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The first glimmer of anything resembling sanity was the dawning that maybe this universal power of love and light was the same as the love and power of God. Small steps to make for a half crazed lunatic like me. I had been told about this from guides and tried to work it out for myself many times and it had started to make sense on a personal level. I started to bandy this idea about amongst friends and they all seemed to have a similar feeling. There was always a qualifying line that would go something like "Yes but the Christian church is outdated and full of hypocrisy" or "The church has been warned of false prophets and the new age". On both counts, I could see where these statements were coming from. Indeed, I had these thoughts myself. Firstly, the church maybe outdated in some views because it talks about a man who lived 2,000 years ago coming back from the dead to save us. But then a lot of new age concepts resurrect beliefs based on events dating back 3,000 to 4,000 years to the time of the Olmecs and Mayans. Secondly I agree there is much fear of false prophets but surely Christ may have been seen as a false prophet and look what effect he had on the world, with his message of love thy neighbor.
The common word of all faiths was light and love so that is what I concentrated on. This was to be my benchmark. In all my dealings and in the search for my truth if a feeling of light and love seemed to be about then it could not be too bad. I must trust that my path would lead me in the right direction. Whether I was right or wrong I had to believe in something to be able to live my life with some kind of purpose or goal. Finally satisfied in my own mind that all things could be part of the same strand of light lifted a great weight from my mind. It also led me to be open to all sorts of experiences, not least of all I could say Christian and New Age in the same sentence and not feel that I was going to be struck down by God and the likes of Zeus or Quetzalcoatl. It kind of let me off the hook and left me floating.
Guides have always told me that analogies are imperfect tools but that they are the only available means to explain complicated realities. By the use of allegories and symbolism, generations of mystics and priests have tried to shed light on our lives and the reasons for them. So, I might as well add one of my own concerning the dichotomy I found myself in above. To love a tree because of the way it bends in the wind and because of the power and excitement it exudes as the wind blows through it only lasts as long as the tree is living. To love the wind all trees have the same power and essence running through them, the same force also touches you and you love forever. - Now all you have to do is decide which tree to bark up. Thinking along these lines kept me happy for ages. I had resolved my dilemma, or so I thought.
I continued to attend circle for a long time after Aiddrienne had said goodbye. Using the powers of telepathy and tuning into an energy that I regarded as an extension of myself was easier to cope with than thinking it was outside my own mind. I still called this energy Morgan, but when talking to him I did it in a fanciful way just to humor myself. I did not think of him as a guide it was no just a laugh. This worked well and I found out a lot about others and myself in a very practical way. Eventually I became despondent of working in this way and felt helpless and hopeless, there seemed no point to any of it unless it was going to lead me somewhere. Not being able to see beyond my own world, I stopped going to circle. I now lead a dual life, one physical that I accepted and one spiritual that I denied was ever happening. The forces continued to act on me though.
I had a block facing my fear of horses for a long time. I would bury it and pretend that it did not exist, truly believing that there was not a problem and the only reason that I did not go anywhere near a horse was that I was not interested in them. Aiddrienne had told me that the reason for my fear of horses was that I had been kicked very badly in a previous life. I had been a journeyman attached to a large country estate. My duty amongst other things was to look after a number of horses used primarily for pleasure by the family. I slept in the stable block above the horses. One particular night I was bedding the horses down when one of them had a fit while I was penned in with it. I received a bit of a battering and that was why I was afraid of horses. I did recall that on a number of occasions the idea of being in a confined space with a horse gave me the heeby geebies. Not having a great knowledge of past lives at the time I was very skeptical and dismissed the whole story as symbolic, preferring to work on the fear of what horses represented to me. This was to do with me not recognizing my own strength and not putting it to the best use and treat it with respect but not to ignore it. That piece of symbolism received and understood I carried on my happy journey.
Over a year later having rejected guides I found myself in a situation where I would have to face this apparent non-existent fear. Contact with guides was no longer a part of my life but it was funny how I imagined talking to them when my fear welled up now and then. My partners family had a small holding with sheep cattle and surprise horses. I had duly given these animals a wide birth whilst trying not to let on to anyone that I was afraid. One weekend my partners parents were going for a short holiday and I was left to look after the livestock. It did not cross my mind that this included the horses, when it did it was too late I could not back out. The first morning I trotted down to the stable block having fed the sheep and cattle. It was not until I gripped the handle of the door that led into a corridor to the horseboxes, that I recollected the story I had been told. Suddenly I froze, I was sweating and my heart was racing. Surely, that story was just a story and nothing more. How silly, ridiculous, me afraid of horses? I may have thought that but the reality now was different. I was terrified.
Here I was alone along way from the main house with no one to help me. I was half inclined to leave them in their boxes for the day saying that I had forgotten about them later. I could not I had to carry out the task I had been left to do. Calming myself down and asking for guidance, of which there was none forthcoming, I walked down the corridor to the boxes. Opening the gate that led into the paddock I hurriedly I opened the stable doors and ran to a safe place. There were two horses, one came trotting out into the paddock but the other remained inside. My mind fled back to the story, I was being pushed into a similar situation. It was almost too contrived to be true. The whole thing seemed to be engineered to make me have to go into a small space with a horse. I thought that it was all rubbish and anyway I had no faith in guides anymore. The way the stables were arranged meant that I had to get both horses into the paddock and shut the gate to stop them coming back into the building and running amuck eating the sheep feed and causing all sorts of problems, forcing me to get this damn horse out. To make matters worse the particular horse who was being so stubborn had a reputation of being head strong and unpredictable. I was now calling the guides everything I could think of for letting me get into such a fix not surprisingly I received no sympathy, all I heard was "Well you got yourself into this fix, you get yourself out. Face your fear". "But I have no fear of horses" I protested. "Oh no?" was the reply.
My only comfort was that I knew that I would not be allowed to come to any harm. So in I went. The horse looked at me as though she had been an actor standing on stage waiting for me to enter stage left. I tried to coax him out from the safety of the door, not a chance this thing had to be done properly or not at all. Moving around her right flank, I stood there frozen to the spot. I knew and had been told that animals could sense fear, suddenly and for no apparent reason, my fear subsided. I felt myself slip into the character in the story there was a knowing about horses that I was sure had not been there before all was calm. I stroked the horses neck and started to talk to her in quiet confident tones, for the first time I was comfortable in the presence of these huge symbols of power. Not only that I had to trust the horse that nothing was going to go wrong in this confined space. Sensing my new found confidence she walked sedately into the paddock.
At that moment I felt on top of the world, through the role-play I had faced my physical fear and in so doing, had pushed through a psychological block that I didnt think existed. I could hear hysterical laughter from above and warm congratulations. "Now do you believe?" I had to agree that it had been a powerful experience but whether it had anything to do with a past life or guides I was going to leave open which in effect meant burying it. What I had felt was real, the sweating the taste of blood in my mouth, these had not been imagined. This lesson taught me that the path is littered with many opportunities to progress and develop and that they come in very real physical ways as well as through meditation and working with spirit even when we think we are not being worked on. It also illustrates the way we can be hoodwinked by guides for our own good. To have been told that a reflection of a past life scenario was going to occur to help me over a blockage would have made me wary and the lesson would not have been learned. I learned it without recognition of the intervention of guides and continued to deny them.
Following the country pursuit theme I became interested in long netting and decided to have a go. The concept of killing something was hard to comprehend at the time because of my views that animals should not be killed for fun, so all that were killed were eaten by the dogs or by people, I felt all right if nothing was wasted. I ate meat so I reasoned that I was being a little hypocritical if I was not prepared to go through the process from start to finish my own. Using a gun or dogs as a means of hunting was one thing, physically using my bare hands was another.
By this time I had two dogs, so I thought it would be good exercise and a focus for their energies. Procuring a net and learning how to use it took a while and a lot of swearing but eventually I got the hang of erecting and taking it down in the dark during dry runs. Then came the night when it was for real and I was not prepared for the feelings and fears I had to get over. Thankfully, only one rabbit was caught in the net so my task was a little easier. I had read all the books and asked advice of people in the know so it should be quite simple. The books said nothing about the problems of getting over ones philosophy nor had they been written for people like me. Stood in the middle of a field at 1.00 in the morning with a live and kicking rabbit in my grip was very different. Immediately I felt the fear and apprehension Yeswie and Aysla shot into my mind, I knew I had to go through with it, this was a test, and I had to get over my fear. This was not a fear being conjured up in my head it was a real palm sweating heart-stopping fear. I got over the fear and got back home as soon as possible, I understood the significance of the act and how reality reflects our mental blocks and helps us get over them. I also had a re-enforcement of the words said at White Leafed Oak. I had not expected that. It took years for the conundrum of Yeswie and Aysla to unfold.
© Phil Ironside