Thursday, January 26, 2012

Memories & Memorials

We create memories with others all through life. Sometimes, they are devised in collaboration for the interest and good of all involved: marriage, schooling, highway systems, advanced healthcare directives. Other times, memories are directed upon us: traffic accidents, surprise parties, stolen TVs, inheritance, murder.




Memories leave us changed: experienced, scarred, rewarded, improved, bitter, broken, evolved.




When lived up close and personal, memories can range from intoxicating and creative to tragic and paralysing. In the drama and excitement of experiences that endure, we are directly touched by the moment and formed by its impact.




Memorials are tributes to the memories of others. They serve to keep the impact of others' experiences alive in order to educate future generations and contribute to positive evolution, growth and connectivity. Memorials live to tell the stories of those who can no longer speak for themselves.




As a psychic medium, I get to hear or feel the memorial that lives after a person has crossed over. They aren't built of steel or concrete but remain the work of art that was one human life. I get the privilege of mending families, resolving issues and clarifying questions, fears and doubts through my work and the gift of spirit.




Of course, there are times when the energy of spirits show up outside the course of client sessions. I am fortunate to be able turn on and off my receptors most of the time but there are occasions when interaction with the spirits of a place is purely unavoidable.




Thus was the case with my visit to the Dachau Concentration Camp Memorial this week. I was not sure just what I would feel, hear or see on the visit but knew I wanted to experience the camp as a tribute to all who were sacrificed during this annihilation of humanity - a remembering so that history can never be repeated.






As I write this, my whole body feels a posture of resistance to sharing the sensations I experienced on the camp tour. Some of them I have no words to describe, smells in the air & tastes in my mouth that I can't recognize, deep nausea, disorientation, sounds of screaming and quiet sobbing, blood, so much blood, thoughts of determination and pressing forward, one breath at a time, private memories of family and friends, prayers to God, requests for forgiveness.






A natural reaction to this fierce intensity & heaviness is to pull away or close down. And I know I cannot serve from a closed position. Making it about me does not honor those whose story is here to tell. So I stayed with them, walked with them, listened, cried and invited them to complete their transition.






I have no way of making sense of the events that transpired at Dachau and across Germany during this slaughter. We can't always understand death and its repercussions. We can honor the memories and build memorials in our minds and hearts to acknowledge, honor, love and release the dead into peace. We can choose LIFE to honor those who no longer have that option. And their wish for us it to live it fully.






Ho'oponopono: I Love You, Please forgive me, I am sorry, Thank you