At the age of 44, I experienced a very surprising and unexpected spiritual and psychic awakening. Unlike some individuals, I was not born with any observable Psi-related abilities, nor had I ever experienced any unusual or so-called ‘paranormal’ phenomenon. In this regard, my life was very ordinary. While I did have an interest in metaphysics and was always fascinated with the stories of those who claimed such abilities and experiences, I was open but skeptical.
It was in the latter part of 2007 that I began to experience a rapid and severe decline in my health. With no answers from Western medicine, I was dedicated to healing myself, but I wanted to heal not just physically, but also emotionally, mentally, and spiritually. Although raised as a Christian (Lutheran on one side and Pentecostal on the other), I became a sworn atheist after leaving college. My scientific background simply couldn’t reconcile the spread between science and religion. In college, I enrolled in numerous religions classes, but none of them ever answered any of my deeper questions about life or death. Despite these Materialist beliefs, when I lost my health, it was the God of my childhood that I turned to for help. I did not ask to be healed. Instead, I simply asked to be shown and told what to do, and then I swore that I would do it – whatever it took!
Little did I know just where I was about to be led.
I diligently set about healing at every level. I would journal daily, sometimes up to twenty typed pages a day, trying to process and purge childhood anger, pain, and trauma. I was also doing the exercises in Caroline Myss’s outstanding book, Entering the Castle, An Inner Path to God and Your Soul. Everywhere I went and in everything I did, I was looking for the guidance that would lead me to my healing, and much to my surprise, it came.
Within a few short months of my request, my writing began to take a strange turn. I began to notice that it seemed as if someone was speaking to me and through me as opposed to me simply ranting or processing my own thoughts. My dreams began to do the same. I would often receive information far above my current level of awareness, hearing knowledge and wisdom, and gaining guidance to help me heal my soul. The knowledge was so profound and loving that I was not afraid. I only felt loved, uplifted, and blessed.
These small but strange occurrences gradually expanded into knowing things before they happened. I would get flashes of images or some random thought would pop into my head only for it to come to pass. Synchronicities increased to daily occurrences with signs and symbols manifesting everywhere around me. It was as if the entire universe was speaking to me – because it was!
The final step of my awakening was the awareness of the presence of spirits. In the beginning, I couldn’t feel their energy but would get fleeting impressions about their life. However, most of the time my communications were with what I considered to be higher spiritual beings – teaching me, talking to me, and helping me to expand and grow. Their wisdom was beyond anything I had ever experienced, so I had no reason not to believe it wasn’t all a result of God’s hand.
In addition to these regularly occurring events, I also had a single out-of-body experience. On occasion, I could also feel the lines of my physical existence dissipate as I would blend into everything that existed around me. For example, one day driving to the store, I passed a freshly logged site in the very woodsy subdivision where I lived. As I drove by, the pain of the trees that had been cut down tore through my soul like a knife. I sobbed at the agony of the event as if someone had cut me down instead of the trees. I was stunned at my reaction and the depth of the pain I felt. I had no explanation for why I had become so sensitive.
Looking back, I believe in many ways my body was shutting down, although I have no proof of this other than the vague unhelpful medical advice for my various conditions. I had a large benign growth on my thyroid and yet doctors had told me that my thyroid levels were fine. Still, I was plagued with intense debilitating fatigue. I slept poorly or else like death, and I would sometimes linger in bed all day. No longer able to work, my core body temperature was almost 3 degrees below normal and I would huddle next to a space heater, even on warm summer days. I barely had the energy to walk let alone keep myself warm. My military spouse was deployed at the time and we had just moved to a new duty station where I knew no one and nothing about the place where we lived. In addition, our beloved pet was dying and in need of numerous surgeries. So, in the midst of all of my amazing and profound awakening experiences, there was also great pain and suffering. Alone and deeply confused by everything that was taking place, all I could do was endure my experiences and trust that I was being taken where I needed to go.
While I was in complete awe of my experiences – my mind, body, and soul floating from it all – I also dealt with a great deal of fear and confusion because of the unusual experiences. Not because of the events themselves, but because of my reactions to them. Sometimes my religious background would make me wonder if it was satan doing this to me, while my scientific background told me that I was simply ill and/or delusional – and yet here it was, smacking me straight in the face and challenging everything I thought I knew about myself, life, and even death.
I was often comforted with bible passages that would somehow float to me during the day. I would hear the book, chapter, and verse, and upon reading, found them to be deeply relevant to my current situation. Books, television shows, and information also poured in from a variety of sources, all seeming to support that what I was going through was real and by some Higher Power’s hand.
It was roughly six months later that things began to change. All of my experiences began to slowly taper off, until one day, like the slamming of a door, everything just stopped and nothing I could say or do would bring them back. For the first time in my life, I had touched something beyond myself, but now I was back in my own body and in my own mind, with only the lingering after-effects of what had occurred. It was an empty and desolate place I had now reached, and I was left in despair. Had I made everything up? Did my experiences really happen? Was I delusional? Did I create the experiences because I needed them, making what wasn’t real seem real? If it had all been guided by God’s hand, then why was He forsaking me now? What about the evidential aspects of my experiences? What was I to do now? All of these ramifications created what St. John of the Cross refers to as ‘The Dark Night of the Soul,’ or what Transpersonal Psychology refers to as a ‘spiritual or transformational crisis.’
At this point, I became a dog with a bone: I simply couldn’t let everything that had happened to me just vanish or get swept under the rug. It was too life-altering, so I had to dig-in and try to figure out if my experiences were real, a figment of my imagination, or some malfunctioning of my body and brain. And if real, then I had to figure out what it would take to make everything start happening again – to bring back those experiences and to make them a conscious controllable part of my everyday life. I craved the spiritual closeness, but also the empowering and alluring ability to know and perceive what was imperceptible – to once again be able to connect with something beyond myself.
In addition, if all of the information and messages that I had received during my awakening were true, then how could I prove it and who or where did they really come from? I felt the only way to prove the validity of my experiences was within the psychic community, especially through examining mediumship. After all, I knew from my religious background that my unusual experiences would only be dismissed or explained as evil, but this simply was not my experience. Where else was I to turn but to a community of people who claimed to have similar experiences and who embraced them without fear!
In addition to diving into the psychic community, I also joined an active paranormal group. It was here, with the Washington State Ghost Society, that I spent over six years going on numerous investigations and personally answering hundreds of emails from other individuals dealing with unexplained events. (If you click on the Washington State Ghost Society link above, I am actually in three of the photos on that page!) My time with the paranormal group made me realize just how common unexplained experiences really are, and how confusing. People who reach out to paranormal groups typically have no idea where to turn for help or how to even define what they are experiencing. They often fear ridicule & judgment but also want a solution so badly that they are willing to reach out to a paranormal group for help.
My struggle to reawaken my earlier experiences was not easy and I failed – a lot! I had to work through several more Dark Night’s of the Soul, dealing with my fears and doubts about life after death. I had to learn the mechanism of being psychic and how it worked for me, but I also had to gain the proper mind and heart that I believe enhances the skill. In addition, I had to gain a great deal of knowledge along the way. There was the personal knowledge about myself that had to be evaluated and then turned into wisdom through life experience. There was also guided knowledge that was given to me/received, or, perceived depending on your point of view.
Despite my appreciation and acceptance of the parapsychological views on the psychic process itself, at some point, I personally believe that science has its limitations. It can often be difficult to separate the resultant spiritual components of certain psychic experiences. For example, during my initial opening, it was clearly expressed to me that I would become a “messenger,” and that teaching and writing would encompass a bulk of my work. In those early days, I heard the words and felt deeply called. I knew back then that my path was one I couldn’t turn away from. It was clear that I was meant to share knowledge and information with others and to also speak of the insights I felt were received from these spiritual sources. However, in parapsychology and clinical parapsychology there are alternative explanations and theories for how and/or why these events transpire. So, while these fields support such psi-based experiences as real and valuable, they often define them as less spiritual and more a matter-of-fact aspect of consciousness itself. This once again puts science and spirituality at odds (for now), thus making the interpretation of what results from certain psi-based experiences highly subjective and deeply personal. Is it God or is it merely the unexplored, and as of yet unexplained, human potential. When we encounter these spiritual experiences, they touch on our personal, cultural, and religious beliefs. For those who are willing, like me, this means that what once we believed to be true must be examined and reshaped.
In order to deal with my religious fears and biases, I felt I had to find the resources that would either support or refute my belief in a God or some form of a Higher Power. Because I felt that many of my communications came from Discarnate beings (people not in physical form) I needed to ensure that these experiences were coming from loving sources. Although my early intentions and prayers were always to follow God’s path for me, religious dogma and ingrained family patterns would not allow me to fully accept or embrace some of my experiences. I was taught only to ‘believe’ in God? But what was I to do when I actually started receiving and connecting with God at an intimate level? Thankfully, I was intuitively led to the works of St. Teresa of Avila and other Christian Mystics – many of whom also had deeply psychic-based connections with God. These included visions, hearing voices, receiving written works and communications, as well as performing healings or other miracles. What I discovered from these Christian mystics is that the ability isn’t to be rebuffed but rather embraced and utilized for making a deeper connection to the greater mysteries of life – and to God.
Reclaiming my psychic abilities, understanding the science behind them, as well as being able to embrace a deeper spiritual connection is a huge part of my story, but it is not all of it. Along with the spiritual struggle, I also had to work tirelessly to regain my physical health. Time and time again I wasn’t sure if I would ever overcome my physical challenges, but the more I allowed myself to be spiritually guided and to keep fighting for my healing, the more I seemed to find answers and solutions.
The desire to heal and regain our health is something that only a person who has lost it can truly understand. I personally have gone to great lengths to find answers to my own mysterious and unknown physical issues. Some of these came from modern medicine, but most came from self-exploration and listening to the stories and successes of others seeking the same wellness for themselves. What it also took me years to realize about physical healing is that we must utilize a holistic approach that examines not only the physical component, but also the mental, emotional, energetic, and spiritual components as well. We are holistic beings, meaning whole-istic, and as such we must heal at the whole-istic level.
Almost 14 years later, my story has finally seemed to come full circle. It was time for me to evolve again and to truly embrace that early calling to be a ‘messenger’ and to write and teach. As I matured spiritually, healed physically, and developed psychically – it was now time to embrace a new way of defining psychic functioning – one that would provide an all-encompassing perspective easy for anyone to embrace. Instead of using the terms psychic or Intuition or even psi (the scientific term for psychic), it was time to recognize that what was really taking place in all of these events was that of ‘Expanded Awareness.’
With the opening of this new chapter in my life, it became clear that I was to willingly accept messages from loving spiritual sources for the purpose of helping myself and others understand and embrace Expanded Awareness. The highest use for this Expanded Awareness is to improve our well-being, and when possible, to help improve the well-being of others.
Throughout the years I founded and facilitated The Insight Intuitive Support Group, a support group for people having unexplained spiritual and psychic experiences. I later was the driving force and Co-Founder for the Northwest Mediumship Association, providing monthly opportunities for budding mediums to gather, learn, and practice with others. I was heavily involved in North Seattle’s Psychic Community and spent two years volunteering at a well-established Metaphysical Bookshop. I also spent over six years volunteering and working with The Washington State Ghost Society, both as an investigator and a medium. I wrote my first book focused on paranormal or Spirit-based activity, entitled Spirit Activity – What Is It & What To Do About It, and created and taught numerous classes on both psychic and paranormal topics. I was co-host and co-creator of the podcast Explorers of Consciousness (no longer available), and have performed both personal and platform readings.
Today I am currently engaged in a podcast entitled Project Perspectives with my co-host Sarah Camp. In it, we directly address psychic & paranormal-related topics. I also have a personal YouTube Channel where I share knowledge focused on helping others to embrace their own Expanded Awareness and optimizing their well-being. I provide the Daily Lessons that I receive from spirit on my Facebook & Instagram pages and via a Weekly Newsletter. The newsletter includes a free PDF highlighting the basics of Expanded Awareness and I am currently working on my next book focused on providing a deeper understanding of Expanded Awareness. In it, I will share the many lessons from spirit in an effort to help others embrace this vital ability.
So thanks for reading, and now you know, “My Real Story!”
Cheers & Wellness,
Carol
