Conversations with the Sick and Dying — Part I

            Never in my life have I been more enlightened than in the presence of someone who is days away from death. Also, people who have deadly illnesses and fight and overcome, have stories that will always amaze me. This is why it is important to balance life with not only the healthy and wonderful friends we have, but also those who are in need of our help. Because from the very mouth of insurmountable struggle, comes divine wisdom—wisdom and insight we all need to bring us closer to Truth.

            I talk about my friend Linda a lot who died with stage 4 colon cancer a couple years ago. We had a date every couple weeks to talk on the phone, because after she moved from Nashville, she lived in places that were a little too far for me to travel. At long last, she ended up in Lexington, where she wrote law for the Kentucky legislature, which was an interesting job for a lawyer with an English degree as well.

            Linda was one of my dearest friends, though we spent very little physical time together after she left Nashville. So, the last ten years of our friendship was our dates on the telephone. Her desire to keep in touch and to fill an hour with catching up on what really mattered in life was always worth it.

            I’m not one to talk on the phone for a long period of time. But with Linda, I made the effort, because we shared from the deepest place of our hearts. We talked of spiritual things and always met at a place of pure authenticity.

            So, when she was dying, the last two years of our conversations were like reading the bible. Every word came from a place of vast learning and divine lessons that could only be taught by God. I remember the last week before she died, I called her sister. She told me that Linda didn’t have the strength to talk on the phone. In fact, she was restricting visitors as well to only those who had very strong belief that she could get well.

            But for some strange reason, I called her hospital room anyway. After two rings, she picked up. She knew it was me and knew it would be our last conversation. She didn’t have much energy and could barely hold the phone up to her ear, but every word she said was like it proceeded from mouth of God.

            She spoke of her vane attempt at trying to get better, even though that was not what God had intended. She told me of the pain she had to face when she realized that there was no time now to really live life, now that she had wasted it working while she was trying to recover (she worked up until her last six months).

            She asked me to pray with her. She said she had to be quiet because it hurt to talk. I remember the prayer: “God, touch Linda right now. Take away all the pain so that she can only feel your loving arms around her. Allow her to bask in the silence and peace of your presence and know that she is loved. Help her to remember that when you carry her from this life to the next that there will be divine purpose for her in the next life and on—”

            I remember hearing the telephone fall to the floor and a nurse scramble to pick it up. That was the last I spoke to Linda before she passed.

            I share this story because in my life, it seems, that God has sent a lot of people to me to work through issues before they die. In fact, one of the things I do as a practitioner is help people who are in palliative care pass over. It’s a beautiful job when I’m appointed to help. You end up spending a lot of time with angels.

            The last person I aided in this process had a large brain tumor. Her diagnoses would usually mean that she would be in pretty severe pain and uncomfortable. But this form of hypnosis we were using kept her from having any pain at all. At least she told me that she had no pain all the way until her death.

            The interesting thing about the last person I helped was she was Atheist and had no real belief that she would go on spiritually. So, I had to design a way of helping her feel as if she would be remembered in the things that were left by her. I helped her design a way to imagine that she would become fluid with the earth and in her passing could remain a reminder to her family, especially her two daughters that she was there in the rain and in the mountains, in the special things that they shared together (trips to special places, beaches, ski trips). She felt such comfort in knowing that her memory would carry her existence forward.

            I wonder if that’s why people are so concerned about having a grave marker the size of a small city or having large funerals. For me, I just want to pass quietly and have my body cremated. I think my ashes would be greatly appreciated in my favorite place, my garden.

            I don’t believe our physical bodies come back to meet our spirits ever. I think our physical bodies decay and go back to the earth, because that is where they came from.

            Our spiritual bodies, however, are heavenly and celestial; therefore, we go on into the stars and into the forever with spirit, which is everlasting—from age to age.