I’ve had several awakenings although the permanent ‘shift’ has yet to happen.

I’d always been what the doctors called ‘depressed’, from my earliest childhood. It was only much later that I realised that what I was feeling was longing. I did what most people do; doctors, psychiatrists, medications, etc. Nothing worked. I believed that if I could become a ‘someone’, everything would be Ok. I was lucky enough to be successful at virtually everything I did, but it didn’t affect the inner longing.

Fast forward to age 40 and the discovery that I have a healing gift. The gift grew but the longing stayed. One day it suddenly dawned on me that ‘out there’ is not the problem (Yes, I am slow sometimes!). Well, I’d tried everything else so decided to try meditation. I’d tried it once before in my late teens and felt this enormous rushing up from inside, which so scared me that I vowed never to do it again.

At first, I could only sit for a couple of minutes before agitation got me up from the chair. I’m very persistent though and kept making myself sit down again. By the end of a week, I was sitting for a couple of hours. By the end of two weeks, I was sitting all day, every day.

I could feel something changing. It was as if the effort I made in the beginning was no longer necessary and a magnetic force was meditating me instead. All the time, the inner voice, the narrator of my life, was getting quieter. About three months in, I got up from a meditation for a drink and stretch and was thinking about the forthcoming visit from my father-in-law, a very difficult person. The usual dread was there. Then suddenly, like a bolt of lightning hitting me, the most enormous love for him filled my body and mind. How could I have ever imagined him as anything other than perfect, my mind asked. The next thought was that I was going mad, then a widening realisation that ‘everyone’ is utterly perfect, just as they are!

That first awakening lasted a little under a year. I was in total peace. My healing gift grew exponentially and just bringing someone into my awareness was enough for a complete healing, even if I’d never met them and only received an email request.

Imperceptibly, the mind crept back in and I lost the awakening. It returned about six or seven more times, each a little shorter; the opposite of most people’s experience of a deepening. It’s good to remember that the mind has had a lot of practice at not being awakened; lifetimes of it!

So, back to the chair I go, listening to the sound, awaiting the light. What better and more noble way could anyone find to spend their time? The only way to know what the Truth is, is to discover it for yourself.