Don't Forget to Pack Your Trunk

In the Risen Chapter, Grief Evolved & Self-Exiting, it's shared how August's Risen friend, Robert, once brought him a deeply compassionate message about grief and dealing with the loss of our beloved furry, feathery, and leathery children:

“. . . instead turn your inner perception toward the Great Truth that your children are still alive. Even more alive, for they now enjoy the perfect health and peace that will eventually be yours.

“And they will be by your side. Their moments of pain and messiness are over and so it will be for you. The fragments of your former selves, seemingly and utterly heartbroken and separated forever, will slowly and surely begin to draw back together, guided by a Great Hand that possesses the Intelligence to gently join them into your new Self, deeply changed and somehow bigger than you were before. Just as your children have experienced a transition, so have you by the very nature of your loving bonds with them. You will achieve a transition beyond any dream that you have ever had, for you will no longer think it a dream, but will recognize it as Reality." (p.99)

It was these words that came to mind after a brief but intense experience I (August) had today while riding the subway. Initially I was meditating to deal with some unusually strong anger and resentment I had been carrying for the past day, so I was not feeling well emotionally. I wanted to process the anger that my ego-mind insisted I was entitled to hang onto —which only made it feel worse — yet which Authentic Self was inclined to just observe and let unwind.

I asked for supportive assistance from Tim and my spirit guides, and fell to pondering reader E.W's earlier sharing that our book had helped her realize that it is possible, through practice, to communicate directly with our Risen loved ones while awake, not just asleep. I was doing just that. It wasn't long before I was in a slightly altered but fairly awakened state of meditative silence — the kind of inner silence that contains all sound before it resounds. It is in such states that true inner seeing — clairvoyance — arises. Inner landscapes began to form, quickly resolving into movement, color, and light.

And then, out of the quickly coalescing mists, a form stepped out towards me and stuck a long wet nose into my spirit face, while all I could see were great big wet brown eyes looking into mine. Somehow I immediately recognized this as one of my family's dogs, Dinah, a beautiful and strangely high-strung collie that had passed over more than 30 years ago when she was 15 years old! But she was far from the nervous thing she once was; here was an incredibly calm, happy being who radiated waves of compassion that so overwhelmed me that tears began streaming down my physical face. She continued to rub her face against mine. The raging resentment I had been feeling only a few moments earlier had instantly vanished, like the sun coming out and shining on a shadow.

Behind her were three more family dogs, all long gone from the Earth, who also came forward in instant and total recognition of me. Their intense and unadulterated joy beaming at me further washed my tears away, bringing the clarity of mind and heart I was seeking. The train came to a stop, and I went forth feeling renewed and enlightened.

It wasn't clear exactly where they were, but I could see furniture and rugs around them. I've had some of my most significant and strongest relationships with animals, and have long had the practice of inviting the spirits of transitioned and transitioning animals, wanted and unwanted, to go to my Risen estate and hang out as long as they want. (Tim has commented more than once about the herds of elephants and dachshunds there.) Perhaps they were waiting for me in some house as-yet unknown to me.

I also remembered something else that Robert had shared about our animals:

“Therefore let this place where we come to share our pain, fear, and loneliness also become the beginning of the Greatest Journey, which is that of Going Home. Upon your arrival, you will immediately be greeted in great joy by your animals, which never have and never will stop loving you in their sacred and shameless adoration.”

I am so much looking forward to more wet noses and trunks.