I am Marisa (Part 1 of 2)

THE ANSWER 

Marisa's Story (Part 1 of 2)

In the seizure induced car accident that happened in 2008 I lost most of my short term memory and really only remembered the BAD things from my life up to that point.... I had nothing GOOD, or so I thought, in mylife and I was lost.  In 2009 when I had another seizure while driving that , obviously, caused an accident.  This one was not as serious as the first accident but I remember watching it happen from "above".  I remember meeting a girl who looked just like me, I remember what we talked about and I also remember that, against my will, she made me come back down to continue life.  I also remember meeting someone or something that appeared to me as a big ball of light to my left that I was able to talk to with out words.

After this second accident in 2009 some of my memory came back, it had been about 7 months and at that point I began searching for answers as to how I saw this accident "from above".  While writing down all the detail that I could remember one day, I suddenly remembered seeing the accident that happened in 2008 "from above" as well.  Those two memories then triggered vivid feelings and visions of me popping out of my body the way I did during both of these accidents every time I would have a grand mal seizure.  I am epileptic and have been since 1998 when I started experimenting with drugs in college.

In thinking about all these memories I realized that I LOVED it when I popped out of my body, I didn't want to be here!  I was miserable and as weird as it may sound, I almost looked forward to having another seizure so I could leave this earth. (even if it was just for asecond).  For a couple weeks after each seizure I would be in an altered half conscious state and that is what felt good for me.... Somehow one day after having a seizure I came to realize that during this time after my seizures my brain wasn't fully functioning and that is, strangely enough, what I enjoyed.  It quieted the CONSTANT chatter in my head, the negativity, the hate I had formyself, my life, etc...

Upon this realization I made a decision.  I was going to figure out HOW I could feel the way I did after my seizures and how I could get out of my body without having to have a seizure.  I knew how much these episodes ruined my life and those around me but they had just become something I got use to having about every three weeks or so for the few years prior.

As I mentioned around this time in 2009 most of my memory returned but it did not cause good things to happen inmy life.  I began to remember all the horrible things I had done, how I had scared and hurt my family and those that loved me, I started to see where my life had gone over the last year, and saw where it was headed so I got VERY depressed. Everyday at the office I spent annoyed, upset, frustrated, angry, and bitter at myself and everyone around me. I took most of this out on my dad who was constantly there with me.  One day he had enough and basically told me to get out of his life via email.... He told me to fly a kite (not in those nice words though) and told me that if I ever got married (he knew I was having issues with my boyfriend at that point, to find someone else to walk me down the isle.  He said if I wanted a father to find him in heaven.  I took that as he wanted me to kill myself so I left and we went almost exactly a year with out any communication.  It was SO hard since we had worked together everyday since we started our business 3 years earlier and my dad was always my hero.  I went through some major changes in my life because in addition to not being able to drive a car, the mortgage industry crashed ( I was a loan officer) and I didn't have many people I could trust anymore becuase most of the people I had attracted into my life were only there becuase I had something to give them. Luckily I had saved up a good amount of money while the industry was good so I basically went into hiding.  Jeff was gone for a 4 month job across the country so I sat in the apartment that he and I had at the time by myself every day and just thought about how WONDERFUL it would be to NOT be here onearth anymore. 

One day while down at the Longs across the street from our complex a cashier that was always chatty with me when I went to pick up my seizure medication gave me a CD with The Secret on it and The Power of Now.  I thought it was nice of him, said thank you then got home and threw it in a drawer.  A couple weeks later, I had a random person mention both of those books to me in a conversation I was having at the grocery store so I went home, got the CD out and listened to The Power of Now since it was first on the CD.  I still have never gotten to The Secret.

Although I was not having any more seizures at this point in 2009 I was still wondering how I could feel the way I felt when I did have them.  I finally came to a conclusion that if I could learn to turn my mind off the way it was when I had seizures that I would accomplish the wonderful feeling of not being here on earth.  I had NO clue where to start.  The reason I mention this now is because listening to the power of now set me on my path to self discovery of the "mind".  When I listened to the Power of Now that day in my apartment, something clicked for me!

The Power of Now made so much sense to me and inspired me to learn more about this so called "devious" and"evil" ego that was HIDING in my mind.  In my frame of mind at that time I loved that by learning about the "ego" and how it is separate from who we REALLY ARE, that I could take that knowledge and use it to blame everything bad that I had ever done and that ever happened to me on it!!  "Oh THAT wasn't ME.... THAT was my EGO!"  Looking back I laugh but that is really what I thought at the time!  I obviously know now that the ego is NOT evil or devious and that it has a purpose.  But, at that point in my life, at the conscious level I was living, having something other than myself to blame for all these things I was suicidal over was just what I needed to get me out of that funk.

When I over came the suicidal tendencies and was finally getting out of the depression, I was still working VERY little and living on what I had left of my savings from 2007 - 2008 . I dove into tons of books about human nature and why we do the things we do.  I had ALWAYS been interested in human nature,I studied Chinese astrology since I was a teen, not so much to tell the"future" but to learn to categorize different personality types,their mannerisms, and each sign's probability of doing certain things and getting along with other people.  I studied psychology during my short 2 year stint in college and absolutely loved learning about the subconscious mind.

I loved all the knowledge I was attaining about the ego and the subconscious mind because I was able to recognize these things in people around me. Although I did not know I had the abilities that I have now, I have ALWAYS enjoyed reading people and this new knowledge gave me even more ammo in addition to the psychology and the Chinese astrology.  I would sit for hours and hours reading websites, watching you tube videos, and downloading audio books about this topiceveryday.  Like I just said, I was notworking much and I was still not driving due to the fact that the DMV needed to see a 1 year “seizure free” period documented by a neurologist and I couldn’t show them that.  So basically, I didn'treally have much else to do.  In essence I was just existing with no life... It was sad, but I filled my time with 24/7 studying.

Once I started to believe that I was an "EXPERT" (yeah right! haha) on the topics I was studying about human behavior, the ego, the emotions, etc I would sit on the computer and send out these quotes that I would learn in the books to others hoping to inspire them to change. (because I was perfect?)  I would say "Oh my gosh! This is perfect for my sister!  She NEEDSto read this" or "Oh my Gosh this is SOOOO perfect for my mom, she NEEDS to read this!" "WOW!  My dad REALLY needs to readthis because it will CHANGE his life!!" 

Through out each day and as the weeks rolled by I would send these inspirational quotes out to all my family members including my dad who was no longer talking to me.  I think I heard back from him once and it wasn't very pretty so I never sent another one to him.  At this time I felt it was necessary to INSPIRE all those around me by pointing out all their HORRIBLE qualities so as to FIX them so they could be good people (like I had become???).

I had not learned yet that we only see in OTHERS what we have in OURSELVES.  I remember the first time I read about the concept, I quickly dismissed it.  I thought “There is no WAY I am as annoying as all those people aroundme!”.  After coming across the teaching a few more times and giving a bit more though, I realized it was true!  I have to admit, it wasa hard pill to swallow at first, in fact I decided to prove the theory WRONG.  I went back into my old emails that my dad had sent me accusing me of thingsthat he swore I was thinking or doing and I realized, "OH MY GOSH! He istotally talking to himself!!!".  Thesame thing happened with emails from my sister! We were not speaking at the time either. I immediately took the immature route and started to think I was a SUCHa victim, that they were SO horrible for accusing me of all their WRONGS and then something came over me and knocked me right up side the head (I am sure itwas my guides now).  Something inside medecided to look back at all my BRILLIANTLY FABULOUS emails that I had writtento them and see what I had accused them of. To my utter amazement I realized that I was literally talking to myselfin a mirror every time I sent those emails out! I was shocked to say the VERY least! I really believe that from that very day, sitting in front of mycomputer and coming to that realization was the first day of the rest of mylife!

From that day forward I began toacknowledge all these things that I had become and at first I went right backinto my funk of suicidal thoughts and depression.  I would think "Why am I even here?""What is my purpose for being alive since I have caused SO muchpain?".  I suddenly saw thatEVERYTHING was MY fault and not the others around me that I had been blamingthe whole time. (again the conscious level I was operating at believed that, Iknow now that this is not completely true.)

At this new low point of my life Icame across a book by Jerry and Esther Hicks called “The Power of DeliberateIntent”.  I began reading it because Ihoped it would help me to get out of this hopeless mental state I thought I hadescaped and cured myself from but was trapped in again.  The book gave simple exercises that couldchange your mood from Sad to Angry(?), jealous to appreciative, etc... The bookexplained that being mad was much easier for us as humans to be than sad andthat made so much sense to me.  I keptreading the book and trying the exercises because at that point I was willingto do anything to not be SO SAD anymore.

The book started to teach me about Lawof Attraction and I began seeing things that I wanted manifesting in my lifeVERY quickly.  Things started gettingbetter, I was working again, making money, and I was working on getting mydrivers license back with medical restrictions (of course).  All of this happened in such a short amountof time while reading the book (and a few others about Law of Attraction  I absolutely fell in love with the authors and became a hugefan.  I went out and bought all theirbooks and the audio versions of each.  Iwas constantly listening to them at work and when I was not working I wasreading.  I loved how simple they madelife sound and I loved that they taught that we are the makers of our ownlives.. no one else... just us!  I likedthat they said this because at that point "myself" is all I had.  I had no trust in anything outside of me,including God.

One day I went online to look up theseauthors to see where they went to school....I was wondering how the heck theygot so darn smart... how did they know all this AMAZING stuff??  I discovered that Esther Hicks was what wascalled a channeler and Jerry was her husband who helped write the books.  "A CHANNELER??  What the heck is a channeler??" was myexact thought.  I had no clue what onewas, so I looked it up!  I found thatthere are certain people that can channel beings that no one else can see andthat TOTALLY intrigued me.  Actuallyintrigue is not a big enough term to explain the draw and fascination I hadtoward this ability and looking back I don't know how I didn't think it was oddthat I was becoming completely obsessed with channeling and channelers.  I began looking for books that were channeledand one day in the New Age section of Barnes and Noble I ran across a bookcalled "Opening to Channel".  Iimmediately thought "Oh my GOSH!!! I can LEARN TO CHANNEL!!! I am going to DO THIS!! YIPEEEE!"

Although I was beside myself withexcitement I did not buy the book that day for one reason, I wasembarrassed.  Because of my upbringingand things I was taught at church I came to believe that all the books in thenew age section were of the devil.  It'sfunny looking back now at how I would go about reading books from thatsection.  What I would do was I would setup camp over by the Christian section which was right next to the New Age -Astrology section.  I figured if anyonesaw me I would be there and they wouldn't think anything of it.  I figured if they saw what I was reading Icould say that I found it in the Astrology section knowing that astrology wasaccepted by most Christians and was not thought to be evil.  I felt good about this set up I haddesigned.  Every 10 minutes or so I wouldslowly and casually walk through the new age spiritual section and quickly graba few books of interest then scurry back to my station where I had set upcamp.  I laugh so hard at myself nowthinking back, but know now that that it was all part of my growth and it alsohelps me relate to other like me going through the same thing in theirlives.  So back to that day, I did notbuy the book out of fear that someone would see me with it but I did gostraight home to order it on amazon along with another book that wasrecommended by the same author called Becoming your Higher Self. I placed theorder for next day delivery and anxiously awaited the knock at my door fromUPS.

At that time Jeff, my boyfriend whom Ilived with knew NOTHING about the things I had began to learn about and am gladbecause had I told him or anyone else for that matter they would have told me Iwas nuts (just as I would have said to myself 6 month earlier) and because ofthat I probably would have just dropped everything.

Luckily for me and my secret studiesJeff was working a lot and would leave at least 4 nights a week and stay athotels leaving me home alone. I took full advantage of this time to read mybooks (that I had securely hidden under my bed) and I also used this time tobegin to learn to channel.

At this point I didn't have much of anidea who I thought God was.  I knew thatone probably existed but had NO clue what he was, why he was, and how God hadanything to do with a "BAD" person like me.  I didn't have enough info to believe blindlyin something that I had no proof of.  Idid spend many years of my life happy in my Christian groups but I accountedthat mostly to just being social with positive happy people that talked aboutpositive happy stuff all the time.  Ididn't actually believe that it was because of a MAN named Jesus who said hewas God that died for us.  That was justtoo much for me to believe.  I wouldwonder, "How the heck does ONE man dying thousands of years ago wash outall the BAD stuff that people did before and after him, especially if he nevereven knew them!"

I didn't really think at all aboutGod, the only time I would, I would cringe because I just knew I was doing theDEVILS work by learning to channel but I was DETERMINED to get back to thatfeeling of being out of my body, the way I felt after my seizures and I wasbound and determined to ask that girl that looked like me WHY she made me comeback after both of those accidents.

This iswhen I came across an a book on audio that both my dad and step dad hadsuggested I read years back so I downloaded it and listened to the whole thingin one day.  The book was called"Conversations with God" and it absolutely 100% changed my life fromthat day forward!   That book gave me abelief in God and a new found understanding of what and who He was. Thischanneled book told me that even though I had been really, really bad, awful,and horrible to those I loved and horrendously abusive to myself that God stillloved me.  The book said that there wasno such things as good or bad, that it is all relative and is defined by manfor the most part.  The book taught thatwe are all down here to learn lessons from our life circumstances that weplanned prior to coming here and to learn from each other.  Learning these lessons from each other, thebook said, sometimes meant that someone would have to "play the badguy" and to me that explained so much! (I believe a little differently nowbut we can get into that a little later). After realizing that God was real and that He loved ME I remember mywhole body got covered in goose bumps and I just happy cried for like 10minutes straight!  I remember going intothe living room where I had the audio playing and turned it to the radio.  I still remember the song that was on.  It was Madonna's True Blue from theImmaculate Collection album.  When Iheard it I just started jumping up and down, spinning, and dancing alone in ourliving room... I WAS SO HAPPY!  For thefirst time in my life I truly felt GENUINELY HAPPY!

My passion for channeling continuedafter this realization but my focus switched from channeling "anotherbeing" into channeling my soul. This was for the simple reason that I believed in God now and I believedthat I actually had a soul to channel. The books I read about channeling yoursoul referred to it as our higher self and that triggered the memory of thebook I originally bought when I ordered the opening to channel book calledBecoming your Higher Self.  I found thebook, opened it up and threw myself into it completely.  What I mean by that is I REALLY began to practicewhat they taught in my everyday life. The book taught that we are SPIRITS living a human experience and theyexplained that by becoming aware of this higher consciousness which is the trueauthentic SELF (the REAL us) that we are able to clearly see what direction wewere to be heading.  I was quickly learningthat by tapping into and becoming our higher-self that our lower self (ego,intellect, emotions) just became tools that our higher self is equipped with inorder to live a successful human experience while down on this planet.

Finding this out was another turningpoint in my life because the "miss know it all" in me was now able toadmit to people and myself when I did lousy things that either hurt them orhurt me with out even realizing it until after the fact. At that time Iremember thinking that when I just wasn't being a good person my mind could say"oh it wasn’t my fault, it was my lower self’s fault!"  It sounds REALLY silly now but it is what Ithought then and surprisingly, for some VERY STRANGE reason that I still don'tunderstand, it brought a huge amount of humility into my personality.  Prior to this, I had NONE… not ONE sliver!  I know now that our lower and higher self areall one but the belief that they were separate at that time is what I needed tobelieve in order to acknowledge the not so wonderful qualities with in me and beginto change them.  Just as I teach all mystudents now, we can't change until we acknowledge that there is something tochange.

The biggest surprise to me, my family,friends, and even co workers was that I ACTUALLY started admitting when I waswrong instead of arguing a point that I knew was wrong just to win an argumentand make the other person look stupid so I could look better than them.  I began thinking before speaking and did lessblurting of the first thought that came to my head in any given situation.  Knowing about integrating my higher self intomy life REALLY slowed me down a great deal and everyone around me started tonotice.  I took this as a sign ofencouragement and got the guts up to call my dad and tell him about all thewonderful stuff I had learned about God. The conversation was short and pretty uncomfortable but I felt goodletting him know that I was aware of what I had done to him and others that Iloved and that I was grateful to have God in my life.  I heard from him a couple of weeks later viaemail asking me to come over to his house for fathers day.  I was SOOOOOO excited!  I couldn't believe it, my dad was actuallygoing to be talking to me again!! My life felt so complete!  Little did I know it would become even morecomplete that night.

Jeff happened to be out of the countrythe night that I got the email from my dad so I was unable to call and tell himall about it!  I had secluded myself somuch in the last 2 years that I really didn't have anyone to call and tell so, forsome reason, I decided that it was the perfect time to do a meditation and workon my channeling.  The session turnedinto a 5 hour meditation in front of the web cam from my mac laptop.  I always recorded the "channeling"sessions in hopes that I would catch something on tape or hear myself saysomething that I was not consciously aware of while meditating.  About 5 hours in (which seemed like 30minutes) I felt the presence of another being and I REALLY REALLY likedit.  I was not scared or creeped out ATALL which is strange to me now thinking back. You would think that I would have flipped out, but I didn't.  Feeling this being that was in the livingroom with me was such an amazing feeling, I had never felt something quite likeit.  Every time I would try to explainwhat it felt like on the video camera it would go away.  I knew that I needed to remember this feelingso I immediately thought to grab a paper and pen so that I could explain it onpaper.  From the time I was a little girlI LOVED writing in my diary and still greatly enjoyed journaling so that iswhat I grabbed and what I began writing in. I didn't want to forget the feeling I was having and knew, just like adream, that often things that happen in meditation fade as you come back to reality.

As I described this being in myjournal I started HEARING thoughts in my head that were not mine. I thought Iwas going crazy at first but then laughed to myself and thought "Well,after 5 hours of meditation I am probably going crazy but this is fun so I amgoing to roll with it!"  I stillhave the journal and web cam files from that night when the being that I was FEELINGbegan to write through me using my hand and my thought patterns to describewhat it had to say to me.  This beingsaid her name was Alana and that she was here to help me raise my vibration sothat I could speak with my higher self. She said that my higher self was at such a higher frequency that I wouldnot be able to channel her directly and that she would be helping me get tothat point through writing.  Alana saidshe was going to teach me about myself and would answer any questions I had forher.

With an even more excited out lookoutlook on life I began secretly writing with Alana every night but would askthe SAME thing every time we talked.  Whoam I ? Who are you?  Why am I here?  What is my reason for life?  When will I get to talk to my higher self?

She patiently would give me the sameanswers every night and what's funny is I never thought to ask anythingdifferent.  Due to the fact that I nowhad a relationship with a beautiful being from the light I got into researchmode again.  I started learning aboutautomatic writing (which is what I was doing) and how Alana could be writingthrough me.  Some sites said that thebeings were angels and some more scientific sites said they were not.  I figured that since I believed in God nowand believed that I was a soul/spirit, why shouldn't I believe in angels nowtoo??  Through doing my research I foundthat people familiar with channeling and communication with beings from theother side called Alana a spirit guide. I asked Alana if she was the only spirit guide for everyone and sheresponded that every person on the planet has at least one and said she wasonly one of mine.  In fact she never hasclaimed to be a spirit guide, she always described her self as a MasterTeacher. 

My life had become so wonderful sinceI started on my path of self discovery. Not only was my dad back in my life, I was back working at our officethat we built together, business was good, Jeff and I were happily living back in our house in Carlsbad and I hadmy driver’s drivers license back.  Mylife was PERFECT!  I was SO happy andLOVED learning about this new Spiritual passion I had found.  The only thing in my life that was notcompletely perfect was my physical condition. With all the accidents I had been in and the lack of healthy habitsthrough most of my early 20's my back and neck were in bad shape, I don't thinkmy lungs were very healthy and I just plain didn't have a healthy lifestyle.  I didn't eat vegetables,   all Iate was fast food, I didn't drink ANY water but drank diet coke like it wasgoing out of style... Looking back, it just seems so gross, but again, theconsciousness I was at was cool with it.

One day my back was really killingme.  I had 4 deals going south, I wasdealing with multiple homeowners on the phone, via text, and email so I decidedthat I HAD to get out of the office for at least 15 minutes.  My plan was to go across the street toMoonlight beach kick off my 3 inch heels, take my suit jacket off and justrelax for 15 minutes before going back into the war zone that I called myoffice.  When I pulled out of our parkinglot something told me to go right instead of left and soon I found myselfparked in front of a local yoga studio that I had been to once before.  Wasn't sure why I was there, but when I heardAlana's voice in my head (which I was now hearing 24 hours a day) she suggestedI go in. 

I said hi to the girl that that wasworking, told her how calming their place was and asked if I could just sit ontheir couch.  She smiled real big andsaid "Of course!".  We got totalking for a while because she was going through some stuff with her home andwas on the brink of losing it.  I helpedher with some tips on how to save it and then got up from the couch.  As I got up I grunted from my back pain andsaid "Sheesh, you would never guess that I am only 31 with all the pain Ideal with".  She got a look on herface, grabbed a flyer and said, well now I get to help YOU!  She invited me to something called Yinki thatnight and didn't charge me for it.  Iwasn't real big on yoga, I preferred the hot yoga that was more of a work outrather than a spiritual practice, but she promised I would love it.  When I got there all decked out ready for awork out I walked into the room and found all these VERY calm people spread outacross the studio with blankets and pillows on top of their yoga mats.  I was confused but went the to the back ofthe room, grabbed some pillows and marched right up to the front of the classso I could be sure to hear everything the teacher was saying and I set my stuffup.

The yoga class began, my back waskilling me but I continued on.  Thenwhile I was in one of the poses that we were to hold for 5 minutes a lady cameover and laid her hands on my lower back, the EXACT spot that my pain was.  She remained there for about 2 minutes andwhen she walked away THE PAIN WAS GONE! I couldn't believe it!  Afterclass I ran up to the teacher and asked what the heck they did to my back tomake it better and she explained that the ladies walking around during thestudio were doing Reiki energy healing on all of us who were taking theclass.  In my head I heard Alana say, “Askher if you can learn to do Reiki.”... So I did. The very next week I was in a private class with my Reiki masterlearning about the Art of Reiki.

To be continued........