I’ve recently returned from my annual trek to Brazil, this year accompanied by 21 loving and adventurous friends. As always, it was an amazing trip. One learns not to go with expectations, but to stay open to things as they are. Yet the expectations creep in; might I hear more this year? Maybe some improved vision or help for shoulder pain? What will I learn? Even that is an expectation, that there will be learning.

How do we hold an intention with no expectations? Intention is open and non-contracted. For me, it’s more on the level of envisioning; seeing and knowing the possibilities. The improved vision and hearing are already there; I invite them to express themselves in this body as fully as is possible. Expectation is a contracted experience, even if subtly so. The work for me comes right back to basic practice, watching for contractions, holding space for them with no self-identification with the mind or body experiences, and letting go, back into the spaciousness of intention and the open heart. 

So there is intention, but I have learned I need to stay loose even with that. If I hold a fixed intention, such as hearing, I may receive what I think I want and turn my attention and intentions away from something of greater value. I have learned to live more with the intention to remain open to whatever is for the highest good, for myself and all beings, and to know that I also can ask for something specific, this year help for my eyes as, with a growing cataract in my good eye, and increased bleeding, vision has been deteriorating. But the physical healing is secondary; first comes knowing the existent wholeness and releasing any belief in brokenness. Form follows thought, or as the Buddha stated it in Dhammapada, “We are what we think. All that we are arises with our thoughts. With our thoughts we make the world.”

Thus, I arrived with no plans, but feeling open to what might come, and with a non-grasping intention toward improved vision and hearing too. I also went with my highest intention, to be of service in whatever ways were most suitable, to learn whatever was offered to learn for the highest good of all beings.

My first week there I went through the line to say hello to the incorporated Entity and mention that my vision was deteriorating. I also asked for help with several other physical issues. I don’t know which Entity was incorporated. There was no smile, or taking of my hand. He just nodded and said, “Sit in my Current” and I was pointed to a seat. That afternoon as I returned to the Current Room and sat in the front row of the Entity Current, I felt a little unheard. I was meditating; the surgery line had passed by about 25 minutes earlier. I rested with any pain of the emotions from “unseen; unheard,” and let go. Now awareness was still and centered. It wasn’t so much trust as letting go, resting in knowing (versus trusting, which still is a ‘doing’) that my needs were being met, just as I sat there. Knowing comes from a place of deep stillness, resting in the core of being, Suddenly there was a firm touch on my shoulder; I opened my eyes and a Current room volunteer said, “Come.” As I arose I looked at the incorporated Entity sitting in his chair just before me; he nodded to me with a gesture to follow her, and she led me to surgery. 

At first I was surprised, then felt let down; the surgery ended just 3 or 4 minutes after I arrived and I thought I had not really gotten any benefit. I went right back to my room and to bed, as one is directed to do; the surgery on eyes, shoulders, back, belly and more, continued. I slept most of the next 30 hours, between visits and continued work from various Entities.

The next week, the session after revision, I went through the line to ask where he wanted me. It seemed like a reasonable question at the time. Father Francis Xavier was incorporated, an Entity whose energy and pure being I have come to love. I was almost scolded, as I was told, word for word from the translator, “You know you are a Daughter of the Casa and I always want you in my Current when not needed elsewhere; now sit here (pointing).” I sat down in his Current as instructed, and almost immediately felt the surgery anesthetic again and pressure, more work on my eyes. The anesthetic feels like being wrapped in a loving and protective cocoon, consciousness quieted, and body energy stilled. Body seems to disconnect from mind. There is drowsiness and lethargy. It is entirely energetic, not chemical in any way. Three more times through my 5-week stay they did eye surgery on me in the Current room. Each time it was obvious to me and to others, as my eyes were extremely bloodshot for 24 hours and I could not focus them.

Yes, there was some added hearing, especially of music and laughter! I had the delight, one day as I sat in the Sunday Morning Interfaith Service, to hear the melodic voice of opera singer Armita Nikdin singing, what else, “Amazing Grace.” It was true grace and brought tears of joy to my eyes and gladness to my heart. I was reminded in that hearing to keep my heart open and trust this process. 

Throughout these weeks, when they were not working on my eyes or body, I was offered many kinds of instruction in my meditation as I sat in the Current. Predominant was mediumship training. This may come as a surprise, coming from me who you think of as a medium, but my understanding of that term was vastly expanded through these 5 weeks. Incorporating Aaron is easy now. I just release and invite him in; he does most of the work. In Current, with my eyes closed, I repeatedly was invited to observe the layers of energy fields as people passed by in line; a radiant core and then the levels of spirit, mental, emotional and physical bodies, and to observe any streaks or shadow in those levels, noting any diminishment of expressed light. I found I could ‘see’ the areas of distortion, see the simultaneous ever-perfect, free of distortion and invite the shift, just as I was doing for myself with vision and hearing.

 It corresponded perfectly with the akashic field practices in which Aaron has been training me for the past 2 years. Aaron’s talks in the May 2012 DSC newsletter all relate to this akashic field work, which has been our primary teaching at longer retreats and senior classes this past year. The work is never to “fix” or “do” but just to hold the compared experience of how things are, along with the highest intentions and knowing of innate perfection, and to invite the shadow to release into radiance. In this way they were teaching me a new kind of vision, to see the simultaneity of the ever-perfect radiance and the lower vibrational bodies, hold the vision of ‘ever-perfect’ as a reminder of what’s possible, and offer the invitation to each being to express the highest possible radiance and truth.  

This became my personal ongoing practice through these weeks, awareness of any diminishment of my own light, any places of subtle contractions of fear, aversion and so forth, and letting go into the highest possible openness and vibration.

But I am a slow learner (aren’t we all?), and doubts still crept in; wanting to make it this way or that; control; fear! On my next-to-last day, I thought to walk through the line to ask about the continuing shoulder pain and the status of my vision. My alarm was set for 7AM, time to get to the Casa for the morning lines. At 6AM the Entity Dr. Augusto (at least it felt like his energy) nudged me out of sleep and said, “You still don’t trust me. I am not like the human who makes promises and forgets, and needs to be reminded, prodded. When I make a promise, it is never disregarded. I know your needs; now go to my Current. I have work to do with you there.” I could only laugh. How clearly he reads me!  Six years ago, he said to me after my accident, “You will not be blind,” and again several years later, “no more eye surgeries and injections in the US; I am taking care of your eyes.” Yet there is still fear and grasping. He was right; I was not fully trusting. He doesn’t forget, but I do. Spirit, our own higher selves and those who lovingly guide us, can be trusted to co-create with us, as long as we are clear in our own intentions. 

I got to the Main hall about 7 that morning and sat on the step by the stage. Almost immediately I felt anesthetic and then a lot of pressure on both eyes. I felt very dizzy, weak. It lasted until just a minute before the door opened. I was pretty woozy and asked if I should return to my pousada; the Entity said, “No; you know I want you in my Current.” I needed support to walk to my seat but got there.

So I sat in Current. Hour one; more surgery on eyes and elsewhere; hour two, sleeping; hour three and on, more quiet.  Toward the end of that session the incorporated Entity, Dr. Augusto, walked up to my seat in the front Current row and put his hand on my head for about 30 seconds. It felt like his energy was moving right through the skull and down into my heart. I just began to weep, feeling deeply seen and embraced by that love. 

Letting go is hard, but it really is all there is; inviting the release of ego’s voice, over and over, trusting our deepest intentions for highest good, and that we are all cherished and can follow this path of presence, loving-kindness and liberation.