“Open Wide Your Heart” website Mark Mallett
I’ve been a seeker my whole life. I was never raised in a religious family. I always had the freedom to think for myself. I was not baptized until I was 21, and that was by choice, and as my mother said, more emotional than my actual wedding the week before.
I don’t know what possessed me to be so vigilant in my faith. Perhaps I was needy, or broken. But somehow I don’t see it that way.
When I was 10 we had moved from a small town in Elmira to the “big city” of Kitchener, Ontario. I had lost my best friend, she had moved away (we still sent each other songs on tape recorder and sweet notes between “Nina” and “Nimby”, but I digress). I had to start over, make new friends, deal with the “girl troubles” of getting along, getting picked on.
That Christmas I wrote a list of the top 10 things Christmas meant to me (I know it’s July but bear with me). At the top of the list I wrote “Christ’s birthday”. Even my mother was surprised. I’m the kind of kid that broke into the presents at 2 o’clock in the morning with a steam kettle to take a peak at what was coming in the morning. We rarely went to church, and certainly not on Christmas morning. I’m not sure where my religious fervor came from.
Later, after my first marriage fell apart, I found myself slipping away between breastfeeding my baby. I left him with my husband for an hour and went down to the village. There was some kind of revival in the park, a man on a speaker saying “If you keep playing the same old records, your life will always be the same. You have to change the record you are listening to.” And then he proceeded to invite others up to be saved. Something moved my feet up to the front in my bewilderment. I could have gone shopping but instead I was here. He sent me to the back where I was put in a tiny circle where one of the faith leaders proceeded to speak in tongues and I felt a swirl of energy as I held hands. When I broke away, my life was never the same.
Six months later, I had left that tiny village, my first marriage, and the life I had been living. I had asked for help, and it came in the form I needed at the time. I listened to tapes in the car by Marianne Williamson, “A Return to Love” and began to be interested in A Course in Miracles. But I was not ready for that.
It took 10 more years before I finally picked up the book for myself. That was after the death of my father-in-law, whose death I witnessed first-hand as he died in our arms. His peaceful transition, and my vigilant care and spiritual fervor, made it one of the most meaningful times of my life. We witnessed for three months his calm in facing death, and on the last night, lying peacefully in bed here at home, without the oxygen mask that had been keeping him alive, he whispered with such intensity, “Wh-i-t-e W-a-a-alll” “Whiiite Waaallll…” as he reached out and joined hands with his long-passed wife and best friend who died the year before. He described what he could, then drifted into a peaceful sleep. I believe in what he saw and experienced as a gift to us, just as Elizabeth Kübler Ross, Swiss-American psychiatrist and author or “On Death and Dying” believed in what she witnessed in hundreds of patients who had near-death experiences.
But I don’t have to nearly die to believe. There is something in me that knows. I could always see things in my room when I was a kid and had many lucid dreams. Symbols would appear in the air before me that I could understand and relate to. Lake a grape-vine embossed pen, meaning “Write”. Or animals or angels resting on my window.
A couple of nights ago my daughter said she saw a light flash beside her bed, and then on the other side too. Her blinds were closed and nothing was happening in the hall to warrant that. I had been told recently by one who senses spirits that a man with crazy eyebrows hunched over a bit and white grey hair was near me. That was Jack. My father-in-law who passed, my daughter’s grandfather. I was convinced he had come to visit her too. And perhaps her grandmother, whom she never met.
In a recent interview with Tina Games, she revealed that she saw orbs of light after her mother died, and that these orbs would visit her and communicate with her, giving her a sense of peace that took all fear of death away from her. No one could understand why she was not grieving the traditional way. It transformed her life.
Most people believe in something, but for the last five years, I have felt a strong presence to communicate what comes through me in times of lucidity and clarity. People who are in my circles, or whom I have interviewed with have witnessed this sudden light-filled clarity that comes through my words when I speak with authenticity and uncensored vigor. I can feel my crown chakra light up, and others feel the “tingles” too.
I feel lucky to be given this ability. I will no longer waste time in on worrying that other people will think I’m crazy, or some kind of Bible-thumper. I’m not. Mentioning the name Jesus doesn’t mean I believe everything that has been told or manipulated by the church for power through the ages. I believe he was an enlightened being – the highest of the high. A beloved brother, friend, leader of the Light. But his message was, “These things and more shall you do.” He never intended for us to worship him, but to rise to his greatness. To join him as equal “Sons of God”. To be One again.
We are all children of God, Christ, Loved, Whole. We come from the same place, and will return again.
This is my story – at least a glimpse. Maybe I will write more. Maybe I’ll write a book. But I couldn’t wait to tell you who I am. I couldn’t hide out any longer couching my words. Those who stand with me, stand with me. I am unafraid.
Here is a poem I wrote the other day which clearly shows my struggle and breakthrough:
October Light by David Simons
“Desert Prayer”
I feel nervous
What if I can’t get into the flow?
What if I don’t know?
What if nothing comes to me and it is late past the hour?
Expectation bleeds into
Surprise. Numbness. Falling
Asleep. Getting it over with.
Or breaking through. All
Possible but still, I have to decide.
What is the miracle if
It doesn’t come through?
What mocking stillness will
Humble me and help me break
Down the barrier to your
Words, your eyes.
I want to express your greatness, your
Gratitude – no, your
Tenderness, humility,
Anonymity? Why does it
Have to be important, mighty?
I ramble on and on stalling
While my heart beats
A vacant heat
Across my chest. Will
My heart open or my mind
Lay awake – insomnia.
Anything is possible. Again
I must decide.
Oh, what the hell!
What do I have to hide?
Turn on the water,
Clasp the end of nozzle and spray yourself
All over.
Drink! or bury yourself alive.
Who is on the other side?
Who will be in need, quenched by my words, thrive?
Who will I save by
Letting my mind lay
Down and my Spirit fly?
Who will hear my words
And know they are alive?
Dear God, let it be me, who hears, who listens,
Who saves, who thrives, and all those
Who come with me.
Let me be healed along with those
I am afraid of.
Let them know me –
And let the stars open,
The night come, the
Heart of my heart
Come alive. A smile
Lay me down in sweet
Surrender, fully fed, kept,
Alive.
This has been part of Krista’s “30 Days of Miracles” series. If you would like to join her, write to her here.
