Not At This Time

Kaitlyn, continued

Faith is an awareness of the unseen forces.

So says Edgar Cayce. Pay attention, he says, and the guidance will come. I was desperate for this awareness, for a connection. For answers. I longed to bring comfort to my family, still reeling from my dad’s passing just five months before we lost Kaitlyn.

In the days and weeks after the bouts of ugly crying, the memorial, the monotony of work from home, I still trudged into my meditation room daily, some days escaping, some days flailing, but all days asking and asking. Insights came on the oblique, when I wasn’t expecting, but I might have been trying to pay attention so hard I jammed the signal.

Until the hypnosis class in April.

It was early, barely past six one morning, and I was in my favorite drifty, dreamy state half in and half out of sleep. I had a lot ahead of me that day: a drive to the city for my second vaccine, and then, later on Zoom, my Soul Contact class, but I wasn’t ready to shake myself awake just yet. Behind my closed eyes a room came into focus — not the vague sense of a room I usually get in meditation, but a real one, sharp as waking: white, pointy tropical flowers, a wall, and light coming in from somewhere to my right. I was afraid to look towards the light in case the whole thing dissolved. It didn’t. It held for a long time. And then, in a second image, someone stood in a bright opening, far off, and waved. I had a rush of recognition.

It was Teddy. My spirit guide. A British dude named Theodore, according to a psychic I saw in my twenties. I know how that sounds. I would talk to him as a joke, and eventually, I stopped fighting his existence. He’s been kicking around my reality ever since.

My journal entry from the day before this, I’d asked. I’d totally forgotten I’d asked. I sat in that same room, and asked for support, from my people, my angels, my guides. And Teddy waved.

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The class met over Zoom. A dozen of us learning to walk each other into past lives from our spare bedrooms and home offices. We worked in pairs. First I guided a woman named Cathy, and I was good at it; she went under easily and came back moved, and told me I was a natural. And to be honest in those days when so little was in my control, it felt good to be good at something.

Then we switched, and it was my turn to go under.

I was weirdly blank as I dropped into trance. I knew I was in trance as I was twitchy and I had that closed eye thing happening, but I was just not seeing or perceiving anything. I didn’t see the tunnel or the light I was guided to, but as my index finger was twitching, which is a yes signal for me, I told Cathy I was ready. Off I went.

I was immediately overwhelmed with sadness and grief. Whoa. After long moments of holding back the sobs trying to stay open and calm (wasn’t working…) my mind’s eye finally returned a stark, familiar image of Kaitlyn, sitting on the floor, head slumped, not moving. I could feel Help me, Help me. Was that her, heartbreakingly, asking for help? The anguish intensified. We tried, I cried out, we tried. I could feel her helplessness, the wall around her that no light or love could penetrate. I cried and cried – not sure if I was crying me or crying her. It was all so hopeless.

No one could help. It reverberated through me. No one could help. No one could help.

And then she rose up out of her body. No more pain. I felt the words, and then said them out loud. No more pain. She’s gone to the light. As these words repeated my body calmed. I felt the agitation and desperate anguish leave me. And peace flowed in. Peace, I said. Peace will come. Peace will come.

I’m not sure who that was meant for.

And again I saw Katie’s face, but this time smiling and teasing, saying I didn’t do it on purpose. I didn’t do it on purpose. I’ve seen this image, heard this refrain in meditation, in dreaming before. I will hold on to this as my truth.

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The next session I went in with an intention. I wanted to reach Katie. I wanted a message…for me, for her mother, her father, for anyone. Proof that she was somewhere, that she was alright, that the line between here and there was thin enough to pass a word across. This was the thing I’d been asking for every morning and now I had a trained guide. If ever there was a moment to receive, this was it.

Nothing came about Katie.

I was frustrated. Other things came, but on the one thing I’d asked for, silence. Near the end, my guide asked if there was any other insight around this, around wanting to communicate. And the answer arrived, clear as anything I’ve received before or since:

Not at this time.

Are you kidding me? Screw you, universe. But as I sat with it, it dawned on me, who am I talking to? How did that idea get in my head? It was just there, like the words to Katie’s Prayer or Carol’s hug, like a knowing. My anger ebbed, turning a bit towards wonder. I’d asked for a message and been told I couldn’t have the one I wanted. The refusal itself was the message. Not no…just, not yet. I left the session hopeful.

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But trusting those messages will come is the harder thing. My job is to pay attention, to keep showing up in that room, ready to receive. I know this now in a way I couldn’t have known then, in the thick of it all. The further I drift from the regular, daily practice, the less I seem to receive. And I don’t think that’s the universe going quiet. It’s me not paying attention to the unseen forces. Not having faith. Paying attention isn’t something you just achieve once. You have to keep choosing it, choosing to be open, to stay connected.

So I do. I keep showing up. Because not at this time, I’ve learned, is not the same as never.

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This is the second post in a series on grief. More forthcoming.
Read the first one here: No More Pain, No More Fear