For a long time now I’ve been a firm believer in things beyond this world. I am not talking about the dogma that each of our parents instills in us growing up or the cynicism that we acquire later in life when we lack proof of said beliefs. I am talking about a feeling so strong, it is undeniable–something you just know, with every fiber of your being. I suppose that feeling can fall under the blanket of what is commonly termed as “faith.” Faith lacks reason and rationale, it scoffs empirical proof and science, yet faith is exactly what is required even in science to make the leaps that make discovery possible. Faith is a belief rooted in the intangible in a tangible world. I find it interesting how many of us “tangible” beings have faith. Could it be perhaps that subconsciously we know we are not that firmly rooted at all? Why do we believe in souls, or in an afterlife? Is it simply denial on our part to snub death? I don’t think so.
I see my life unfolding in ways I never thought possible. I grew up eating dirt in the backwoods of a Communist country and wound up living in one of the richest countries in the world, able to exercise my expression and fulfill my dreams all because my father believed in something beyond what was there. He had faith that he could give his family a better future. Before long he weaved his faith into dreams and his dreams became reality, giving birth to new opportunities for his daughter–me.
George R. R. Martin once wrote, “The best fantasy is written in the language of dreams. It is alive as dreams are alive, more real than real … for a moment at least … that long magic moment before we wake. Fantasy is silver and scarlet, indigo and azure, obsidian veined with gold and lapis lazuli. Reality is plywood and plastic, done up in mud brown and olive drab.”
There is this part of me that I know doesn’t belong in George’s plastic and plywood reality. There is a part of me that has always been free to roam and dream and imagine. That part of me is as important as the part of me that goes to work everyday to sludge it out in the mundane world of bills, pain, illness and disappointment. That’s the part of me that allows me to see this world for what it is: An illusion. Through the years I’ve indulged my geeky side with quantum theory books, Dungeons and Dragon campaigns, poetry, history, and a hefty dose of fiction. What I’ve discovered is that real life, like fiction, like science, truly has no rules. On the quantum level it’s all one big chaotic soup where everything we know breaks down–where walking through walls is as likely as gravity. In short, I have faith that everything I’ve ever been taught is wrong. We have more power than we dare admit and consciousness is truly the smallest building block in the universe. Whose consciousness? That’s the kicker isn’t it? Alas, that is a topic for another day.
I know that this is going to sound somewhat insane, but I don’t really care. Since last summer I have been struggling with a lot of pain. I’ve gone to a lot of doctors all of which turned out to be huge disappointments. I fired three of them and in the end the new ones weren’t able to help me either. Test results got lost, drugs that were prescribed to me made me feel worse, so on and so forth. My emotions were spiraling out of control. I couldn’t hear myself think– never mind write. I had stopped believing in magic. I was stuck in an endless loop of pain and negativity. I truly couldn’t see the light at the end of the tunnel. I needed a change desperately. That’s when I ditched traditional medicine and made a radical choice–I found myself a spiritual healer. This decision seemed to make sense considering my firm belief in energy and holistic medicine. Maybe drugs didn’t work on me because I truly believed they were making me worse. The mind, is, after all responsible for the effectiveness of drugs as proven by the placebo effect is it not?
“The best fantasy is written in the language of dreams. It is alive as dreams are alive, more real than real … for a moment at least … that long magic moment before we wake. Fantasy is silver and scarlet, indigo and azure, obsidian veined with gold and lapis lazuli. Reality is plywood and plastic, done up in mud brown and olive drab.”
–George R. R. Martin
My session with the spiritual healer involved a lot of strange stuff–not maracas and chickens per se–but it was certainly a completely new way to approach my medical condition. This woman was able to tell me things about my childhood that I hadn’t really told anyone. The emotions began pouring out of me in choked sobs and spasms. I realized then and there that there that something was eating me from the inside out and I needed to release it. By the end of the session it was as if a light switch had gone off in my mind. I felt differently. I walked differently and within a week, my pain began to go away. In two weeks my sanity began to return and nearly all my symptoms were gone. Five weeks later, I feel like a changed person. Maybe this radical change was achieved because of my faith that something would change, or maybe, just maybe, we are indeed beings of energy. I am OK with either explanation.
Since my visit to this healer I have felt a tremendous shift in my energy. Doors that were previously closed have begun opening up. I’m not saying healing didn’t require some work on my part. In the last few weeks I have released a lot of negative emotions I didn’t even know I was holding in. I needed that push in the right direction, a guide to lead my subconscious out of the darkness. Around me I have seen significant positive change, leaving me to wonder if I’m causing it. No, change that. I now know for certain, or rather, I have faith, that I do influence the universe around me. If we are energy inside a fluid world of waves, who’s to say that negativity and positivity don’t ripple?
At the height of my illness when my gears suddenly began to grind to a screeching halt, I went on the web and found this beautiful picture of a luna moth. I posted the picture everywhere. I made it a desktop wallpaper, my twitter background, my Facebook background, etc. You get the gist. Subconsciously I sought out this symbol. The luna moth was so beautiful that it provided me with comfort and a sense of hope–the word rebirth comes to mind. Deep down I was looking for something, I just didn’t know how to express it. Our subconscious works through dreams and symbols. I knew I had a real problem when the drugs I was taking stopped me from dreaming. It was as if I was stuck in a black and white, static world at night. Gone were the vivid dreams filled with symbols that had graced my nights.
I have always recognized the butterfly, the otter and the panther as meaningful symbols in my life. The panther has been with me for as long as I remember, same with the otter, but the butterfly was the one totem that I hadn’t really encountered–until my illness. Butterfly medicine came to me, urging me to follow my instincts and intuition, to trust in intangible things and I am glad I listened. Five weeks after my visit with the spiritual healer I found two luna moths perched outside. I had never seen them in person before so you can imagine my surprise and awe. They were absolutely beautiful. I cannot tell you how much this meant to me. It was as if the universe was validating my belief in magic. You know you are blessed when you are visited by fairies. I know I was.
So getting back to faith, I believe in a holographic universe made up of energy. I believe that existence is tied to consciousness, that energy can’t be created or destroyed–that we have a soul. I believe that when we spread positivity and smiles in the world, we make it a better place. I believe that intention is a powerful tool–that illness is as much in the mind as in the body. I believe that I’m shifting, like the butterfly, becoming more in tune with my subconscious and my feminine energy. I believe in beauty and lastly… in magic.
It is my most sincere hope, to leave on this earth something of that magic through my books. This wish I release to the universe and I give it wings.
