In my 40s, I started purposely pursuing my interest in spirituality, which I will discuss more in other posts. One thing I started learning to do was to pay more attention to information that came to me, understanding that we often receive guidance. People have a variety of ideas about where guidance comes from. It may be from your unconscious or your higher self. It may be from a spiritual guide or teacher. Some experience messages from what they believe to be God.
I often receive guidance or insight. I’ll get an idea, but it is accompanied by a physical sense, usually in my gut. It’s like information literally hits me or runs through my body. I am learning to pay attention to these moments, because it is feels different than thinking. It usually strikes out of the blue, and is not part of a logical chain of ideas I am going through. And as soon as it happens, I utter “Thank you!” out loud, and then feel a bit foolish. But the information is often something I need to move forward with an idea. As a quick example, I had no idea what to name this blog, and as a result, put off starting this project. One day, I was out for a morning run, and an idea popped into my head that the blog should be named “not my imagination.” It was accompanied by a strong sensation in my head and gut – my sign for guidance. I liked the idea, and a couple days later, I searched to see if this name was taken, and it wasn’t, and it was inexpensive. I felt like I had been given a gift! I recognize that many may say that my brain had been mulling this over, which I am sure it had been, and that I’d had a flash of intuition. I think it was intuition, but more often now, I think that our intuition is inspired, and that we are aided by spiritual partners.
It has taken me some years to become more comfortable with the idea of guidance. It feels fake, since I hear it in my head, and I am often inclined to distrust it. But my guides have found ways to give me tangible experiences to show me that guidance is real and that I should pay attention. The first big lesson was in another post, where I heeded the loud advice to pull off the road. My next two examples are also about cars and car travel.
The first story involves a road trip with some girlfriends to Bend in the winter. For weeks, I had been getting a strong feeling that I needed to check the windshield wipers on the red Subaru we owned at the time. But I blew the frequent messages off. The windshields were fairly new, so there was nothing to think about. Or so I thought. I was driving us through the mountain pass toward Mt. Hood. As we ascended, we suddenly drove into driving rain and wind, the kind of rain that makes it very difficult to see well. Suddenly, the driver side wiper flew off! I did not panic, but slowed down and did my best to see in the narrow spot near me cleared by the passenger side wiper. My friends were justifiably freaked out about our predicament, but all I could think about was that I had been receiving warnings about this for several weeks! Moments later, we were out of the rain and were able to get safely to a gas station. The first station did not have any wiper blades, but the second one had one left that was just the size I needed! I realized that I had failed what I saw as a test to receive and act on guidance. I vowed to take it more seriously the next time I got urgent messages.
This second story also involves a road trip where I was driving. In this instance, I was driving home with my husband and some friends after a lovely trip to Vancouver, BC to celebrate Christmas. For hours, it was an uneventful drive. At some point, I knew I’d need to get gas, but the car indicated that we had at least 50 miles worth of fuel left in the tank, so I didn’t worry about it.
As I easily cruised down the left-hand carpool lane on Interstate-5, listening to the conversation in the car, I suddenly got a bad feeling, a warning that something was wrong. I wasn’t sure what it was, but I wasn’t going to ignore it. I said a quick, internal prayer to Archangel Michael, asking for his assistance with and protection from whatever was coming up. I didn’t know if “it” was immediate or three weeks from now. I just knew that something was going to happen.
I started to feel anxious about there being a cement wall to my left, with no road shoulder. I wondered if the “something” I felt unease about was going to happen while we were driving. And then the car started to feel funny to me. None of my passengers noticed, but I could feel the car becoming unresponsive to me and slowing down. And no shoulder to pull onto, and not enough power to cross several lanes to the right-hand shoulder. I calmly let everyone know that something was wrong with the car, and that we were losing power. We continued to slow down, and suddenly I not only had a shoulder to pull onto, but there was a large grass median that we could stand on. I had just enough power to get us by the median. We got out of the car and onto the median, and wondered what to do next. My husband searched for towing companies, and the rest of us stood there, teeth chattering in the cold air.
After what seemed like eternity, but was only minutes, an SUV with its sirens on pulled in behind us. It turned out to be an off-duty fire marshal from the Port of Seattle/Sea-Tac, who said he just happened to be driving on the freeway, unusual for him at this time of day on a weekend. He invited us into his car for warmth and safety (he turned on flashing lights for visibility as darkness approached). Finally, the tow truck arrived and the fire marshal figured out where the nearest gas station was. My husband rode in the tow truck while the rest of us stayed in the car with the fire marshal, who drove us to the gas station. We put gas in the tank and hoped for the best. And got home safely without further incident. And if you are wondering, we had NOT run out of gas. It turned out that a sensor had gone out and was not able to detect the amount of gasoline below a certain point.
I did not tell anyone in our group that I sensed that something was going to happen, or that I had prayed for our safety and for assistance. But I know that I had some sort of pre-cognition about this event, and that my call for help had been answered in the form of a safe place to pull over and a kind person to help us out and keep us safe from the traffic speeding by. I am still grateful for the fire marshal, who we thanked by sending a bunch of dog treats for his retired K9 fire dog.
It might not surprise you that I now take messages or guidance of any kind pretty seriously now!