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Before we begin: If you know me, and you listen to this episode, I want you to understand that you are unknowingly healing a painful perceived gap between us that I have been experiencing for a long time, and I extend my utmost gratitude to you in advance. <3
Welcome to Season One, Episode 1 of Tales from the Truth Seekers. This podcast is a series of interviews from people who have had first-hand spiritual experiences which then proceeded to change their lives forever, as these things usually do. So, since I am your host, I thought perhaps I should begin with mine. It’s the only solo episode in the season, just me, telling my story to my laptop in a small public library in a tiny town in rural Virginia.
In the years following my experience, I began to feel like the main character in Lois Lowry’s The Giver. If you don’t know this story, it takes place in a utopia that is actually a dystopia. The main character is gifted with information about how the world used to be, back when colors, dancing, passion, love, death, birth, music, emotions, and everything that makes us beautiful and human was “allowed.” He tries to wake up the other people in his life from their zombie existence only to be met with confusion, fear, and ostracization. Eventually, he can’t take it anymore. This metaphor felt like my internal living reality for so long. It was as if I’d somehow been gifted with incredible, life-altering, information and yet the more I tried to tell others about it, the more I felt like I was stuck inside of a soundproof box, slowly spiraling in feelings of isolation. This is a big reason the woman from the episode above insisted that she meet with me to validate my experience, isolation is a dangerous feeling. Yet I’ve come to accept what my initial experience taught me and what it really was: a total release from external need and validation, brought on by an inner wholeness, and a complete contentment with what is, right here right now, because 99.9% of the time, what is right here right now, is perfectly, totally, and beautifully alright.
So my highest hope is that this episode speaks to you, deeply. When I listen back, all I keep thinking is that words cannot ever do it justice. I worry that it won’t land at all. I see everything I forgot to mention. I notice all the ways that everything could be misinterpreted by the mind. I didn’t reiterate how calm I felt or how innocently powerful I was. I didn’t clarify that the “judgement” I refer to meant negative assumptions and othering, not objective discernment. I also meant to make it clear that the two realities have directions. The reality of separateness is horizontal and linear, and the reality of union is timeless and vertical, and that somehow when I went away and came back, I ended up at the spot where they cross… I also wish I’d reiterated how grounded I was and how awake I felt. I wasn’t floating away or losing touch with reality, quite the opposite. I was one hundred percent here for the first time ever. My eyes were physically more open, and my thoughts were not involuntary, so the waking dream-state we have all come to deem as normal had been turned off. Because of this, I’ve come to think the word awakening originally referred to something quite literal. I also forgot to mention that I felt a surge of adrenaline in the moment before I disappeared, but I can only re-record and edit so many times, and I should save at least some of this for my book someday.
I know I have to accept the fact that for some people listening, it could just be a “huh, interesting,” and then a move on with the day. But, hopefully, for some of you it brings hope (not blind belief), wonder, peace, and reassurance that the thing you are looking for, the magic, the mystery, the health, and the wholeness, are all not only real and possible, but that they are the most real, and the most possible things that exist.
Welcome to Episode One.
Much love and gratitude,
Natalie
Books mentioned: The Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle
Book I should have mentioned: The End of Your World: Uncensored Straight Talk on the Nature of Enlightenment by Adyashanti (This is the book the woman who met with me recommended and it saved my life.)
HUGE thankyous and shout outs to Rachel White of the Skeptical Shaman Podcast and Roger Oney of Roger Goes Rogue. One year ago, I had no idea how to put my dreams into reality and never would have guessed it could happen so fast. Thank you so much Rachel and Roger!!!
Sidhe Readings & Channelled Art Website
Personalized Sculpture based on your Astrological Birth Chart
Included below is what I wrote just about a week after it all happened so it’s a very pure reflection, however I didn’t realize how much detail I needed to go into in order for people to even begin to understand what I was talking about. I remember at the time being secretly and naively shocked that it didn’t immediately go viral and change the world. Reading it back now I can see how others weren’t as amazed as I expected them to be. Although it was amazing enough to be published in an online journal (the silly title was just meant to be click bait) and it is still a very lovely piece that remains very close to my heart. It also includes a few details that I may have forgot to include in the episode above so I thought I’d share it here. I think it’s best suited to read after listening, but you do what’s best for you. :)
I tried meditating for the first time last week and, well, it worked.
In fact, now that I know what can come of it, I might be changed forever.
Here’s what happened:
I just sort of laid down on my back, closed my eyes and started telling myself all the things I’ve learned from meditation believers, and with each new thought I relaxed my body more and more.
I reminded myself that there’s nothing to be afraid of, at all, ever.
Fear is an illusion. Fear is an illusion because attachment is an illusion.
There’s nothing to be afraid of losing because we actually have nothing to lose.
We have nothing.
Money can burn like paper, possessions are easily lost or stolen, even the people you love more than anything could be gone tomorrow.
The past is gone and the future is a mind projection.
We should love anything or anybody outside of ourselves but all we really have is ourself, here, now in this moment.
That’s what exists, the moment happening now.
I’d been fighting with the boy I’d been seeing for a while and hadn’t talked to him in two days. When he popped into my head I reminded myself that I would deal with that in my own way on my own time. Then I told myself to just be.
Immediately, I felt adrenaline. I think it’s because it’s scary to really let yourself detach from everything. All the sounds around me became distinct and then my eyes focused on the backs of my eyelids.
Then I was asleep. I have no idea how long I was asleep, or unconscious, or whatever I was—maybe 20 minutes? (Looking back, I’m not sure if it was sleep.)
And I don’t remember any dreams. When I woke up I realized that all the colors in my room were bright. I looked over and saw my rings on my windowsill and felt that the angles formed by the way they were sitting were picture worthy.
Then I realized the ripples in my pillow were too, as well as the electric chords hanging down from my table.
I had the idea to get up and Instagram everything in my room but didn’t have any desire to rush or capture and attach to anything so I just laid there appreciating how it all looked.
When I sat up, my relationship immediately popped back into my head but I wasn’t angry anymore. I felt sadness. But it was different.
I wasn’t trying to run from my sadness.
I wasn’t trying desperately to find a way to fix things.
I wasn’t thinking of all the things I thought he did wrong and how I need to tell him so he can fix them, and fix my feelings and make me feel better.
I wasn’t trying to escape it and I wasn’t making him the only rescue line.
It was just pure sadness.
The day before I had jotted down a couple of things I wanted to tell him once we had cooled off and weren’t angry:
“This doesn’t work because you, you didn’t, you didn’t, you didn’t, you’re not good at, you make me….” But I’d completely forgotten about those things, or they were just gone from my head and everything rushing into my head was:
“I apologize, I chose to, I’m sorry, I was acting out of pain and it was wrong, I’m deeply sorry, you don’t deserve, I understand…”
And I sent a long text. But there was no hope, no agenda, no expectations towards him. No he ‘should’ be this or that now. I remember being a little afraid to send it but I knew that somehow I wouldn’t be mad if he wrote something back that was angry or blaming.
I knew that it was my decision to take that risk and I did all I could do. Then I sent it and dropped it from my mind. I didn’t check my phone once.
I stayed in this state for two days.
I noticed a lot of things during this time.
I performed mundane tasks with awareness, care, and clarity, even walking. Temperature and hunger seemed to have less of an effect on me. I was never rushed or stressed.
When left alone with my own mind—for example, just sitting on the train—I actually controlled my thoughts. I chose what I wanted to think about, and no past stress or future possibility came into my head to haunt me. I’d think of something, solve it if it was a problem or put it from my head if it there was nothing I could do right then.
I wasn’t chewing on the inside of my cheek or picking at my face.
Other women didn’t seem like competition at all. In fact, the whole idea of competition seemed silly. Status, power and attitude all seemed very silly and every single advertisement I saw seemed overly desperate.
I wore no makeup, without hesitation. But there was no sense of accomplishment or achievement in it, I just didn’t need make up. In fact, during all of this I never felt “better than” or judgmental or cynical because others weren’t acting like I was.
I was just being a being, clear and at peace.
It’s somewhat comparable to the difference between when we were bullied as kids and how we’d react to it now. Most of us would probably laugh at what was said to us then. And because we’re confident now and like who we are, we’d possibly even feel pity for someone that was so immature and pained inside. It’s not a perfect metaphor but it’s similar in that the outside can’t ever take or touch what we have inside.
During those two days I also only checked my phone for specific things that needed checking and I wasn’t using it for escape.
I was able to meditate and actually fall asleep without thoughts or fears filling my head, which is the only healthy solution I’ve found for falling asleep quickly in 27 years.
I was more honest and didn’t find myself thinking of excuses or second guessing any of my actions.
Junk food wasn’t tempting.
My eyes felt more open and I felt aware.
I felt awake. (when I said “awake” I meant physically, literally.)
I believe this is our natural state, and unfortunately it seems almost impossible to access in this kind of society.
When I went to see this guy the next day, it was not like I’d ever been after a fight.
While waiting for him to get off work, I was just sitting in his cafe noticing how the ceiling looked for the first time. I wasn’t afraid or upset that it happened. I saw him and I felt happy.
We ended up talking for hours and I noticed that I wasn’t getting defensive of anything anymore. I felt responsible for all of my feelings and I didn’t feel the need to prove that I wasn’t not a “push over” by getting angry.
He even ended up offering his own apologies for a lot of the things that I’d written in my original list. I’d never felt so caring and close to him.
Some people believe that God is like a current and we are all conductors of that current which brings us to life. If we could all just stop for a moment and eliminate all the static and background noise then God really can come through us. Animals and plants must do this every day of their lives, and with our intelligence, we have the potential to become something remarkable and truly transcendent.
After my experience, I think that this way of looking at things is not too far from the truth. Whether or not I believe in God in a traditional sense, something to that effect seemed to be happening to me.
Even after trying to explain what I experienced, the words can’t compare to actually being there. All I can do is say that it’s peaceful, natural and real, and that I was actually the person I’d always wished I could be.
So what I’ve learned is this: eliminating outside attachments and just being with yourself, even if it’s for a little while, somehow consumes you with self worth. And without any voids to fill from the outside, you in turn become selfless.
By Natalie Fehlner
June 13, 2014