Words of Comfort: from the Spirituality Subreddit

I was browsing on the Spirituality subreddit on Reddit some months back.  The poster, who was grieving the loss of her mother from last year, asked about what happens to our souls when we die.  I liked the words from this one commenter in particular:

"I like to think of life here on Earth as an amusement park ride for souls. Your mom's soul was in the car (body) in front of you and the ride ended for her and she's waiting at the exit for you. When the ride ends for you you'll talk and laugh about it and get a churro and figure out what ride to go on next."

Books That Have Helped: Healing After Loss

If you're deep in grief and are having a hard time focusing on anything, including reading for extended periods, there is a book I would highly recommend: Healing After Loss by Martha W. Hickman.  The book was given to me by a dear friend who knew my mom well for many years.  Though Hickman departed this world in 2015 after a prolific writing career, her words continue to resonate with many people, including yours truly. 

The book is divided in 365 meditations, one for each day of the year, each one being no more than three or four short paragraphs.  I have found Hickman's book to offer much comfort and solace in recent times. I especially love some of her words from her October 23rd entry:

"But our life has changed now, with the event of this loss.  Perhaps it is time to take our energy we poured into that relationship....and turn to some new thing....Think of your loved one as blessing your effort, smiling through the veil that separates life from death, cheering you on...."

Articles Worth Reading: Messages in Lorraine Moran's Dreams

Visitations in dreams appear to be one of the most common ways people receive messages from their deceased loved ones. Guideposts has an article about Lorraine Moran, who lost her grandfather to suicide when she was 10 years old.  Several decades later, she lost her 34 year-old nephew Joey, after years of abusing alcohol and other drugs.  She describes in poignant detail about visiting Joey in the hospital during his final days, when he was hooked up to all kinds of medical equipment and could barely communicate.

But what is most remarkable about Lorraine's experiences are the dreams she had in the aftermath of their deaths.  After his suicide, Lorraine describes how her grandfather visited her in three separate dreams, merely saying the word "yes" to her in each one, and being comforted by him. And then there's the account of a dream she had after Joey's passing:

"One night just a few days after Joey passed, I fell into a deep sleep. I dreamt I was hanging up my clothes on my clothing line. My grief continued to weigh down on me as I worked. Then I felt a presence with me. I turned to see Joey. He looked so different. His face was filled out and had its color back. He smiled and his blues eyes were bright and full of life. As he looked at me, he started to laugh his familiar, hearty laugh.  

I was suddenly hit with anger. How could he be laughing right now? Didn’t he see how much pain I was in? But Joey just smiled at me and put a hand on my shoulder. 'Aunt Lorraine, you don’t get it,' he said. A calm slowly settled over my body." 

And what is this "it" that those of us still here on Earth don't get?  I have to wonder....

Animals and Spiritual Development

As a follow-up to the last post: I was reading an excerpt from Craig Hamilton-Parker’s book What to Do When You Are Dead. Hamilton-Parker works as a spiritual medium. There was a passage in his book that I found particularly fascinating and eye-opening, where he talks about animals and their spiritual evolution:

“My spirit guide has told us that animals do not all survive as individual identities after death. Some merge to what he calls a ‘group consciousness’. Their spirits return to a collective awareness for that particular species, and from this pool of awareness different animal souls are born. It is only when an animal becomes self-aware that its soul continues after death and starts the long process of climbing the evolutionary ladder toward human and angelic consciousness.

For many animals, this journey begins if it receives love from a human. In particular, pets and domestic animals gain a sense of identity because of prolonged exposure to humans. Our consciousness ‘rubs off’ on them, so to speak, causing them to forsake much of their instinctive nature and start to develop free will. Some people lavish love on their pets and treat them like their own children. Although in many ways this is a form of psychological transference, they are in fact helping the animal progress spiritually. The love they lavish on them enables the pet to quickly attain a sense of identity. The owner is thereby helping to create a new soul. I suppose you could say that pets are children in a real sense, for their souls are brand new!”

This is definitely a revelation to me. I’ve heard before that animals are here on Earth to help us human develop spiritually, but it could also well be that we’re here to help them spiritually develop as well!