I often get asked,
“Where is my favorite place to travel to, or be?”
Additionally I am asked,
“What are the things you enjoy most in your travels and life?”
On the outer appearance this looks like a simple social question, when in truth it is a deep spiritual opportunity!
I am a woman of profound awareness, profound gratitude and deep love for my life! How could I not be, with the life I have had up to this point? I have died twice, watched my son die, had my body partially paralyzed twice, been under the scalpel over two dozen times. I have had my home, my marriage, my money, job and possessions, my daughters’ emotional health and their tender childhoods, ripped away by horrors, fear, other people’s egos and limited beliefs, and my answered prayers.
One afternoon I walked into my church, sat down and wrote a letter to God and asked, “Please take from me ALL that does not serve YOUR HIGHEST WILL for the good of ALL, so that I may walk my HIGHEST spiritual path possible in this life time! I willingly release my life and all people, places and possessions for YOUR cleansing to elevate me to where YOU need me to be for YOUR work to be done through me!”
I sealed the letter in a self-addressed, stamped envelope and asked the minister to mail it to me in six months. She taped it to her calendar six months ahead and did just that!
Not much had changed for me when that letter came, so I did it again, then got serious about letting go and letting GOD! That’s when the “wrecking ball” hit.
Everything I created from a fear based mind came to the ground! HARD!I was torn down, then pulled up by my bootstraps and drop kicked into a higher path! The more I resisted with fear and doubt, the more it hurt!
I finally stopped the “ego” (ejecting God out) and decided God and I made a great team. I know where I have been and He knows where I am going. I chose to trust God, and my process, and it WAS a process, not an event!
It took me 37 years to screw things up it was going to take a while to get the mess cleaned up! My pain, my fears and other’s fears, resentments, doubts and confusions added a lot of thorns in the path but I survived ! And looking back I see I survived with only minor abrasions! Am doing so much better now!
Life is about learning. Learning sometimes hurts. Growth is learning and adjusting our opinions of that experience to not also experience hurt. To say we hurt about something is to hold onto judgment about it; which is not really trusting our process, or our Creator to keep us safe. I have grown tremendously! Thank God!
Unless you are willing to live the consequences of a prayer like that, and have the strength to get through it so you can embrace the Heaven on Earth on the other side, I recommend a milder prayer!
That prayer was the invitation for God’s Demolition Team WITH a wrecking ball to show up! They took down everything I knew and all that I had and changed form everywhere! No stone was left unturned! I must say it was a ride through wind, fire and water, and I am glad I did it. I could never go back to my old way of thinking, living or being.
I LOVE WHO I AM NOW! I could NEVER GO BACK! EVER! I am sure ten years from now I will say the same. I have no thoughts of sitting where I am, I am still moving and growing.
To answer the first question, I love wherever I am. I guess that’s part of self love. “Wherever you are, there you are!” If one is not comfortable with their own company they probably won’t be happy anywhere because THEY are there! If it wasn’t so tragic, it would be funny!
Being a professional traveler it is always nice to come home! Although it is a simple, and modest, home of a single mother, it is a sanctuary in its own rite. It tickles me I have had international spiritual teachers and celebrities in my home who extended their stay just to be in the peace and sacredness of this space. That says a lot about how far I have come!
I have learned to take any space I am in, clear negative energies and bless it. Never thought ten years ago I would do "weird" stuff like that! My spiritual journey and progression has taught me to let go of all those limiting ideas, and now I am soaring.
It is so easy for me to blend in wherever I am, and appreciate, with great joy, whatever I am experiencing! It’s not simple to say ONE place is better than any other. My outlook on life has changed so much in the past two decades. Crowds never intimidate me, a room full of strangers no longer threatens me on any level, and it is exciting to go on the treasure hunt in such a place. There’s always at least one, if not all, amazing people in a room! That thought never crossed my mind in my younger days!
I can find holiness in a "hole in the wall, greasy spoon" full of old men, old women, young parents with screaming children, cowboys, Indians, truckers and even flies and cockroaches! Yet, I am also grateful to experience the opposite of that when someone goes to the effort, and expense, to indulge me in fine dining! I am very comfortable there and I appreciate fully, the gift of it!
I find communion in an auditorium of people waiting to hear a lecture of spiritual awakening. I can find heaven in a redwood forest alone with the trees and the sun dashing in to light my way through the woodland halls of majesty. I hear the voice of God in the dry desert winds and can stand in a dry wash where the waters ran fast and full one time, where now the cracked mud just tells stories to those of us willing to be still enough to listen.
There is a blended sense of sanctuary, and exhilaration, when I stand in front of an audience opening up proverbial doors and turning on lights for them, I tell them that Jesus said for us to be like little children and that the little children will lead us out of this mess we created. I invite audiences to "GROW UP and ACT LIKE CHILDREN so we can SAVE THE WORLD!"
Speaking of those children, there is sanctity in the embrace of an adoring child, or an elder who is honored I stopped to take the time to give respect and love them. The elders, so many of them, have let go of their ego based youth and returned to the wisdom of their childhood, not physically, but spiritually!
I am not speaking of the ones with anger and hostilities, mind warping unforgiveness and resentments. I am speaking of the elders who have found peace and meaning in their journey and face their last days without too many, or no, regrets! They have come to a place of acceptance and respect for the process of life and all of us living it together. The truly wise souls know the truth that there is only one of us here! There is " No tree is so crazy as to have the branches fight among themselves!"(Native American) Why do we?
Judgment is foreign to children, it must be taught. Fear is also taught, along with hate, self-deprecation, and aggression. Children love openly, and freely, and see no fault in others. Wisdom of years can bring us back to that state if we let go of unforgiven states. Crabby old people haven’t gotten that lesson!
Peace reigns for me when I am in the mountains away from the clattering, and the psychic screaming, of the human herds in the cities, yet there is a richness of souls in a metropolitan arena that cannot be discounted.
The sensual rock of the ocean waves can send me into the deepest of sleep. The crash of thunder and driving rain in a summer monsoon puts a comforting energy into me as the world is cleansed, electrified, recharged, restored and renewed, for if that is so for grass and trees, it is equally so for me.
The little things in life are now my big things, a stray alley cat that sees my energy and knows to trust me enough for a pat or two. I travel all over the country and every place I land there are treasures there. Doesn’t matter where you are in the world there are universal things that make all places the same.
The smell of bread cooking or steak on a grill, the smell of fresh cut grass or sliced watermelon. The peace I feel when I watch a baby breathing deeply, and easily, in her sleep. There never was a time in my life I didn’t acknowledge, and appreciate, those things; they just have more value now.
I love the smells of an art museum or big, old city library, the mysterious vibrations that fill an antique store; stories locked into metal and wood, ceramic and oil paint just begging to be heard, the blast of art, color and smells in a French bakery, the cool elegance of an ice carving, the water whispering “Look at ME now!” Yes, look at you, so glorious, so beautiful!
Raised on a race horse farm I can actually say there is a comfort for me walking through a barn and smelling ALL the smells, manure, hay, grain, sweet feed, horse sweat, leather, saddle soap and liniment; it’s rich, musky smell takes me back to a time when I was my Dad’s “stable boy and first hand!”. Now that my father has walked on, those memories, and those aromas, mean even more now than ever.
I love the beauty of sunsets on lakes and oceans, behind a mountain or high rise city skyline. Like a prima ballerina in the midst of flowing dancers I love to stand in a field and watch the grasses swaying elegantly in front of a back drop of blue bonnet colored skies and crisp white clouds racing to change form as they move across my piece of heaven.
The smell of rain coming, fresh air blowing through open windows in the house, fresh linens on the beds, a pot roast cooking, the aroma of hot homemade cookies, a roaring fire in the fireplace on a cold, damp day, a hot bath and warm dry clothes after getting soaked in cold rain.
There’s a magic, still, to see my breath in icy cold air, snow sparkling on a clear winter night, diamonds twinkling in the black velvet night skies, the rich smells of hot spiced cider or fresh cut herbs, flowers, and freshly ground spices.
The smell of a man, the sweetness of his kisses. The boyish surprise on his face when he tastes a drop of French vanilla I dabbed on my lip before he came in the door. The gentle strength in his hands and arms, the celestial heights we soar to when making love, the way I melt in the safety of his embrace. The heavenly dreams I drift off to after the loving.
This is why the angels envy humanity for we have the bodies to express our love in ways untouchable by the Angelic realm. Do you realize how blessed we are to have bodies? Do you hear the grumblings of the masses disenchanted with those bodies? Not I, for I know what it is like to lose my body! It may be a bit battered but what battleship doesn’t have her scars? I understand loss and I understand bliss and gratitude to the seat of my soul!
How rich, how wealthy, I am that I have experienced all these things!
The smell of a sweaty little kid all tired out from fun in the park, the swelling of my heart as my child, wide- eyed with pride, and love, hands me a paper plate covered in macaroni, glitter and glue declaring the greatest love in all the world is for me! The tears cannot stay at bay when I think of these things!
The enormous sense of relief that I have not failed my child, when as a young adult about to leave home for college, she seeks me out just to tell me “of all the people she has ever met, or read about, excluding Jesus, that I am the only person she knows who TRULY lives unconditional love, that I really do walk my talk and that she admires me, thanks me, and loves me for it!” Oh dear God, THANK YOU! She GOT IT!
My gratitude is present in every area of my life. The unbelievable comfort of sliding into the sheets after a very long hard day. The total surrender I feel easing into a deep, hot tub and the release of all that day brought forth. I give praise for clean, hot running water and I pray for those I know who do not have such a luxury, knowing one day I will be in a position to do a LOT about that!
The thrill of seeing miracles in front of my eyes; proof life never ends. The gratitude, the love and the safety I feel knowing Spirit is with me always. How amazing it is to be awakened in the night at 1:23, then 2:34, then 3:45 and 4:56. To step out of the bed and place my foot on a large white feather, to find a blue crystal earring belonging to my mother that I gave her years ago in my father’s cremains as we prepared to spread his ashes on her 87 birthday, “Happy Birthday Mom, Love Dad”, to have a love letter locked away in a cedar chest suddenly appear on the table on the one month date of my father’s death. The letter was a love letter to my father from my mother.
To have the smoke alarm go off on the south side of the house, then after we stopped that one the one on the north side of the house went off.
To have house lights, street lights, car lights, lamps and nightlights go on and off as I ask questions of Spirit is beyond words and something one must live for themselves to understand the enormous love and wealth of spirit I feel!
To feel my feet landing on the ground as I walk, ANYWHERE, is such a gift because I have had times when I could not do that! To stand on an aircraft and perform every job expected of me without pain or weakness from injury, thrills me in every move on a daily basis. I AM noticing, and I AM continually grateful!
To kneel before a fellow human being and ask how I can help you be more comfortable is the greatest honor. If you have never tried that you are missing out! Even Jesus did that as he washed his disciples’ feet. Our position in life should never keep us from being humble and in service of others, especiallyto those who serve us!
I am grateful for all the opportunities I have in my walk in life to Bring Light to Possibilities for others! My ministry is anywhere my feet are standing!
To hear the little munchkin voice, “Nana’s here!” makes my heart sing! To hear, “I love you Mom you are the most powerful and amazing, loving, woman I have ever known!” pulls my heart strings as my daughter messaged me on her late brother’s birthday last year!
She told me she was holding her sleeping son in her arms and could not stop her sobbing, or end her heart pain, for what she could only imagine I lived through years ago when she was just a six year old girl who could not understand the heartache of a mother and all that I went through.
It tore at her heart to remember me holding her brother as he was dying, “ If I had to hold my son and watch him die, it would kill me mom; I would refuse to take another breath if Sage died! I don’t know how you get the strength you have! I could only wish to be half as strong as you Mom!” She said she admired me beyond definition and hopes to have just part of the strength, courage, faith and love I have. Her own motherhood finally brought the understanding, and compassion she struggled to find.
She is right, what didn’t kill me, made me stronger, more loving, appreciative and vibrant! I know now from the gift of the years of my walk in faith that my son, and all those who have gone before me, are still with me in another dimension and I cannot, nor ever will be, abandoned! Humanity’s greatest fear; abandonment! It is a lie we tell ourselves! I have learned that! The truth gives me great peace.
My gratitude for what I see in front of me, the health I have, the love in my heart, whether or not another loved me back, would not matter for I have the greatest love inside of me! My love for God gets me through the painful days and celebrates my glory days!
My son’s passing has not scarred me but has enriched me and I feel safe in his etheric love for me! I am watched over always!
Love and gratitude for every part of my life has healed me well beyond any expert expectation and to depths well beyond the mere physical! There has never been a tragedy in my life only blessings!
“Where is my favorite place to be?” you ask.
“With me, wherever I am!”
I never thought that would be my answer, until now! Thank God I have finally grown up and can be like a child; a free spirit, in living, loving trust, for all there is in me, and around me!
NAMASTE’
Linda L.H. Smith, Licensed ATP®
“Bringing Light to Possibilities”
July 2009
