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I forgot how shocking it is to lose someone you love.  Although I have lost many loved ones, it always seems to surprise me.  I feel the vulnerability of being a human being on this planet with the ever changing nature of my body and my life.  Yet, somehow there have been  great stretches of time where I haven’t even thought about this fragility of being.  Caught up in the doings of life, I was stunned  by this  friends death.  I plunged  into the great mystery of our living and dying.  A pregnant  question surfaced in the ocean of my life: What is dying anyway?

Because I loved Kathryn so much, upon her death I felt pain arise, so I stopped.  I felt my heart break open.  I chose to stand in an observer position and use this experience as an invitation.   I  began to inquired; What is death? When the body no longer serves, does a part of us go on? What is the meaning of death.? What is the bigger picture that I don’t now see?  Where does the spirit go?  Can we visit our loved ones? Is there a greater vision for us all as we all shed this mortal coil?  These questions swam within me even when I was not aware. As time has passed  since the departure of Kathryn I started to hear a sonar call as my intuition guides me deep within the ocean of being. This is the song I heard echoing  below the surface: everything is transitory, nothing is as it appears.   I heard death is not a stranger to us mortal souls. Just  look to the nature around us which abounds with the story of the cycle of life and you will start to understand. The Oak Tree arises from an acorn which contained the expression of life and the cycle of the seasons and ultimately the disintegration back to the earth.   We are the same life,we come from the mystery and are born into an expression of love and light. The seasons are already in the seed and the life arises and then falls by Grace. Each moment dies into  the  birth of the nex moment. Heading the song I feel  increasingly calm around my questions as  my heart  knows that there is something that never leaves, a peace and love which is the essence of life itself.

More questions arose and contineu to flow: so, where do we  come from and where do we go?   Jesus the great prophet and example said “In my Father’s house there are many mansions.”  Are these mansions a part of our beingness that we cannot see? Well,  we are beings in a multi universe reality.  Our mind can only process what we can sense and relate to , but not what is unknown.   I asked my heart to tell me about these other mansions.  Then I heard a pod-cast that told of the different dimensions of being from the Baha’i Faith.  It was said that when we are conceived as a human  on planet Earth we are in the womb for 9 months.  In this sweet environment all is given, we develop the sensory systems to hear, see, feel and taste.  We develop a brain for concept formation and emotional connection.   We then have a vehicle for our spirit.  Our life itself on this Earth is like being in another womb.  Though experience our spiritual capacity is expanded in self-love, compassion, service and humility. We are gestating for the next “mansion”. When we leave this plane we now have new “bodies” we need to move to another realm.

Somehow this clicked for me.  Kathryn, so open hearted and trusting, unfolded into the most compassionate radiant living light.  Although in great pain and surprised at the prognosis of her shortened life  she dove deeply into unknown water and surrendered into living liquid love.  I watched her in great pain one moment and  showing compassion and concern for others the next. I was in awe. Something much bigger was happening here than Kathryn dying, checking out.   A Blooming was taking place.  A veil  to the illusion of this life was being lifted. Kathryn, by her openness and surrender allowed a peek into something truly miraculous. She was made ready for the next life.

A few days before Kathryn took her her last breath she became unresponsive for many hours.  Michael and I thought that we would not see her again.  We both dressed up in  Indian Pyjamas and went to her home with a colorful Bindi on our forehead.  Upon arrival we saw radiant Kathryn sitting up in bed.  She embraced us both and we all wept.  Michael and I told her we have dressed for your wedding day to the Beloved.  We wept some more, the mystery caught us all and spun us.  Kathryn told us that while she was “gone” earlier in the day she had experienced the most incredible sensation of nothingness and timelessness. She saw spirals all around that were electric colors like “gelatin green,” and “bright cherry red.”  ”I couldn’t look away….I just felt so at peace and my attention was riveted to these unfathomable sights”  We listened with rapt interest, our eyes wide open.  We all knew this was a new landscape, a ocean calling for the drop.

The Sufi’s ( lovers of God) say when a loved one  dies they do not leave, there is a golden thread of light and love that is woven into the heart of all those who were left behind.  This rings as true, I feel the connectivity to Kathryn now,a presence that feels palpable. Could she still be here?  I saw a science show that sent a robot down to the greatest known depth of the ocean, 30,000 feet.  We could not survive at this depth  in the great sea. Scientists expected to not see life in this dimension.  How wrong they were, this inhospitable place was teeming with life.  In the black bone crushing depth  red, transparent and black creatures thrived, all  camouflaged from our eyes. They were living and flouishing past the limit of our visual spectrum and our physical reality. Perhaps this is just like the other “mansion” Jesus spoke of.

Although I cannot see her or feel her, I don’t think Kathryn went anywhere,  but is embraced in a mysterious timeless space.  I believe that death is a process that is a portal to another incarnation.  I don’t know what that means for us but I look at the trees, squirrels and clouds around me and I appreciate the apparent  Divine Rhythm of  life.  There are many mansions in God’s kingdom and by right of consciousness we find our way to the next sphere of being.

Kathryn, I know you are at peace.  All of my loved ones, as fathom this life, I  affirm that you  are on a divine journey has no  beginning and  no end.  Death may be a portal like so many  milestones in this life.   So what I come to is that death is not an end, but a portal that leads from one life to another.   I choose to embrace the  great mystery and the sacred  seasons of life.  I do not believe that there is an opposite of life called death.  Life goes on and on.

Namaste.

Carol Anne