The Cave of Lost Souls

A few months ago a friend emailed me about her discovery of this series of caverns when she was journeying for someone. The caves had mud floors where souls were buried in the mud. Well, I also found this cave when I was unravelling a curse. I was sent to look for a relative who had cast curses on a family. When I found this soul I was able to persuade her to revoke the curse. Then I wanted her to ascend to the Upper World, where all souls should go.  But, she still had more curses to remove before she could go.  After some time I was able to help her to transcend.

Soul parts of abusers

Often, when I have been in the process of depossessing clients of spirits that may be hanging around them, I have come across soul parts of people who have abused them in the past. This also happens sometimes when I am doing Focusing, as the initial part of both processes is very similar.

When doing Focusing we will find a part that is not a part of the client. It often is malicious and causes great distress to the client. The same happens with depossession. We will find an entity that is malicious. In both cases we can speak to the entity and find out where it has come from. These are not parts of people who have died, but who are still living.

It is not ethical to send a soul part back, without permission, to somebody who is still alive; so I send them to the Lower World to await a time when their owner may come to collect them. I do not know if the abuser consciously leaves a part of themselves with the victim in order to control him or her, or whether the soul of the victim clings onto a part of the abuser's soul, or whether it is a karmic occurrence whereby the abuser gradually loses parts of his or her soul.

If anyone has any views or experience on this subject I would be glad to hear from you.

Beautiful Marriage Vows

I was doing some focusing with a friend who was due to get married in a few days’ time. He was feeling very apprehensive, not about making a huge commitment to his partner, but about standing up in front of a group of people and feeling vulnerable.

He and his partner had devised their own vows. To him the ceremony was all about being open-hearted. These vows brought tears to my eyes:

·         I trust in your love

·         I am here to be seen

·         I bring my whole self to the marriage

·         I ask you to support me in feeling my true heart

·         We commit to creating space for the girls (while holding hands with their children) to be themselves.

·         At the end of the ceremony everyone to join hands and feel connectedness with each other and the Loving Spirit. “I ask for your help in feeling my loving heart.”

Even though this was about being open-hearted he was feeling on his own – not connected to anything.

He had mentioned earlier about feeling the Universe looking over his shoulder. I reminded him about this and he began to feel connected to the Love all around him and aware of the Presence. He felt grounded into it. His body connected to the ground. His Spirit meeting the Presence all around him.

Then he realised why he had not been able to be open-hearted but on his own. He had been hoping that being open-hearted would bring that connectedness. But he was doing it the wrong way round. He needed to feel the connectedness first, then he would be open-hearted.

The wedding went very well and he very much enjoyed the day.

 

A Lightbulb Moment

I woke up this morning with this blinding realisation.  Well, it was obvious really, I don't know why I didn't think of it before.

During my career as a Counsellor and Psychotherapist I have found that all of my clients, without exception (as far as I can remember), have been suffering from low self-esteem, surviving abuse of various kinds, being treated as a doormat, putting everyone else before themselves, giving of themselves too much - to their own detriment.

Psycotherapists and counsellors have been criticised for encouraging people to put themselves first, leading to a "me first" culture. We have been accused of fostering a culture of individuality, rather than working for the good of the family or community.

Putting oneself first seems to go against the teaching of most religions, which preach humility, turning the other cheek, giving away one's possessions, caring for others...

And then, this morning, I realised that all (well, most) religions consist of men preaching to men. Of course! For thousands of years men have been favoured by parents and communities, encouraged to achieve, fight, make money, make war. They have been brought up like little princes, catered to by their womenfolk who adored them, nurtured them, fed them, comforted them and anticipated their needs from cradle to grave. As a result men have tended to be arrogant, pompous, selfish and blind to the needs of others. That is why they need to be preached at by their priests and prophets to think of others.

There needs to be a balance. Women, especially, suffer from the belief that they should put themselves last. Women, also, suffer from violence, neglect and abuse in greater numbers than men. However, I do not deny that men who have been abused also suffer in the same way.

Maybe now is the time for a new religion. One that preaches equality for all and one that fosters individual development and achievement for everybody, as well as consideration for others. After all, the two aims are not mutually exclusive.

Depossession

My first encounter with a possessing spirit was when I was doing Focusing with a client some years ago. The client was in some distress and when we started Focusing there was something on the right shoulder. This was not a part of the client, which is almost always the case with Focusing, but it was an evil spirit that hissed at me. I did not know then how to do depossession and I reported the experience to my Supervisor on my Shamanic course. I journeyed on this possessing spirit and found that it was a soldier from an ancient war who had attached himself to various people over the years.

When we later learned about depossession on my course, we were told that all souls of dead people should go to the Upper World (I suppose some would call it Heaven). It did not matter what the people had done during their lives in the Middle World, they were all entitled to transcend to the Upper World. Unfortunately, many spirits do not make the transition. I have encountered spirits who believe that they have been too wicked to be entitled to transcend. There are also some who have died suddenly and do not realise that they are dead. In the modern world, with the decline of religions, people are ignorant of the existence of the Upper World and, therefore, do not know where to go when they die.

These souls drift around in the Middle World. This is where we get our ghosts and poltergeists. Often they will attach themselves to a living person to share in that person's energy and experiences. They are usually quite harmless but occasionally they can influence that person's tastes and decisions.

We have been taught to remove these spirits but also to make sure that they go to a place where they are not likely to attach themselves to another individual. If they are the souls of dead people we send them to the Upper World, where they can continue their existence.

Sometimes, when I am doing depossession, I come across alien beings. They are quite like "Q" who appears in Startrek. They have just come along to observe. I call upon the elders of their world to come and get them - and they do.

Of course, this is quite dangerous work and I have to take care that everything is in place to protect myself and those around me.  I find the work fascinating.

Soul Loss and Focusing

Soul loss is another phenomenon which is encountered both in Focusing and in Shamanism. The idea of soul loss in Shamanism is that sometimes, when we suffer a shock or a traumatic event, we lose a part of our soul. In fact, we can lose almost all of it, such as when we are in a coma or when we find ourselves outside our bodies at a crash site or in an operating theatre. Such phrases come to mind as: "I jumped out of my skin", or, "I was beside myself", or "I was somewhere else, I don't remember". Sometimes the soul comes back by itself but often parts of us split off and stay stuck outside our normal awareness. It is strange, though, that they can still occasionally have a dramatic effect upon us, filling us with fear and making us act in ways over which we have no control . As my Psychosynthesis trainer, Barbara Cole, used to say, "What is excluded, controls". The Shaman can journey into non-ordinary reality and bring back these soul parts, though they do come back with conditions that we change our lives in some way, otherwise they will leave again.

I believe that in Focusing we contact these same split-off parts. They remain in our bodies as a felt sense but they are out of touch with our thinking brain. When we can contact the felt sense (which is a particular phenomenon or sensation but not a feeling or an emotion) we are getting in touch with this excluded soul part. We ask it what it has to say, what it wants and how it wants to change things. Very often, in a single session, the soul part can return and be integrated into our everyday being. These parts often also demand that we change our way of life. They will not stay if we continue to live in a stressful and un-nurturing environment.

Psychopomp

Psychopomp is enabling spirits from the Middle World to transcend to the Upper World.

We live in the Middle World and when we die we are all supposed to go to the Upper World (I suppose you could call it Heaven), no matter what we did while we were alive. Unfortunately, in the present day, where many have given up on religion, and the souls of people do not know where to go when they die. I also encounter many souls who believe they do not deserve to go to the Upper World because they think they have been wicked in some way. There are also souls of people who have died suddenly and are not aware that they are dead. So, there are throngs of souls inhabiting the Middle World in non-ordinary reality, in a state of limbo, who should really be pursuing their development in the many realms or levels of the Upper World.

When I was first introduced to Psychopomp on my course with the Sacred Trust in Dorset, the whole group of us entered the Middle World in non-ordinary reality. We all found that we were really welcomed by the spirits in this world, who were anxious to move out of the state in which they were drifting.

I found myself in an urban environment and a queue soon gathered at a sort of bus stop. I was able to send them to the Upper World by asking them to go to the light and helping them along. Simon, our trainer, had told us that now we could perform psychopomp we might find ourselves attracting souls who wished to transcend. We had all brought a crystal which we could hang up at the entrance to our houses. The spirits would not enter our houses but would wait in the crystal until we were ready to send them on. Some of my colleagues would forget to do it and would find odd spirits inside their houses come to remind them. I once left my crystal in my bedroom when I went on holiday and returned to find the house full of spirits.

Since learning Psychopomp I have performed it weekly. It is such a pleasure to do this service for lost souls. At first I merely had to work with the spirits from the crystal. However, I soon found that there were hordes of spirits waiting for me when I started my session. The Archangel Michael now comes to open a great portal for them all to pass through. I have recently sent through a large number of Nazi soldiers from the second world war and a huge number of battle casualties from the Somme in the first world war.