take control of our mental and emotional states.  Until we can do this, we will not control our physical bodies or our weight.    For me the real break though came when I began to practise the gentle movements of Tai Chi and Chi Kung.  This practice became my escape route from the dieting trap.  As I cultivate the chi, which is the universal life force that permeates all of creation, I am able to raise my vibrations, calm my mind, balance my emotions, and create a stronger, healthier and yes, thinner body.

After over ten years of my practice, my life has completely turned around.  I have lost over five stones and kept it off for several years.  I feel younger and much happier than I did twenty years ago.  I now have the tools to handle and release any emotional pain as it rises up in my system.  I have definitely stepped off the dieting merry-go-round for good!

Gloria Hanson

Gloria is creator of a new revolutionary holistic weight loss programme called Size Perfect to begin in February 2011.  See advert. She also runs weekly Infinite Tai Chi and Chi Kung classes in West Didsbury, Manchester.  Contact information:  07870 335 348.

Candles flickered in the shops and coloured lights adorned the narrow alleyways. Bright red paint and orange garlands were piled up in heaps on the stalls. Cheap bangles glinted in the fading daylight. There was a festive air amongst the brightly dressed crowd but, although it was Christmas Eve, the decorations and celebratory atmosphere had nothing to do with the arrival of Santa or the birth of Christ. The visitors thronging the bazaar behind the river were on their way to take part in the nightly aarti ceremony on the banks of the Ganges at Haridwar.

Aarti is a Hindu ritual in which candle wick soaked in ghee is lit and placed in a small plate surrounded by flowers and sandalwood. The plate is then circled around a deity or god while the participants chant. The five essential elements of fire, air, water, earth and wind are all represented. This is in keeping with the Hindu belief that the human body consists of five elements and that it will eventually dissolve into those five elements. Different types of aarti are performed at different times of day and may vary according to the branch of Hinduism practised. Many Hindus perform aarti in their own homes on a daily basis. The ceremony we took part in is known as the Ganga Aarti and takes place every night at Haridwar on the Har-ki-Pairi ghat.

Haridwar represents the point where the Ganges leaves the Himalayas and meets the hot plains of India and has long been a place of pilgrimage. For millions of Hindus, it is a life-long ambition to come to Haridwar and bathe in the waters of the Ganges to be purified and cleansed of all sins in the fast-flowing river, as it gushes down from the icy peaks of the Himalayas. Devotees hang on to chains by the side of the ghat to avoid being swept away as the waters thunder past.

Hindus believe that Haridwar has been blessed by the Lords Shiva, the Destroyer; Vishnu, the Preserver and Brahma, the Creator. The area is of great importance to Hinduism and is one of the sites of the Kumbh Mela which takes place every three years alternating between Haridwar, Allahabad, Ujain and Nasik. According to ancient mythology, a battle between gods and demons of possession of the pot, or kumbh, containing the nectar of immortality raged for twelve days and nights – the equivalent of twelve human years – and during the battle, four drops of the nectar were spilt, landing on Haridwar, Allahabad, Ujain and Nasik. This is now celebrated by the Kumb Mela.

Dreadlocked Hindu sadhus, often smeared in ashes congregate in their thousands for this auspicious event. Sadhus are wandering holy men who have chosen to renounce all material comforts in the search for enlightenment and freedom from the cycle of reincarnation. Some live in caves in the mountains living off berries and other fruits. The most mysterious, to Western eyes are the Nagas who, often wearing nothing other than ashes, take precedence in the bathing order during the Kumbh Mela and lead the bathers into the Ganges on the most significant bathing days, while millions of others must wait their turn.

The path of the sadhu is, according to Hindu thought, the fourth and final phase of life and many who take this route will have had successful careers and raised families before renouncing the material world. The discomfort and stringent requirements of the lifestyle, such as the obligation to bathe as early as four in the morning wherever they are, which may involve dipping into freezing mountain waters, mean that very few people choose to become sadhus, or in the case of women, sadhvis. Those who do are widely venerated in India and travel free on public transport and exist on offerings given to them by the devoted public who believe in doing so they are also making offerings to the gods.

The site of the nightly Ganga aarti, the Hari-ki-Pairi ghat is variously translated as The Footstep of God or footprint of Vishnu, the preserver of the universe. Vishnu is said to have left his footprint on a stone on the ghat and since one of Vishnu’s other name is Hari, the ghat is names in his honour. Vishnu’s footprint and the drop of the holy nectar make Haridwar a very holy place and stringent codes of behaviour are expected. Alcohol is strictly forbidden and the area is completely vegetarian. However, this does not mean that the food is boring as nowhere else in the world has come up with so many tasty and imaginative ways for producing vegetarian food.

As we approached the ghat, the smell of insence mingled with the smell of spices and food cooking. The chanting and banging of cymbals got louder as we stepped onto the already crowded ghat. We deposited our shoes, as it is forbidden to walk on the sacred steps in anything other than bare feet. We paid an attendant to guard them and cautiously went down towards the river for the ceremony.

The closer we got to the river, the denser the crowd became and next to the main temple, which is bright orange in colour and contains images of various garishly coloured Gods, the crowd pressed in on us. Some people were offered Prasad, which are plates of food to appease the sacred gods, while others lit incense and waited expectedly for the ceremony to begin.

A smartly dressed priest took us in hand. He gave us containers of holy water straight from the Ganges to drink. At this point the river is fast moving and it is likely that the water is clean and unpolluted. Nevertheless, I politely took a sip and let the rest dribble down my face and advised my daughter to do the same. The priest leads the ritual and chants verses in Sanskrit which participants have to repeat. With no knowledge of Sanskrit we did our best to follow the proceedings. Burning incense was waved over our heads and a red string bracelet, to indicate that we have done puja and were therefore protected, was tied to our wrists. Puja is a ritual which is performed both in public and in private, often more than once a day, and is a way of showing reverence to a deity.

We followed the priest down to the river where, we stood perilously close to the edge of the rushing waters, surrounded by crowds all anxious to get as close to the river as possible. The priest picked up the plate with the burning candle and we all crushed together in a group swooping up and down trying to follow and repeat the words of the priest. Then the chanting grew in volume and as it reached a crescendo, the lamps were placed in the water and we watched as they floated away, twinkling, into the night, quickly disappearing into the dark waters. This marked the end of the nightly ritual.

The crowds began dispersing, but the priests were waiting for us. We split up into family groups and my daughter and I went with a priest who spoke good English. Still overwhelmed by the ceremony and the atmosphere, it took us a while to understand what he wanted – a donation. As in most cultures money and religion are intertwined. In Britain a plate is passed around in church and people make a donation at their own discretion. In India everything is more upfront and a donation has to be negotiated to satisfy both parties. The priest suggested an outrageously high price which had to be negotiated down. Then, having reached a satisfactory compromise we were blessed and left happy in the knowledge that we should now be on track for a healthy and wealthy future.

We headed for the bazaar, anxious not to lose the rest of our group.

The labyrinth bazaar behind the river exists to service the pilgrims and a glittering array of religious paraphernalia is on sale at, for those coming from the West, low prices. Despite the fact that we were the only Westerners in the bazaar, we were not pestered and were allowed to browse freely. Fixed prices seemed to be the norm and nobody tried to overcharge us – perhaps it is considered disrespectful to do so in such a holy place. We spent some time browsing and purchasing, in the case of teenage girls in the group, glittery nick-nacks and sparkling materials. As Haridwar is not only an important religious centre, but also a respected centre for Ayuverda – the Indian medical system which is said to be the oldest part of the planet – shops selling Ayuverdic products and treatment are in abundance.

The following day, Christmas morning, we awoke to the sound of the priest banging bells and chanting softly in the courtyard below. I went down to the private ghat owned by the hotel and watched the priest as he performed his early morning prayers and splashed water over himself in an orderly fashion. The Ganges rushed past and further along the banks others were partaking in the rituals in the early morning sunshine. Religion and rituals in India are part of every day life and the giving consists of offerings to gods, rather than the frenzied consumption and present giving that characterises Christmas celebrations in the West, where the true significance of the occasion has been lost amidst the commercial mania that lasts for months. Standing on the banks of the Ganges, watching the peaceful, timeless scenes unfolding, and far away from the Christian world, it was easy to contemplate the meaning of Christmas as well as appreciate a simpler, slower paced life.

Marian Warford

Email:marinaws@hotmail.com

POWERFUL SPIRIT HEALER / PSYCHIC SURGEON

Strong buoyant feelings of love and happiness hit me as if on a wave, as I enter the large hall of the Casa De Dom Inacio.(Johns healing centre and Spiritual Hospital in sunny central Brazil.)  I sit amidst hundreds and hundreds of people, from all over the globe and all walks of life, with all different beliefs, sitting in white or light colours humbly and expectantly waiting their turn to see the healing medium. I feel deep in my bones that I have FINALLY found the place where I will heal and also feel very much at home and welcome. Settling down on a chair to await my turn, I focus my attention on why I have come here , feeling all at once happy, excited, apprehensive, humbled and full of hope. The healing sanctuary sits peacefully nestled at the very end of the small and rural village of Abadiania, which is a one and a half taxi ride from Brazilia airport and sits on reportedly, the largest crystal plateau in the world. (John of God was guided to build his sanctuary here by the Spirit entities that work through him, as it is known that such a large mass of crystal, forms a powerful base for transformative healing energies and therefore speeds up and intensifies the deep healing processes that occur here.)

Since John was very young, he has been taken over by benevolent and elevated Spirit entities, as a very powerful and highly effective Channel in healing many, many people. He has dedicated over forty five years to this, often at great personal cost to help thousands upon thousands with many forms of serious diseases such as cancer and aids, many of which have been so called medical write- offs and hopeless cases.) Although there is nothing like a guarantee, there IS an incredibly and unexplainably high success rate of healings here. Many people travel thousands of miles to get here. John of God is perhaps one of (if not the) most powerful and well known healing channels on the planet today. Perhaps his background as a poor farmer has served him well in being able to withstand and sustain such a tough mission. He is a big, strong and simple man with an indomitable spirit and strong faith in God and his given mission, and insists “It is not I, but God that heals.” As Dom Inacio, the Spirit whom the casa is named after said “For they who believe no words are necessary, for those who do not, no words are possible! )

My call to file past the healing entities has arrived! With excitement and curiosity mounting we pass into current rooms (Meditation, cleansing and prayer rooms.)

In the first room I am touched by a peaceful, palpable and benevolent presence. A hushed feeling of love and compassion tinged with light envelopes the rooms, it is quite unlike anything I have ever experienced before! Suddenly, tears of soft release stream down my cheeks effortlessly and unashamedly, my heart opens wide and unknown weights within lift!

I gaze at rows and rows of people sitting in quiet contemplation, prayer and meditative deep trance, all eyes closed and arms and legs uncrossed. I sense the powerful current they are helping to sustain , to help support all that is taking place in here. Deeply touched…. I move forward , glancing at pictures on the walls, of the spirit entities known to have been working through John of God for many years. These include King Solomon ,( an imposing and magnificent legendary figure,) Dom Inacio, Jose Valdivino, St. Francis of Assisi, Dr. Augusto and Chico Xavier. As I near the chair where John sits the energy grows in intensity and I catch him looking down the line and passed the others in front of me to gaze penetratingly into my eyes and soul with his large blue eyed fixed stare! ( It is known that he has released many spirit attachments and negative unwanted energies clinging to people with his gaze, sending them on to where they need to be , on towards the light.) I stop in my tracks he seems to know everything about me. I have never seen anything like it! His gaze then dropped to my right lower abdomen ( where I had had chronic problems for years he can reportedly see through the physical body and read the aura and blue prints of each of us.) On reaching him , he takes my hand reassuringly and scribbles a prescription for herbs, tells me to sit in the  current  rooms and have an operation in a few days .All is over quickly and the translator motions me to leave. I feel as if a shift in my life is about to occur and feel very moved.

The next few days I sit in the current rooms, eyes closed, arms and legs uncrossed, and tune in. With closed eyes I see and feel light pouring through me and out from the centre of my heart to all present and all beings everywhere. The more I give out , the more I receive, I am indeed being used as a beautiful and powerful healing channel to aid the work being done here, as well as receiving healing myself. Deeply en-tranced, I experience a lovely deep communion with benevolent and elevated spirit beings and feel so much closer to God and the deepest part of my inner self”.

I have had incredible experiences in these current rooms (as many others report also) I will never again doubt the presence of the astral / spirit world and it’s boundless benevolent light workers. I enjoy without measure being in these rooms!

The light beings work through and around John the medium and our prayers and good intentions also serve as an integral part of the work. There are six sessions a week. Days without sessions are for rest, digestion, reflection, practical considerations and meeting with friends. On leaving the current rooms I feel elated, energized and filled with a bouyant  well-being. Other times I feel I need more time to come out of trance and altered states, taking time out to be alone for a while. Some people simply feel rested in coming out of these rooms and even fall asleep during sessions, but the work is still going on with them.

Into the light of day we join the queue for free soup and a chat and enjoy the lovely sunshine how I enjoy sitting in those angelic realms!

On the day of my operation, we are all called into a small room where some mediums are sitting in trance and deep concentration. We are bade to sit and close our eyes, focus on what we need to heal and put our hands on our hearts. Sitting for some ten minutes or so, I feel lovely energies circulate inside and around me and as John of God walks past and with great power declared “In the name of God your all operated on” I feel a surge of pleasant sensations run through me, particularly in the areas I need to be healed. I hear a voice as clear as day, from some place deep inside say,  if you would not have come here, you would have had a heart attack! This, together with pulls and tugs in my heart area rings alarmingly true. It was all over in a few more minutes and we were all led outside into the bright sunlight and given some post op. advice; take much rest, not too much sun, eat lightly and stay within your own company as much as possible for some days, to treat this as a normal op. in a hospital and respect the process. No pork, chillies or alcohol when taking herbs. It has been known to happen that people go home and have an x.ray with their orthodox doctor and see evidence of stitches on the operated area that John has worked on, much to the dumbfoundedness of their doctor. I feel much better and have done ever since. In general, since being in Brazil I feel much better in all ways. Many incredible healings have been reported here.  Funnily enough it is sometimes the ones whom have the most doubt and lack of belief in any God or after life and spirit world, the cynical, whom have radical healing experiences as if Spirit wants to prove something! Others need more time to learn particular lessons presented by their disease. People come for mental, emotional and spiritual healing as well as physical. Operations can be visible (physical) or invisible. The choice is ours.

Though there is really no difference in results between the two, John often gives an operation or two on stage, perhaps to lift the veil of what is possible and what is not in our limited perceptions. Cuts and stitches are administered, tumours are removed, crutches are thrown away and there has never been a case of infection, even at the close inspection of doctors and professionals within scientific organisations, who come to try to prove it a farce. The work has only proven to be authentic if not illogical. There are profound emotional and spiritual shifts in people.

The village itself consists of a few shops, juice bars (selling amazing health packed juices from Amazon) There are twenty or so pousadas, (guest houses) in Abadiania and the village is surrounded by  endless open country all around. The Pousadas are clean, safe and simple with wonderful healthy veg / non veg buffet-style food. Meals are a main part of making friends here and are heartwarming and healing in themselves. Most of the pousada owners have been healed by John and are very friendly and understanding because of this.

The sanctuary’s waterfall is considered sacred, the water has healing properties and is very revitalizing. Visitors (including myself) love to go and cleanse there and healings have been known to happen there. Set in a magic secluded glade, it is great for quiet reflection and giving thanks for all received here. It is possible to get near with a taxi, for those having difficulties getting around.

It’s also relaxing to sit in the casa gardens or on the especially constructed meditation and prayer platform / pagoda to view the wonderful valley view below, and the far off mountains or the spectacular sunsets these local skies display. Crystal baths designed by the spirit entities are really pleasurable to take and can be found onsite.

The whole area is very supportive of the intense and incredible healings that take place here and anyone who visits has to acknowledge there is indeed a far greater Power than ourselves,  even though invisible and not always evident in our daily lives.There are places on this planet that are natural and powerful gateways to higher realms, that act as catalysts for transformation, cleansing and healing to take place . These places gather intense and powerful healing energies that provide healing that may otherwise be more difficult. I really do feel that this healing place the Casa de Dom Inacio is one of these gateways. The universal source of energy,or God or whatever you wish to call it is everywhere, but in such places intensified and magnified.

I walk up onto the hill that sees all over the area. A condor takes effortless flight and I gaze out onto forever over these vast open crystal landscapes to witness one of the famous sunsets here. Tears of Joy mixed with sadness roll easily down my cheeks, I know I will be leaving tomorrow. Transfixed. I look into the distance, into a city of light that sits majestically in clouds of pink with gold and silver linings so fragile and ethereal so beautiful with domes and spirals whispering of other lands in other dimensions and I realise, this is how I have experienced this place: as being in another dimension. I turn slowly away as the city leaves traces through this burning heart! Treading softly as if not to disturb the vision in the sky I walk slowly home to pack.

Anita Fuller

anita@johnofgod-brazil.com

“It felt Love. How did the rose ever open its heart, and give to this world all of its beauty?

It felt the encouragement of light against its being, otherwise we all remain too frightened…”

You may think it odd that I take this stance in an esoteric publication, but if we are to really take our own ‘growth’ seriously then the first place we should be looking is within. No human on this planet can change that fact. There are no special prayer mats that allow you exclusive access to angels or guides, no single building, institution or belief that has a monopoly on the great energy from which we are all created. If people truly believed they were super human, divine, or have special gifts to find places that all the other mere mortals could never hope to reach, then they wouldn’t be here in the first place!
Are people becoming blinded by their own desire for ‘illumination’ to the point of being lead to believe they can only ‘buy’ their way into bliss? Simple acts of courage, compassion, kindness and generosity of time are just as powerful as a reiki attunement, a crystal healing or dowsing ourselves in a waterfall of essences and sprays. Already this industry is feeling the ‘pinch’ but I would go as far to say as it is more a case of weeding out the less authentic people from the real light workers, than a case of feeling the effects of the current economic downturn. Life is about quality not quantity, and it is no different for those who profess to teach and facilitate enlightenment. Perhaps as many as 80 in every 100 mind, body and spirit professionals will not honestly be able to rise up when the real beacons of light are called upon.
People need to earn money, have their palms crossed with silver as it were, I don’t begrudge anyone making an honest living, but I ask, please make it honestly, don’t pretend to know more than you do, or worse still make it up as you go along. You can only fool some of the people some of the time…  We are all ‘angel experts’, for we can, when looking with our hearts, recognise the purity of humanity in others when it shines through. When someone pays you a compliment, a child smiles, when fireman rush into a burning building, when you are told you are loved… the energy of ‘angels’ or what ever you want to call it, works through us and will use vessels that mean something to each and everyone of us to get the point across. Now you may be an avid fan of the angelic realm, own a few books, have attended a few courses, and that’s fine if it has given you what you have sought. But if after all this investment, both financial and energetic, you still feel you need more, then stop and ask yourself why.
For some time it has been a case of ‘he who shouts loudest’ getting heard or drawing some of the most vulnerable people to them. They may not be the best teacher, though. To anyone walking their path, please continue to seek help, advice and understanding, but exercise discernment, ask questions of your prospective guide. And remember your guides will come in many different forms; a friend, a neighbour, a stranger in the park, a shopkeeper, the dustbin man, a nurse, you son, your daughter, your grandmother, your partner, an elder, a therapist, a musician, anyone we come in to contact with has the potential to share with us something amazing.

And if your questions are met with resistance, consider why. A good teacher will gladly share what they know and say just as easily if they don’t. As a pupil you have the opportunity to teach those who wish to guide you. If your questions are met with, ‘because my guides say so’, or ‘I know better’, make a gracious exit. And never  be afraid to ask how someone came to teach or share what they now know, why  they choose to do it in the way they do and so on… A good teacher will delight in being able to express this to you, a good teacher only wishes for you to grow to get to a point where you no longer need them, not the other way around… be aware that true enlightenment is our destiny not an addiction to be groomed and fed.
And I say all this in defence of the simple, yet incredible wisdoms that are now coming more and more to the fore, and in defence of the authentic, passionate and generous souls who facilitate this, in whatever guise they choose to get the message out there. Some years ago I came into the mind, body, spirit ‘business’ naively thinking,’ love and light’ from all to all, but was reminded quite quickly that as emotional beings, we all have our failings, and so I uncovered just as many ‘big egos’, power and control misers as I had seen in the advertising, pharmaceutical and political realms that I had previously frequented. But this has made me even more determined to keep walking the path, which now crosses all areas of understanding be it spiritual, religious, political, environmental, scientific and emotional and it has given my amazing opportunities to speak with some wonderful and knowledgeable people. They are out there and they are approachable.
I know we are all different, there are some better placed to teach, and some better ready to learn. But if you are reading this publication you have already set out your stall to want to understand more, and it is specifically to you I would advise that you rejoice in your hunger for experience, your love of life, your desire for greater understanding. Soak it all in, but just be aware of the pools of water in which you dip your sponge… see beyond the fancy literature, the flowing gowns, the intoxicating accents and take a good, long look into the heart and soul of the person and you will know if they are ready for you!
There will always be those who are happy to ‘follow’, to live their lives according to others, but I’m not speaking to those people today. I hope that if you are curious enough to question your life; why you are here and what is out there for you, in order for you to experience all you can, then to you I say, ’Stand up and be counted as one who wishes to know, not as one who needs to be told.’  Where ever you are in your life, whether you are giving out information or receiving it, I wish you all that you need and may you find your truth, getting the answers and the inner peace that we all seek from the very moment we are ‘conceived’.
Kate Osborne is a self-proclaimed ’mother, wife and lover of life’. Two years ago she gave up her editorship of one of the oldest MBS publications to work with individual teachers and practitioners, following her passion for greater understanding, by helping others to spread theirs. To find out more visit www.solarusfoundation.com or call 01626 362343.

For most of us we will face a time (if not more than once) where we ask what is the point of life, specifically, why do we as individuals exist? No child is born knowing what they want to ‘do’ – for they are simply happy to ‘be’. But then the child is taught that ‘being’ is not enough, aspirations are imposed and ‘doing’ overtakes all. Well, I want to share with you a truth that I have discovered – that in cultivating our ‘selves’, going back to our roots, through our past incarnations to the very seed of our creation, we can weed out the doubts we face now and blossom into the most spectacular form of our true souls…

One of the most popular types of workshop is related to ’Past Lives’ or ‘Soul Retrieval’. Perhaps this is partly due to a resurgence in all things esoteric, (it being  generally more acceptable for people to speak of these things), but I believe it is also down to the fact that as ‘beings’ we have a fundamental desire to re-connect to our place of origin the minute we become aware of our detachment from it. It is a scientific fact that only two fears are inherent in us – the fear of falling and a fear of load noises – just look at any baby’s reaction to a bang or a feeling of instability. The medical profession relate this to our primal urges of survival, the fact that as babies in the womb we are protected from load, sudden noises, encased in a warm dark place in which we are suspended – the safest environment for our fragile bodies.

Is it any wonder that our ancestral beliefs mirror this from a spiritual perspective rather than a physical one? When shamans journey back through their timeline, crossing the different realms they universally speak of ‘home’ as a place in which they exist that is warm, quite and more often dark not ‘bright blinding light’. Within the darkness there is always light, but it is the ‘womb’ of creation that they all speak of and the comforting blanket of the dark serves also to highlight the ‘divine sparks’ of creation. And it is this very act or travelling through our incarnations that now seems to help so many to make sense of their questions today. Now I am not talking about discovering you were someone famous, powerful or rich, though many people do recount appearing to look very different, and live out lives very alien to them now, but at the core of getting back to your roots, you will always know you are ‘you’, your essence remains constant and the reason for retracing your steps is to answer questions you have now, not to raise new ones.

The questions can be as simple as ‘Why do I need to go to Canada?’ as one man asked me once. This man was not someone you would ask for directions in a deserted street; he was powerfully built and had a stunning red Mohawk. When he was walking towards me I saw him transform into a most magnificent Mohican warrior. He stood quietly by my stall for a while, just looking on and I said to him, ’You’re a Mohican. You need to get in touch with your lands, don’t you?’ Well, he was aghast and told me that ever since he was a little boy he was fascinated by Native Americans, he’d been drawn to France and was desperate to visit Canada, to go ‘home’ but he couldn’t explain it to anyone because there was no reason why he should feel that way. He said people always thought of him as a ‘punk’ because of his hair, but he felt most comfortable having it like this, nothing to do with punks at all. For the first time he felt his inner knowing had been validated and he wasn’t going crazy. It was the ‘green light’ he had been waiting for to really live his life and do the things he wanted.
Tracking back can help us to end negative patterns, to let go of fears, to generally peel away all the layers of baggage that we have encasing us in this life.  It is also accepted as medical fact that what we experience as children determines how we emotionally react to similar events throughout or lives as adults. For example as children we are not born with a fear of hot water, it is only when we touch it and it burns or are told not to touch and associate feeling bad that we ‘learn’ it is bad. Same principle applies to the other extreme, phobias – a fear of spiders has probably come from witnessing someone close to us show their fear and it becomes a learned behaviour or a learned associated emotion. Some scientists would even go so far as to say that we can inherit fears genetically. This proves the idea that cells can store memory (another now more widely held belief)… So is it not possible that this stored memory can come from much, much further back?

That now as our ‘new’ brains (based again on scientific beliefs that our brains have evolved from a more primitive mammalian brain to ‘new’ brain the neo cortex), are capable of so much more than 150,000 years ago we can actually start making use of all the incredible information stored inside us and process it a way that helps and not hinders. Understanding where this information comes from (and it is what a good practitioner can assist you to do) helps to makes sense of our very being. And the triggers to understanding these things can come from dreams, fears an inner knowing or even certain places in the world; sacred sites are particularly prevalent in drawing people to them to work through issues from the past.
When I was growing up, between 9 and 10 years of age, I developed a fear of ‘multiple’ rape. Now at this age I had no life experience of sex at all or exposure to it to explain why I was even having these thoughts and fears. Then a couple of years on I was raped by a man, but my fears and the dreams, dreams didn’t subside. I hadn’t had a premonition as a child, this was something else. It wasn’t till many years later when I was in Sedona, USA, that it made sense. My then husband and I went ‘walkabouts’ in the desert. Coming up to a ravine we passed 3 men standing by a car. As I walked passed them and entered the ravine I heard a voice say ‘Get out, before it happens again.’  I told my husband and he turned and noticed the men were following us.  We made for a very narrow part of the ravine, got on our bellies and began to crawl up and out. And as I did so I saw before me a village and in the vision this native village was being over-run by white men charging in and I knew then that my fear from childhood was based on this event from a long-forgotten past.  My husband and I crawled out, the three men gave up the chase, I never had the terrible vision again and that fear was gone.

Once we are freed from the negative emotions attached to our past experiences by understanding the ‘whys’ and ‘wherefores ‘ then we have the space to breathe more expansively and focus on our hearts desire, as well as having a stronger  connection to our source. In other words when we are happy in ourselves, confident that we matter and are loved we are free to radiate that outwardly and everything makes more sense. When we have tended the soil of our souls we simply grow better. I wish you all a bountiful harvest.

Barbara Meiklejohn-Free now offers the most extensive Shamanic course available in the UK –WALKING THE SACRED WHEEL, THE SHAMAN WITHIN.

To find out more visit www.spiritvisions.co.uk or call Kate on 01626 362343.

Here begins her honest account of a terrifying time in her life;

I got out of bed, just another normal morning and did the usual breast test which I have done every morning since I had a lump which turned out to be a cyst and about a year or two after that another lump which I waited for 6 weeks to get an appointment at the hospital. Then on the very morning of the appointment the lump had disappeared over night.  Ever since then I have made it a morning routine of checking my breasts.

This morning I feel a lump that wasn’t there the day before. Maybe it is a swollen gland. I will give it a while to see if it goes down. I feel it there for the next three weeks thinking it may disappear like the previous one. But it doesn’t.  I guess I had better go and see the doctor just in case. She will probably tell me it is just a swollen gland.

I go to the doctor today and she examines me and says “yes I can feel a small lump there. I am surprised you didn’t come to see me before and not wait three weeks.” So I explain about the previous times and she says “So you were hoping it would disappear again like the last one?”  Yes I was. “Well I am going to contact the hospital and you should have an appointment from them in the next two weeks. If you don’t hear from them get in contact with me and I will chase them up.” I thought she would say it was a swollen gland. Still I expect she has to play on the safe side.

It is a week since I saw the doctor. I have received a letter with an appointment for a mammogram and one to see a specialist afterwards. Oh, I suppose the one for the specialist is just in case it is some sort of lump and not a swollen gland.

I arrive at the hospital and have the mammogram not giving it too much thought. After all it is probably just a swollen gland and I won’t have to keep the appointment with the specialist. I wait outside after the mammogram for the results. Then I am called and they say they want to do an ultra sound. Oh, okay I had an ultrasound before and it turned out to be a cyst. They just put a needle in and drew off the fluid and hey presto the lump was gone. It is probably the same this time. Yeah, sure it is.

I heard them say, “We need to do an ultrasound as the mammogram wasn’t very clear.” Okay, fine. When I had a mammogram done before they just ran the machine over my breast.  Now the doctor is starting to bring in below the breast, down the side of my arm, down around my back. Bloody hell what is going on? Do they think this is a cancer and that it is a secondary cancer and they are looking for where it is coming from?  No, I am just being silly it is nothing.  “ Well it seems as if the mammogram didn’t pick it up but the ultrasound is definitely picking up a lump, we will need to do a biopsy.”  Oh shit, still it doesn’t have to be anything. Although all along deep down I have felt that this lump felt different from the other two.  The doctor says “I have to warn you that there is a slight chance whether we go in from the bottom or the top, of puncturing the lung. It has never happened yet but I do have to warn you that there is that slight chance. So if you feel your breathing change and getting worse let us know straight away.” Bloody hell, that sounds great. Thanks a lot.  I ask if as they have to wait for the results of the biopsy does that mean I don’t have to keep the appointment with the specialist?  “Oh no, you still need to keep that appointment as he will explain what we have found so far.  You must keep the wound covered for 48 hours and wear a good supporting bra for the next 48 hours non- stop.”   Okay, it is probably just some sort of a lump but nothing else. Surely it can’t be anything serious.

I am now in with the specialist. “Well looking through the papers we are a little confused. We discussed your case over lunch today.”  Oh that’s nice, what the hell does that mean, discussed it over lunch?  “Nothing showed up on the mammogram but they put a warning on it. We have decided that in our opinion it is cancer. However the biopsy has the final word.  I am sorry it is bad news.  However the good news is that we have caught it early.”  My husband asks the specialist, (I think as a way of trying not to believe what he had just heard) “are you sure it isn’t a cyst”?

“Yes we are certain it isn’t a cyst, a cyst would have shown up on the ultrasound. Any members of your family had cancer?”

“Yes, my father died of cancer, my mother had breast cancer and died of cancer and my brother died of cancer”.

Fuck cancer.  If he is saying that it is cancer, he wouldn’t say that and put me through that without being pretty sure of his facts.  I can’t fucking believe this. All the work that I do and have done on myself. How the fuck can I end up with cancer? Shit. Hold on, hold on, he said that the final word rests with the biopsy.  Ok so it doesn’t mean it is cancer for sure until they get the results of the biopsy. But would he really say the word cancer to me unless he was pretty sure. I don’t think so.

Jesus I have to wait a week now to have the final result.  Do I tell my in-laws? No I won’t say anything  – my mother in law has had two strokes and it wouldn’t do her any good. I say to my husband “I don’t think I had better say anything to your mum and dad until we get the results of the biopsy” he agrees. Then later he says “I think they would be annoyed if we didn’t tell them”.  Shit, how do you tell someone that you have just been told you may have breast cancer?  Whatever way I tell them it is going to be a shock. I am still in shock myself. I just can’t believe it.

What about my daughter? God do I tell her she is so far away living in Korea? I don’t know what to do for the best.  After thinking about it for awhile I have decided not to tell her at least not until I know the results of the biopsy.  No need to worry her when I may be given the all clear. Yeah, I will wait until then and then I don’t have to say anything.

We call in to see my in laws to tell them. God how do you start to tell someone that you have cancer?  Mum keeps flapping around doing things and my husband says to her, “when are you going to sit down?   Daphne has something serious to speak to you about”.

“I have been to the hospital today and they said that they think I have breast cancer but the final word rests with the biopsy which I have to wait for the results”. They are shocked.  Then they start saying “you will be alright, you caught it early etc”.

None of my friends can believe it. They all say they are sure it will be alright and expect I will get the all clear. Anyway just because it is cancer it doesn’t mean that it is malignant.

The hospital phoned me this morning with an appointment to go and get the results of the biopsy.  I don’t think it can be good news, I don’t think hospitals usually phone you with an appointment. They usually put it in the post to you. Maybe I am wrong as I  haven’t had much contact with hospitals for quite a while.  Maybe this is the norm nowadays, I don’t know. Anyway I have got an appointment to get the results.  It is that word cancer it swirls around in my head. I try to stay positive and hope that I will get the all clear. I am feeling so cold, like ice running through my veins. I think I will have a bath to warm me up. Oh hell I can’t, I can’t take the bra off, have to wear it non- stop for 48 hours. So I decided to fill a hot water bottle and go to bed and try to warm myself up.

My friend who is a homeopath is sending me a remedy to help me and to help remove the shock from my system. My sister phones and says she is ordering me some Essiac tea. So those are on the way to help me. Also several friends have asked if they can send me absent healing. Anyway everyone is being very good to me and I am being sent lots of healing from everywhere.  I have even sent lotus petals from a powerful ceremony in an ashram in India from one of my soul group.

I am being offered lots of support, love and healing from everyone. It is really very touching.

Now my family are trying to do everything for me.  For Gods’ sake I haven’t become useless over night. I am just as capable of doing things as I was before this happened.  For Gods’ sake would they just let me get on and do things? Ok when I come out of hospital then I will need help but not now, it just annoys me now.  I feel worse when they do that.  Yeah, I know they are just trying to help and they probably feel useless as there is nothing they can do to take it away. They care for me and they just want to fix it. However they can’t and doing everything for me just isn’t helping my emotions.

I try and keep my mind busy during the day. Sometimes it hits me, shit breast cancer. What do I think?  It must be or they wouldn’t have said that, they wouldn’t say it and worry me without being pretty sure. Yeah but they have to wait for the result of the biopsy. Had a few tears. What if I don’t make it?  What if it is cancer and it has spread?  Now stop thinking like that, I know all this body mind stuff, I teach it all the time, so I know what to do. A few of my friends say Louise Hay cured herself of cancer so you can do it. Yeah I know, of course I can.  Strange that I should have met her last September!

What have I missed in the work I have done on myself to create this?  I look it up in Louise’s book. Cancer is resentment but breast cancer is about nurturing. Nurturing others more than yourself. I have changed a hell of a lot over the years but obviously I need to do more work and change more. This has happened for a reason and there is a bigger picture to it all that I can’t see yet. I have over the years done the releasing anger and resentment, there could obviously be more there than I haven’t hit upon yet.

Today is the day and I am hoping for the best to get the all clear. “ Your results of the biopsy are back and did the specialist explain to you last week what he thought of it?”

“Yes: I reply. “What did he tell you? “

“That he thought it was cancer”.

“ Well  yes,  as we thought that is the result of the biopsy.”

“So what are you saying?  It is cancer?”

“Yes” we are sorry.

“Fuck, fuck, I wasn’t expecting this.  One part was and another part wasn’t. I wanted to believe I would get the all clear. So what happens now”?

“Well I will make an appointment for you to come in to have an operation to remove the lump. We can’t say if it has spread until we operate. However at the same time we will remove a few lymph nodes from under your arm to test to see if it has spread. If  they are not affected great, if they are then we will have you back in straight away and remove all the lymph nodes as a precaution so it doesn’t go any further.  Either way you will probably need a course of radiotherapy on the breast just to make sure that all the affected cells are killed. If we find it has spread you will probably need chemo.”

Oh that fucking word, chemo. I hate the fucking thing. It ruins the organs in your body. No fucking way am I having chemo. I know that is just my opinion of chemo, my family think differently about it.  I would rather take my chances. Then he made the appointment for me to go in for the operation on April 6^th.  Then I was sent to see the cancer nurse who talked me through the whole thing again. She gave me her mobile number in case I wanted to talk to her at any time and had any questions that came up later.

All the possible scenarios keep going through my head.  What if, what if and what if.  The good news is they have caught it early, yeah but what if they haven’t? What if I was right when they did the ultrasound and they think this is a secondary cancer and they were searching for where it originated? What do I tell my daughter, should I tell her? Hell she is so far away I don’t want her to be worried.

My God such a feeling of fear came over me today. Not of the cancer but what if I don’t survive the operation. I can’t believe I am feeling such fear about coming through the operation. Why am I feeling this fear?  I have never had any fear about operations before. Mind you, I will be 61 this year and I have only ever had 2 operations. I have only been in hospital three times. Once when I was 12 when I nearly died and I was in there for a month or two. Then to have a cyst removed from above my eye when I was 13. The other time was when my daughter was born.  Why am I feeling this terrible fear?

My family and friends are all being very kind and supportive and have been right from the start of this. However today it just got to me. I know they are just trying to put my mind at rest, but this constant saying “you will be alright, you will be alright”. It is just getting on my fucking nerves now. I told my husband that I don’t want to talk about it anymore today.  How the fuck can people say I will be alright, they don’t know, they don’t have any guarantees.  They haven’t got a fucking clue. So would they just shut up.

I have decided to do a Byron Katie on it  (for those who don’t know who Byron Katie is I suggest you google her and find out about her) and I am just looking at the facts. The facts are that I have breast cancer, they are going to operate and can’t say exactly what is what until they operate. It might have spread, it might not. When the operation is over they can say what treatment I will need. So there are the facts.  Why build a story around it all? Building a story around it all just causes stress and tension and fear.  So I am just going to go with the facts. That’s it.

I still don’t know what to do about my daughter. Should I tell her or not?  I will think about it over the next few days and decide. I think she would probably want to know and yet because she is so far away I don’t want to upset her.  Well I am off to Liverpool to stay with a friend and do the Moonstone Festival and run an Inner Child Workshop so I will think about it then.

This fear of not coming through the operation keeps coming back and taking me over from time to time.  God, I know it is only a million in one chance that I would died during the operation but if that happened my daughter would never forgive everyone for not telling her.  That wouldn’t be fair on her I will have to tell her, though I dread having to tell her. She has a right to know.

Had a lovely time up in Liverpool with my friend and she gave me a lovely long treatment.  It was nice to just get away for a few days and almost completely forget about it all. Now I am back I have to decide when and how to tell my daughter. I decide to send her a message asking her to arrange a time that we can talk. When I told her she went into shock which was only natural. I felt so bad having to tell her this news. I try to reassure her and tell her that they said they had caught it early.  The poor girl is in a state. Later she sends me an e-mail asking me to send her all the details and exactly what they had said.

Get a message back from her today saying she felt a little better about it all after reading my e-mail. Thank God for that. I just want to put my arms around her to comfort her. She is so far away from home.  Now I have become aware that the fear I had about not coming through the operation has disappeared since I told her. I realise now it was all about letting her know just in case I didn’t pull through. It wasn’t about me pulling through the operation at all but how it would affect her if she hadn’t been told.

My husband has good days and bad days but today I just told him I am sorry but I just can’t console him. I am using all my strength to deal with my own emotions at the moment. I haven’t got the strength to support anyone else just now. He said he understood and didn’t expect it from me. He wanted to support me as best he could.  I know he is having a hard time coming to terms with it as well. I know how I felt when I heard the news about my  father, my mother, my brother and various friends.

People keep saying “stay positive, stay positive”. The one thing I have learnt over the years is that we need to work through our negative emotions before we can move on to be and stay positive. This was really put across to me when the film The Secret came out. There were people seeing this film for the first time and it was a completely new concept to them and they actually thought from watching the film that no matter what happened to them they had to stay positive. I had people coming to me who were suddenly suffering from depression and others having panic attacks. This was all because they were suppressing their negative emotions and trying to stay positive.  Bloody hell, how can someone be positive when they have just been told that they have cancer?

Today I went for my pre- op. More forms to fill in and then wait to see someone. Called in and had history taken. Had blood pressure on right arm and then on left arm.  Then had pressure in ear taken. Then blow into a container to test my lung capacity. Weighed, height taken, and then for MRSA a swab first in my mouth, then up my nose and then in the groin. Bloody hell, I didn’t think that would be done. Shows how little I know about hospitals these days.  Then was asked if I snored. “Yes” I reply honestly.

“How bad?”

“Very bad” I answer even more honestly.

“How bad is very bad?”

“Well let me put it this way, when I sleep with friends they get up and go into another room”.

“Oh that isn’t very nice”.

I think to myself, “yeah it is alright for you to say that but you haven’t slept with me!”

Then back to the waiting room until I get called and have a blood test done and an ECG. More waiting until I see the doctor. History taking again and lots of questions etc then checked over and finally listened to my chest while I breathe deeply. Then I can go home, yeah.

A friend phoned me while I was still in bed having a lay in. My voice was quite hoarse and she thought it was my husband who had answered.

I joke, “now it is a breast operation I am going in for not a bloody sex change”. Today hasn’t been so bad emotionally.

Spoke to a friend today who is recovering from cancer and she said that having cancer is a lonely place to be.  She understood that sometimes you just want to tell everyone to sod off and leave you alone. Her words were to ‘shut yourself away on a desert island’. No one really knows what you are feeling.  I realise I was experiencing one side of my emotions when my father, mother, brother and several friends had been told that they had cancer. Now I am on the other side of the emotions and experiencing it from that point. Yes, a big bloody difference.

My emotions have been all over the place today. Started off the day well and then saw a programme on television about cancer. One man was talking about his wife who had breast cancer and she was giving the all clear and then two years later she died. It had been in her spine and they didn’t know about it. That really set me off and I had a good cry on and off for the rest of the day.  So much for me thinking I had come to a place of acceptance. That’s a laugh. Calling this journal my dance with breast cancer sounds about right. I didn’t want to call it my fight with breast cancer as there is enough fighting going on in the world without me adding to it. Dance is about right thought, some days it is a waltz, others a fox trot, others a quick step and then other days the tango. More like a bloody tangle of emotions.

Received a package from a friend today with some of her home made chocolate truffles.  Ahhhh they are delicious. Just what I needed some comfort food.

A friend came over to see me today and she gave me healing and some other therapy. Unlike me, I didn’t really drift off during either of them. Although I am not consciously thinking about the situation it is obviously playing on the sub-conscious mind stopping me from relaxing fully. Another friend called in and offered to take me tomorrow to see Steven Turoff the psychic surgeon. One part of me would like to go and the other part of me just feels so exhausted I can’t be bothered. So I have decided not to go. Whether it is the right decision or not I don’t know but it feels like the right decision at this moment in time. Received a package today from another friend with some remedies and some Cd’s with music that I like, a crystal and a nice card with one of her special affirmations. That was nice. Friends are being so nice sending me cards, crystals, cd’s and remedies.

The day for the op is getting closer. In one way I feel that is good as it is the next step. Then another part of me thinks “Oh God I then have to wait for the results from the tests on the lymph nodes.  What if they are infected and the cancer has spread?”

I arrive for the operation on Tuesday morning at 7.00a.m.  Mr Frecker the surgeon came to see me with some students. He explained to them that I had found the lump and that this was a case where the mammogram had not picked up the lump but that there was something there and so they did an ultrasound.  They said they wanted me down in theatre by 9.45am.  So when I got down there I thought “well this is it”. However they got me on a very narrow bed underneath a very large camera and took pictures of my breast from above and then with my arm outstretched from the side after injecting in a dye which seemingly highlights the area where the cancer is.  It took about 20 minutes. I had a quick glance at the screen which was over at the side and I saw two blue blobs. I thought maybe one is the nipple and the other one the cancer.  I thought I was then going for the op but they sent me back to the ward and I had to wait for another hour.

Went down to the theatre and they said they were putting the needle in the front of my hand that it would hurt a little.  I thought this is a real letting go. I am having to completely trust these people who are complete strangers to me with my life. I thought what it must feel like for people who are giving the lethal injection. Well the needle did hurt a little but the vein wouldn’t take it, so then they said they would have to put it in my arm and that would hurt even more. It did and then that didn’t take either. So they tried another place in my arm and then I think they tried another and finally they found a vein that was suitable. “You will feel a sensation in your arm and then a nasty taste at the back of your throat and then you will drift off into a nice sleep.”

The next thing I knew was hearing a voice saying “Daphne the operation is over.” I gradually came back into the recovery room and then a nurse came down for me. She said “I must apologise to you as I came down earlier to get you and I really frightened you, you really jumped.” I certainly didn’t remember it.

Bloody hell my arm is painful.  Oh shit, it is so painful to try and position myself in the bed and of course no one can help as they can’t touch the right hand side. The breast doesn’t feel painful it is the arm where they took the lymph nodes from that is causing all the pain.  I have a saline drip in my other arm and a tube for oxygen in my nose. They are taking my blood pressure on a regular basis.  Just been to the loo and my wee is a bright blue. They said that would happen because of the dye they injected into me beforehand and they also injected more dye in while I was having the operation to show up the lymph nodes.

Didn’t sleep very well as had to sit up and whenever I got out of bed to go to the toilet it was really painful trying to get settled in bed again.  I had taken the pain killers at tea time but I didn’t take the ones they offered me in the evening and maybe I should have done. When the nurse came round with the tablets this morning she said I should take them anyway as I will benefit from them as I will have to do exercises to help prevent frozen shoulder and the exercises may make the pain worse.  So, best to take the painkillers to avoid the pain altogether. Later the nurse came to bathe the wound and dress it. Bloody hell it looks a long scar I didn’t expect it to be that long.

“Surely a small lump doesn’t warrant such a long scar?” I ask her.

The nurse replies “Oh no, that is a thread”

“Oh thank God for that. Looks like I also have a nice blue and yellow breast”.

Had a visit from the physiotherapist who explained to me the exercises I need to do to get my arm going again and to prevent frozen shoulder.  She also gave me a leaflet to read with diagrams of the exercises. Then I was told I could go home later today but I would need to see the breast care nurse before I went. She arranged for me to come back on Monday to have the wound inspected and an appointment made for me to get the results from the lymph nodes. Then it will be decided for definite what treatment I will need.

Nice to be home again although seems strange to me as I feel restricted in movement. Lots of good wishes from family and friends and people all sending healing etc.  My mother in law said she will cook a dinner each evening for me which is very nice of her.  So we went up there tonight and then came back home. I went to bed about 8.00p.m. Just felt very tired.  When I scratch lightly above the wound it echoes like it is hollow. So funny.

I am glad the operation is over. This morning I have different feeling and emotions. It is just hitting me now that I just can’t believe I am going through this. I can’t believe this is happening to me. It is just disbelief really. Funny, thinking about it I would of thought that these feelings would have come about at the beginning more so then now. Obviously this is how it is for me and all the various feelings are probably different for each individual person that goes through this experience. Though when I think about it now is probably the time, as before I was in shock.

Back to the hospital today to have the dressing removed from the wound. That nurse who said that it was just a thread was completely wrong.  It is a scar. Bloody hell I didn’t think it would be that long. It looks like it is going from one side of my breast to the other.  Why did they have to make it so long for a little lump? Or maybe those blue blobs I saw on the screen were both lumps.  Did they find more in there than was thought at first?  Have also being given an appointment for the 21^st to get the results of the lymph nodes. It is all this waiting and not knowing that is frustrating.  Also I find it very frustrating not being able to do a lot and having to rely on others to do things for me.

I woke up this morning with a very strong feeling that alright some women will read this journal and start to check themselves on a regular basis. Then there will be others, especially younger women who may let it go over their head.  Very important that I must take pictures of the breast and the condition it looks in now, as for some women seeing the results will be enough to make them check themselves.  What? Bloody hell I don’t want my boob on show for all and sundry to see. The more I thought about it the more I thought well if it helps one person then it is worth it.  I took a few pictures myself which it was very hard to do with one hand. So when a friend came around today to give me healing I asked her to take some photos for me. It is not the sort of thing I would normally do – expose my boob to the world, however it is in a very good cause and it is a very important cause, so I am doing it.

At the moment looking at my boobs is like looking at a white person standing beside a sunburnt Asian.  Actually a sunburnt Asian who has being in a fight. All the yellow has gone and it has turned a dark brown. I am doing the exercises each day and my arm has got quite a bit more movement in it, although it is still sore. Now I have more movement I can see that where I thought the pain was coming from under the arm where they took the lymph nodes from it isn’t there at all. At the end of the scar across the breast is where the muscle comes down from the arm and it feels like the muscle has been cut.

Well today is the day I get the results. Hell! Two of the doctors are stranded abroad because of the volcano incident so they are running over forty minutes late. It feels like you are just at the finishing line and then find out you have another mile to run. In the end they are over an hour late. Got called in and told that the cancer hasn’t spread. Thank God. However I will have to have radiotherapy and maybe hormone treatment. He also confirmed what I had thought that there were two lumps. Then I was examined and had to have blood drained from the wound. The doctor said that it would be much more comfortable for me once he drained the blood off. Well it certainly is. I didn’t realise that that the pressure was building up and pressing on the end of the scar which is where all the pain was coming from. My arm has so much more movement now. Fantastic.

When we came out my husband said “I am over the moon, that is just fantastic news. I am surprised that you are not excited”.

I reply “you know what,  I am just too tired to feel excited. It is as if all the tension and anxiety building up to this has just hit into my body now and I just feel so exhausted”.

A friend gave me a session of Theta over the telephone this morning and later on in the day another friend called to see me and she gave me some healing. Felt tired later. Essiac Tea, Homopathic remedies, Flower remedies, vibrational remedies, healing, theta, reflexology, one blessing and lots of absent healing apart from my meditation, visualization and affirmations. I don’t feel I can take on any more at the moment. That’s besides up and down the hospital. You get my drift. Don’t get me wrong I do appreciate it all and am grateful for it all. In fact I am having so much healing that at the end of it all I might have a few spare boobs!!!

It was great news yesterday and what a relief to know that it hasn’t spread. However today I have just felt exhausted. Went to bed during the day and slept for a few hours. The hospital phoned with the next appointment in a weeks time to see the oncologist to discuss the treatment I am going to have.

I have noticed since I was told about the cancer that as a passenger in a car I am getting really jumpy.  Just can’t seem to help it.

It is six days now since I was last at the hospital. This morning I phoned the nurse to say my breast has swollen and I think it needs to be drained again. She said to call in and see her tomorrow after seeing the oncologist.

I saw the oncologist’s assistant about the radiotherapy treatment. He said they would start in about two weeks but that was before I told him I had to have the breast drained after seeing him. Said they could give me hormone treatment as well as radiotherapy but that goes on for five years and for the extra benefit I would get from it they don’t think it is worth putting me through that. It would only add about another 2% to the chances of it not coming back again.  The radiotherapy will give an 84% chance. The side effects are fatigue, the breast may swell and get very red, the radiation can affect the top part of the lungs so may affect breathing. The breast will probably change in size and will not go back to its normal shape. As my brother would say – would you rather have all that or be dead?  Puts it in perspective doesn’t it. It is so true thought isn’t it? Makes it seem very simple.

Don’t know about him saying that the boob might get bigger or smaller. Looking in the mirror now it is already got smaller. One seems to be heading south while the other appears to be heading north.

So then to the nurse to have my breast drained.

“Well that was the hoped for ending but didn’t turn out that way”

“Hell” the nurse took one look at it and said “I will have to call the man himself”  – meaning Mr Frecker the surgeon.

So he came in and said “you have had a haemorrhage in the breast. I will have to cut it open and get all the blood out”.

Seemingly  if it happens it is just shortly after surgery but this is a delayed one. So as it was unusual he called for certain people to come and look and watch as to what he was doing. One of the nurses said to me, “you must have been in a lot of pain?”

I said “no,  I didn’t have any pain just a little soreness”.

She kept saying she could not understand why I didn’t have any pain.

He took the scalpel and said “now watch this, if you are opening a fresh wound this is the way to do it so it doesn’t hurt the patient. “That didn’t hurt did it? “

“No”.  After a while though as he cut more I did start to feel it. It wasn’t too bad thought as it just felt like if you cut yourself with a razor blade.   Not that I go around cutting myself with razor blades but I have done it a few times by accident. Then the blood poured out and as I was lying down it ran down my neck and back. They got me to sit up and cleaned me up and had to do it four times before it was completely finished. Once all the blood was out they then squirted saline into it to wash it out a couple of times. So have to phone the nurse this morning and according to what she thinks as I describe it to her I will have to go back to the hospital either today or tomorrow. What a drag.

The nurse said to go up to the hospital to see her this morning which I did. She said it was draining nicely and changed the dressing and gave me some dressings for me to do it myself each day until I go back to see her next Wednesday morning.

A lot of blood seemed to come out of the wound during the night. Maybe I am lying on it during the night and squeezing it. I think it might be best if I try going to sleep sitting up in bed again like I did when I came home after the operation.

Have tried sleeping sitting up now for a few nights but it is still bleeding a lot and I am not getting a very good sleep at night. Never mind, I am going back to the hospital tomorrow so will see what the nurse has to say. The wound looks like part of the inside is coming out at the moment.

Saw the nurse this morning and she said she needed to use a caustic stick to put on the wound so it will stop it from protruding. Otherwise it will heal like that and will look peculiar. I told her about sleeping sitting up and she said it didn’t matter if I rolled on it during the night. If I squashed it, it would be alright as it would probably help it to clear out quicker. She changed the dressing for me and gave me more dressings to take home so I can do it myself each day. Have to go back to see her on Monday morning.  It feels like it is becoming my second home. I wonder should I ask if they do bed and breakfast!!!!!! I can drive again horray! It feels like I have got my freedom back.

I keep asking why did this happen to me? This morning I woke up and it all seemed very clear to me. All these years I have been looking after the mind and spirit and apart from doing the emotional work on the body, I have been ignoring the body. What I mean by that is I have still being eating juke food from time to time. Pushed my body and not given it enough rest.  There have been times when I have had too much alcohol.  If the mind, body and spirit are not in balance then something is bound to give sooner or later and breast cancer is my sooner or later. So now I am being put in a position to learn all of this and have no option but to rest and learn to know when I feel tired and to do something about it; to take care of the body as well.

I laughed this morning at how the Universe tests us. The last two articles I  have written for More to Life were about control and fear. It is as if the universe has now said, “right let us test you on how good you are at putting these into practice”. My getting jumpy as a passenger in a car has made me realise that it was a unconscious response to having no control over this situation. I can do certain things but all the medical treatment, when, where and how are all out of my control.  Fear of course was the one that came to the forefront with the words “you have breast cancer”.  Then I have also had to let go of any control to do with my work. I just had to let go and go with the flow as it were.  I feel as if this might be a turning point in my career, some change coming up, but how it will change I don’t know. Will just have to wait and see. Well you never know my new career might be Boob Flasher. I could design a special uniform to wear. I will have to sleep on it!!!!!

Have been up the hospital once a week for the nurse to see how my breast is coming along. The wound is slowly healing but not quite closed up yet. Have received an appointment for Barts for the X-rays and tattoos.

Yeah the scar is just about closed up now, thank God. I have decided to go ahead this weekend and do the 3 day advanced Theta course. I didn’t know if I would be up to it but as I haven’t even started treatment yet and bored of not been able to do a lot. I though it would do me good to

something interesting. It has been arranged for me to stay in the area so I don’t have to travel back and forth each day.

Today I went to Barts and they asked me a lot of questions again. I was asked to hold a big board with my hospital number on it in front of me while they took a photograph of me. I said I felt like a prisoner. I was told it was for their records to they could make sure they had the right patient each time. I suppose as they are doing radiotherapy they have to be very careful. Then I had lines drawn all over my breast and had lots of X-rays taking. Then they asked if I had ever had any tattoos and I said no. So they said that it would only feel like a needle prick. The two tattoos would be very small and would be permanent. I said that my daughter had said that as today was Buddhas’ birthday  could they give me Buddha tattoo? She just smiles -  I didn’t get them – Just two little dots instead. Then I was taking into another room to have CT scans. They said I would hear from them within two to three weeks with the dates to start my treatment which would be 5 days a week for 3 weeks. Yeah I just feel I now have to put my life on hold again for another about 6 weeks. Frustrating. Still I ask myself would I rather put my life on hold for 6 weeks or be dead. I am sure you know what answer I came up with!!!!!!

Have finally got a date to start my radiotherapy. Thank God for that, at least I now can get on and get my life back again.

A few people have said that on a spiritual level I am going through this for all women. I tell them “well the next time I come back to this planet, I am going to make sure to read the small print in the contract”.

I have written this and showing the photographs because I want all women to know how important it is to check themselves regularly. I have gone through what I have gone through and I check myself daily. There are a lot of women who have gone through a lot worse than I have and then there are those who unfortunately have not survived.  I can not believe how many women do not even check themselves. So please please every woman who reads this make sure to check yourself on a regular basis and impress it on all the women you know. Thank you.

Daphne Whitehouse

©Daphne Whitehouse 2010