Quest Magazine

Printed in the Summer 2019 issue of Quest magazine.
Citation: Hebert, Barbara ,"Healing Tragedy and Loss: The How and the Why" Quest 107:3, pg 21-23

By Barbara Hebert

One only has to keep up with current events to find tragedy and loss across the globe. None of us is immune from it. Surely all of us will experience tragedy and/or loss at some point through such things as death; abuse; neglect; homelessness; terrorism; poverty; aging; divorce; crime; illness; work and life transitions; pain; miscarriage; infertility; violence.

Dealing with tragedy and loss comprises two separate but equally important components: dealing with the situation in an emotionally healthy manner and understanding the why of the situation. In order to move forward in our spiritual journey, we need to work through tragedy and loss—emotionally as human beings and spiritually as part of the evolutionary journey. It is a profound process that requires time, effort, and insight.

It is important also to realize that healing may not occur on some levels. For example, someone who has been diagnosed with a terminal illness may not experience physical healing, but that does not mean that this individual can’t experience emotional healing and spiritual understanding.

The first component is dealing with the situation in an emotionally healthy manner. Doing this involves a process of several steps. It does not happen overnight, but  requires time and effort. Because it is a process, we do not take the various steps in a linear manner; we work on them simultaneously.

The first step occurs once we are over the initial shock of an experience. It focuses on the feelings elicited by the situation. We must allow ourselves to feel whatever feelings arise by simply allowing them to surface and experiencing them. This is not to suggest that we should wallow in the feelings, but we don’t want to suppress them either. Feelings are part of this human experience; therefore experiencing them and learning to deal with them are part of the process of becoming fully human.

What human components are involved, for example, in dealing with the loss of a loved one? Many people experience profound sadness, anger, loneliness, and possibly even guilt, just to name a few. Allowing oneself to actually feel these and any other emotions that arise, without judgment or suppression, comprises a critical part of healing. It is also important to allow ourselves to express feelings in a way that does not hurt ourselves or anyone else.

Listening to our internal self-messages is another crucial part of the process. In this step, we begin to observe ourselves and our thoughts objectively. What thoughts arise? After tragedy and loss, some individuals might think, “If I had only been a better [spouse, child, friend], then maybe this would not have happened.” Paying attention to how kind (or, more likely, unkind) we are being to ourselves with our thoughts provides us with essential information. It is important to examine these thoughts in an objective manner, such as, “Is it accurate to say that if I had been a better [spouse, child, friend], the loss would not have happened?” Very few individuals have the power to change the outcome of a given situation.

On  the other hand, none of us is perfect; therefore it is likely that we could have acted differently at times. At this point, it becomes imperative that we begin to accept our own imperfections and learn from them, which seems to be part of the human journey. If a loved one dies and a survivor has regrets about what has been said or done as well as about what has not been said or done, then he or she works to accept what has occurred and takes active steps to make sure that nothing is left unsaid or undone with others.

Accepting one’s imperfections goes hand in hand with the third step, which involves forgiving oneself for not being perfect. Self-forgiveness plays an extremely important role in this process. Most of us do not intentionally hurt others, yet we cause hurt unintentionally. We act in ways that we regret. We say things that we wish we hadn’t. Recognizing that we do our best, given the circumstances in which we are functioning, contributes to the process of self-forgiveness and ultimately helps us to deal with the painful events of life in a healthy manner.

Another step is to see ourselves realistically. As human beings, we tend to be self-involved. We tend to think we are the only ones who has experienced such an event, or we think we are the worst person in the world, and so on. These statements are simply not true. We are imperfect human beings, doing the best we can in a confusing and complicated world. All of us are learning, and no one is the only one, or the worst, or any other distortion our minds may concoct. We are emanations of the Divine, and as such, we are neither the best nor the worst. Tragedies and losses happen to everyone.

The final step in the process of dealing with difficult situations includes finding an empowering and uplifting support system. The importance of sharing heartache, pain, and suffering with others who can provide emotional support cannot be overstated. This support system may, and probably should, include a mental-health professional who can provide insight and guidance regarding the steps one needs to take.

The second major component of healing from tragedy or loss involves trying to understand the why. The Dalai Lama is purported to have said, “When we meet real tragedy in life, we can react in two ways—either by losing hope and falling into self-destructive habits or by using the challenge to find our inner strength.” Metaphysical ideas, readings, and theories can be helpful in providing the structure, that is, the why in understanding and dealing with misfortune in a healthy way.

For many years, I worked as a mental-health professional, both as a clinician whose expertise was in child sexual abuse and as an educator who worked with graduate and postgraduate counselors. Inevitably these young professionals would encounter clients who had experienced situations that defied explanation. For example, one client was a young woman had been sexually abused by numerous individuals in her lifetime, abandoned by her father, and neglected by her mother. Another example: a teenage client whose stepfather took pornographic pictures of her and posted them on websites.

Not surprisingly, new professionals would at times experience their own secondary trauma in hearing about the clients’ horrific situations. My role as an educator was to help them put the situation into perspective so that they could facilitate the client’s healing process. My first question to the counselor was almost always, “What is your worldview?” That is, “How does your worldview help you understand why these horrible things can happen to someone?” My role was not to share my worldview, but rather to elicit the counselor’s. The answer to that question varied from individual to individual. Some new professionals had already contemplated this issue while others had not considered it at all.

Why is it important to understand a clinician’s worldview? From my perspective, helpers (professional or nonprofessional) must have some structure, usually spiritual or religious, that explains why. Without an understanding of why, many people will struggle with the intensity of the work, may have difficulty in facilitating the healing process, and may burn out. Furthermore, if the counselor has an understanding of the why, then it is easier to facilitate the client’s own understanding of why these things happened.

Therefore it is critical to clarify one’s worldview, especially in relation to why these dreadful situations occur. For me, Theosophy, or the Ageless Wisdom, provides that explanation and has enabled me to work with sexual-abuse survivors, both children and adults, for many years. The Ageless Wisdom teaches that we are on a journey of spiritual evolution in which we are expanding our consciousness so that at some point in the future (after lifetimes of learning and growth), we will become fully self-conscious human beings. We will have learned all that there is to learn in this phenomenal world about being human and therefore will have become perfected.

One aspect of Theosophy that has provided support through the years involves the belief that experiences are not attributable personally. That is, God (or whatever one calls that Ultimate Reality) is not angry at or punishing an individual. It is common for individuals who experience tragedy and loss to blame themselves. Even very young children (ages three to five) believe that they have done something to cause their pain or believe that they could have done something to stop or alter the situation. Adults also take on responsibility and self-blame for incidents that have nothing to do with them. One such example is a mother whose adult child was accidentally drowned. This mother was very angry with God for allowing the death to occur and was firmly convinced that if she had given more money to the church, her child would have lived. The recognition that incidents like this are not personal can provide a very important element in healing tragedy and loss.

Along these same lines, my belief in reincarnation—another major concept in the Ageless Wisdom—has provided support for me. The belief that we have multiple lives does not negate the importance of each one of those lives, but it does put each life into perspective.

It may be useful to invoke the age-old analogy of school: perceiving each lifetime as a grade in school (although there are certainly more grades than in contemporary schools). The ending of each grade is bittersweet for many: pride in accomplishments and lessons learned, excitement about moving onward, sadness about not seeing friends for the summer.

We can put unfortunate events in perspective by perceiving each lifetime and its tragedies and losses in the same light. Of course it does not obliterate the pain, which may remain for many years, if not for the entire lifetime, but we realize that the tragedy and loss is, from the perspective of many lifetimes, temporary.

The concept of karma also gives us answers to the why of tragedy and loss. Karma, from the Theosophical perspective, is a universal law based upon harmony. Everything that we think, say, and do impacts the harmony of the universe, and this law works to restore that harmony when it is imbalanced. H.P. Blavatsky writes: “Karma creates nothing, nor does it design. It is [the human] who plans and creates causes, and Karmic law adjusts the effects; which adjustment is not an act, but universal harmony, tending ever to resume its original position, like a bough, which, bent down too forcibly, rebounds with corresponding vigour.”

If we believe that we are here on this earth to learn and to grow—to transform ourselves spiritually—then it makes sense that our life circumstances facilitate this growth. It’s important to add a caution here: although karma facilitates the process of learning through action and reaction or cause and effect, we really do not have much of an understanding of this Universal Law. In The Mahatma Letters to A.P. Sinnett, the Mahatma K.H. tells Sinnett, “You know nothing of the ins and outs of the work of karma—of the ‘sideblows’ of this terrible Law,” and later added,  “Have another look at Karma . . . and remember that it ever works in the most unexpected ways.” Although we speak about karma as if we understand it, we have only a vague grasp of its workings.

One might be inclined to consider unfortunate events as punishment or payback for misdeeds in a previous incarnation. This is akin to the earlier discussion regarding self-blame. It seems more realistic instead to view such incidents as opportunities for growth and expansion in light of the concept of harmony and balance, however little we may appreciate the opportunity at the time. Most individuals can look back and see that times of difficulty resulted in the greatest personal or spiritual growth. This realization reaffirms the Dalai Lama’s view that tragedy in life can challenge us to find our inner strength. Whether we encounter our own personal misfortunes or we work to help someone navigate their way through difficult circumstances, the Ageless Wisdom teaches that karma gives us the opportunity to grow.

Perhaps the Theosophical concept that has been most helpful to me in this area is the belief that each of us walks our own path toward becoming fully self-conscious human beings, and that each and every one of us will attain this goal at some point. We have no knowledge of where another person is on their particular journey, or of the specific challenges on which another person may be working, but we can trust that the end result will be the same for everyone. As the late TS international president N. Sri Ram wrote, “This concept . . . is perhaps the most inspiring truth of Theosophy.”

For example, a five-year-old child was sexually abused and through that abuse contracted a sexually transmitted disease. The child was terrified to talk about her experiences as well as about the person who abused her. Law enforcement investigated but was unable to identify a perpetrator. Counseling continued, of course, but the child maintained her silence.

When we look at this tragic situation from a Theosophical perspective, we begin with tremendous compassion for this child and those who love her. We also recognize that we don’t know anything about this child’s journey and what she has chosen to learn in this particular incarnation. We know that this is one step of the journey for this soul, and it will eventually result in spiritual growth and ultimately in full self-consciousness.

This understanding does not, however, mean that we accept abuse, nor does it mitigate the suffering endured by this child and her family. We must use our discernment, as discussed in At the Feet of the Master, to balance metaphysical understanding with an awareness of the pain. The balancing of understanding and awareness challenges us to engage in compassionate action. In 1907 Annie Besant wrote, “Your duty is to do all you can to help others. Do not take Karma as an excuse for indolence, as I am sorry to say many people do.”

In conclusion, dealing with tragedy and loss in a healthy manner involves two crucial components: working through the human response and finding a worldview that helps us understand the whys of the situation. In order to work through the human response, we must feel our feelings; observe and change our negative self-messages; accept and forgive ourselves for our imperfections; and find or create a support system. The second component incorporates the need for understanding why tragedies and losses occur. The Ageless Wisdom fulfills the second component through its teachings about the impersonal nature of situations; reincarnation and karma; and the soul’s evolutionary journey to becoming a fully self-conscious human.

Along with these elements, we balance healing and understanding with compassion. Healing and understanding underlaid with compassion allow us to deal with misfortune in a healthy way. As Jack Kornfield writes in Buddha’s Little Instruction Book, “Our sorrows and wounds are healed only when we touch them with compassion.”

Sources

Alcyone. At the Feet of the Master. Adyar: Theosophical Publishing House, 1910.

Barker, A.T., and Vicente Hao Chin Jr., eds. The Mahatma Letters to A.P. Sinnett in Chronological Sequence. Quezon City, Philippines: Theosophical Publishing House, 1998.

Besant, Annie. Theosophical Lectures. Chicago: Rajput Press, 1907.

Blavatsky, H.P. “Reincarnation and Karma.” Blavatsky Study Center (website): http://www.blavatskyarchives.com/blavatskykarmareincarnation.htm; accessed Feb. 15, 2019.

Kornfield, Jack. Buddha’s Little Instruction Book. New York: Bantam, 1994.

Sri Ram, N. Human Regeneration. Wheaton: Theosophical Publishing House, 1985.

Printed in the Summer 2019 issue of Quest magazine.
Citation: Leland, Kurt ,"The Grace Machine: Healing the Shock of Spiritual Darkness" Quest 107:3, pg 18-20

By Kurt Leland 

At the beginning of her essay “Spiritual Darkness,” Annie Besant gives perhaps the most graphic depiction of clinical depression in Theosophical literature. She begins by stating: “Few of the perils which beset the path of the serious aspirant are more depressing in their nature, more fatal in their effects, than what is called spiritual darkness.” What follows leaves no doubt that Besant had experienced such a state. She speaks of:

the gloom which descends on the heart and brain, wrapping the whole nature in its somber folds, blotting out all memories of past peace, all hopes of future progress. As a dense fog pervades a great city, stealing into every nook and corner, effacing every familiar landmark, shutting off every vista, blurring into dimness even the brilliant lights, until, to the bewildered wayfarer, nothing seems left save himself and the stifling mephitic vapor that enfolds him, so is it when the fog of spiritual darkness comes down on the aspirant or the disciple. All his landmarks disappear, and the way vanishes in the gloom; his wonted lights are shorn of their luster, and human beings are mere shadows that now and again push up against him out of the night and into the night again disappear . . .The “horror of great darkness” is upon him [cf. Genesis 15:12], paralyzing every energy, crushing every hope. God and man have deserted him—he is alone, alone. (Besant, Essays, 118–19)

Though Besant directs these comments toward spiritual aspirants, the situation she describes is universal. Anyone who has experienced physical, emotional, mental, or spiritual trauma may recognize themselves here, from teenagers suffering over the first breakup of a love relationship to adults helplessly watching as their community is destroyed by wildfire. Tragedies such as rape, violence, and sexual abuse and natural catastrophes such as hurricanes, earthquakes, and tsunamis may leave in their wake from one to tens of thousands of people in this spiritual darkness.

Several years ago, a dear friend arrived on my doorstep in this state: white with fear, in a cold sweat, paralyzed by anxiety. I did what I could to calm him down, but a few days later I learned he had threatened suicide and been hospitalized. Some preparations had been made to get him into a residential treatment program that seemed like a good fit, though it was far from home. I sat by his side during the long trip there and helped him settle in. After his program was over, I returned to pick him up. He stayed with me for some days until I found him a long-term home. I put him in touch with professionals who helped him assemble a treatment team. There were ups and downs, period of progress and setback, but I’m happy to say that with the help of his team and the loving support of his family, he made a complete recovery.

The great gift of this period was what I learned from weekly in-person chats with my friend as I watched his healing process. Here is what I extrapolated from those meetings, pondered on in the light of Theosophy.

Perhaps the most helpful guiding principle of our chats was one for which Besant was famous: the idea that we have a physical body and several subtle bodies, including the emotional (sometimes called astral), mental, and causal (so called because it holds the causes from past lives that affect our present lifetime). In this article, I’ll use the term soul body instead of causal body, since the latter is often identified with the human soul. There are other bodies beyond these, but they do not concern us here.

Earlier I mentioned trauma in connection with this spiritual darkness. Trauma could be defined as an injury to the physical, emotional, mental, or causal body, or any combination thereof. The injury takes the form of more information coming into the body than it can assimilate in the moment, resulting in a loss of equilibrium and a shutdown of processing such information. The loss of equilibrium may be experienced along a continuum from simple overwhelm to uttermost terror—various shades of fearing that the integrity of the body is compromised or its existence threatened. The body is effectively paralyzed, producing a state of shock. This shock is what Besant described as spiritual darkness. It lasts as long as required for the affected body to recover its processing ability and restore its equilibrium, to feel reassured of its integrity and reestablished in a sense of safety. Though an outside observer might describe this shock as physical, emotional, or psychological, according to the body affected, the experiencer may not be able to make such distinctions. The feeling of being utterly without hope and help, cut off from “God and man,” results in spiritual darkness, no matter which body is involved.

Each body has its own vulnerability to the shock and trauma of too much information. For example, the physical body is overwhelmed when the immune system can’t keep up with the replication of bacteria, viruses, or malignant cells; or by pain or blood loss in cases of injury, accident, or abuse. Though healing may eventually occur, the nervous system seems to remember and store such traumas for years—and may not recover full functionality without some form of trauma-release work. (There are a number of healing modalities that proceed along such lines, such as the technique of somatic experiencing pioneered by Peter Levine.)

Emotional trauma can take the form of abuse by a victimizer who arbitrarily grants and withholds love or instills fear as a means of control. It can also result from the loss of any loved one, especially when that loss is sudden and tragic.

Mental trauma can develop from abuse, in particular constant judgment or criticism. It can also occur when the magnitude of a tragedy simply cannot be comprehended—and this may be true not only for eyewitnesses but also for people exposed to gruesome reportage in news media.

Trauma to the causal body can occur through loss of an idol or role model, a mentor or spiritual teacher. The causal body may also be traumatized by brainwashing and cult indoctrination.

In every case, one or more of the bodies is affected by information that overwhelms and paralyzes it. Often awareness is withdrawn from the affected body. Physical sensations are deadened, ignored, or not even registered. The same occurs with feelings and emotions in the emotional body and constructive thoughts in the mental body. The self hunkers down in the mental body, cut off not only from sensations, emotions, and thoughts, but also from understanding, guidance, and illumination from the higher Self. Anxiety runs riot because of fear of further trauma and an urgent desire for release from pain.

To help someone experiencing the shock of spiritual darkness, one thing we can do is support a gradual process of reoccupying the bodies. First, to the extent we’re able, we create safety by providing body-to-body connection (healing touch, hugs), heart-to-heart connection (sympathetic listening, caring concern), mind-to-mind connection (reinforcing shared beliefs and values that mitigate fear and support a positive outlook on life).

Soul-to-soul connection may be more challenging to establish. Often people who have experienced trauma or tragedy feel betrayed by the soul, God, the universe—even to the point of losing faith that such things exist. In such cases, the best medicine is simple witnessing, deep compassionate listening, letting those who suffer know they’re loved no matter what they’re thinking or feeling. The statement “Know that you are loved” can work wonders because it invites people to notice where, when, and by whom they’re loved as they’re ready to become aware of that love again and perhaps feel grateful for it. On the other hand, saying “I love you” to someone experiencing spiritual darkness could be traumatizing because they might not feel worthy of that love.

If I listen deeply enough to people who are suffering, I often become aware of what I call their inner healer. This is the voice of their soul expressing what it needs. In those who suffer, this inner voice is often drowned out by other voices vying for attention—critical, angry, despairing, or anxious. I try to capture, repeat, highlight, and reinforce moments when the inner healer speaks, expressing a need or insight that could alleviate suffering and carry forward the healing process. But to hear the voice of another’s inner healer, I have to be compassionate, patient, unattached to outcomes.

Over several years of weekly chats with my friend, certain questions emerged in my mind. I would periodically introduce them into our conversation as things to consider. In the early stages, they didn’t register or were dismissed. But over time they became conversation topics, and later they were internalized and brought up by him without prompting—often with answers he had been thinking about.

There were six such questions. I’ve experimented with them in other contexts, including workshops, as focal points for meditation. In one workshop, I briefly explained these questions, then asked the first and struck a Tibetan singing bowl. People could hold each question in mind, perhaps repeating it inwardly while noticing their reactions, which might include doubtfulness or acceptance. When the sound became inaudible, I went on to the next.

I believe these questions can soften the mental body so support, guidance, and illumination from the soul body become more available. These questions could be used for establishing and sustaining soul-to-soul connection with someone who’s experiencing spiritual darkness—as long as we don’t press for answers.

1. Am I willing to accept the conditions of my growth as the beginning point for change? This brings us out of denial of the past and anxiety over the future into the present moment by overcoming the mind’s tendency to reject what it dislikes, including trauma and its effects. We can’t heal from trauma unless we’re willing to learn what it has to teach us. Acceptance that trauma has occurred is the first step to growth.
2. Am I willing to be responsible for the consequences of my actions and learn from my past? The mental body tends to blame us or others for undesirable consequences we’ve experienced, but the soul body knows why anything has happened to us. A willingness to be responsible for our actions, no matter how much pain they may have caused, can open the way for soul-level understanding to come through. We may then discover what we’ve learned from such actions and why their consequences were necessary.
3. Can I turn my fears into intentions to grow? Paralysis in the mental body caused by anxiety can often be alleviated by identifying the unknowns that cause fear and expressing a willingness to explore them until they become known. Thus paralysis about applying for a job could be overcome by expressing an intention to learn how to create an effective résumé or to request, fill out, and submit an attractive application.
4. When confused, can I open an inquiry into the forces in play? At the soul-body level, everything we experience is a result of the interaction of various forces. Not knowing what they are overwhelms and confuses us. By opening an inquiry into these forces—the causes or influences affecting us in the moment—we can make the mind more receptive to illumination from the soul body. Such forces may include our own thoughts, feelings, and actions, as well as those of others, such as family or coworkers. They can also involve physical conditions such as the weather and the aura or ambience of our emotional, mental, and spiritual environments, where we live, work, play, or seek intellectual or spiritual nourishment. (See C.W. Leadbeater’s Hidden Side of Things for information about the influence of subtle environmental forces.) Breaking trauma down into such forces can help process information that may have overwhelmed or paralyzed any of our bodies.
5. Am I willing to be an agent of turning stuckness into flow? People who have experienced trauma often feel urgency to free themselves from paralysis and pain. They may search for quick fixes and look to us for such solutions. But trauma may be more of a process than a problem—not something to fix but something to help along. A more reasonable approach is seeing it as a temporary experience of stuckness and suggesting a single step that might move that stuckness into flow. Taking action on that step breaks down paralysis and may help the individual understand and integrate the trauma. The feeling of flow indicates that we’re more in touch with the forces in play and more available to guidance by the soul body.
6. Can I be grateful for the support and guidance of higher powers? Whether such powers include the soul, a guiding angel, God, or the universe, our gratitude for its support and guidance helps us perceive and accept them.

These observations above are intended to be suggestive rather than definitive. However, I should explain the background of the sixth question more thoroughly. For me, the universe is a great Grace Machine. At the center is our divine Source, shining like a spiritual sun, radiating joy. We’re all on a journey back to oneness with it. As we experience trauma in any of our bodies, we turn away from that Source—how could it have permitted us to experience that trauma and the suffering it caused? The more we turn away, the more tightly we become wound up in our bodies to protect us from further trauma. We close out the light and joy of the Source, and the result is various grades of spiritual darkness.

Yet in every moment the Source attempts to turn us back toward it. Working through the law of karma, it sends us experiences that unwind our trauma, wear down our faults, and strengthen our virtues. Eventually, we all achieve the goal of returning to oneness with it—and that is grace. There’s plenty of room for error and there are plenty of lifetimes to correct our mistakes.

At every moment we’re surrounded by beings, people, objects, and situations that point the way back to the Source, if we’re willing to see them and act appropriately. Gratitude for this support and guidance makes it easier to do so. By acting appropriately, I mean turning stuckness into flow.

The sign that we’ve acted appropriately is an increase in joy, because we’ve turned back toward or advanced a bit closer to the Source. Besant has something to say about this joy. It seems fitting to close with her words, since they represent the glorious opposite of the spiritual darkness we began with:

They err who believe that sorrow is the end of things; they err who believe that pain and sadness are really the atmosphere in which the Spirit lives. The Spirit is bliss, it is not sorrow; the Spirit is joy, it is not struggle. The essence and heart of all things is love, is joy, is peace; and the path of pain is the path and not the goal. . . . For out of that ocean of Blessedness whence the universe has sprung, spring love and joy and peace unceasing. (Besant, Pain, 27–28)

And that is the Grace Machine, always working to bring us closer to such love, joy, and peace—from whatever trauma or tragedy we may have experienced in this or any other life. Thus for me, tragedy seen in the light of Theosophy is a constant prayer to serve the great Grace Machine by being an agent of turning stuckness into flow.

Sources

Besant, Annie. Essays and Addresses, Vol. 2: The Spiritual Life. London: Theosophical Publishing Society, 1912.

———. Man and His Bodies. Adyar: Theosophical Publishing House, 2008.

———.Pain: Its Meaning and Use. Adyar: Theosophical Publishing House, 2003.

Leadbeater, C.W. The Hidden Side of Things. Adyar: Theosophical Publishing House, 1912.

Composer and author Kurt Leland lectures regularly for the TSA. His books include a compilation of Annie Besant’s articles: Invisible Worlds: Essays on Psychic and Spiritual Development (Quest Books, 2013) and Rainbow Body: A History of the Western Chakra System from Blavatsky to Brennan (Ibis, 2016). His consulting practice, Spiritual Orienteering, is based in Boston. He can be reached at www.kurtleland.com. Videos of his lectures can be found on the TS YouTube channel.

Printed in the Spring 2019  issue of Quest magazine.
Citation: Pateros, Christina ,"Simon’s Crossing: The Death Ritual of My Beloved Animal Companion" Quest 107:3, pg 15-17

By Christina Pateros

As I awakened, I realized that Simon, my beloved cat companion, was not licking my face, nor had he lain on my pillow cocooned around my head as he had done each night for the past thirteen years. It was his ritual, which had become mine. More than I knew.

I had a sick feeling in my belly, finding him tucked deep in the back of my bedroom closet. He had often hidden underneath the comforter on the bed for hours preceding the arrival of unfamiliar visitors to our home. But this was different. This time he stayed hidden and tucked away for days. I missed his nightly cuddling and early-morning greeting, although many of those early mornings had felt way too early for waking at the time. That morning I gently pulled him out of the closet and I held him, feeling very little life force. He purred intensely, but his eyes were distant as he laid lethargically in my arms.

Three vet visits, multiple exams, poking, prodding, invasive interventions, and tests led to a final phone conversation with the veterinarian, Dr. Levesque, that began with her saying, “The news is not good” followed by “He is not a surgical candidate. I would hate to have him suffer anymore. I’m recommending euthanasia.” Sobbing, I assured the doctor that I heard it all and understood, and that I would be there to pick Simon up soon.

I always promised Simon that I would be back—whether leaving for weeks at a time for travel or on a simple run to the grocery store. This time, I had assured him I’d be back after leaving him with the vet that morning for several hours for further tests—the tests that revealed the devastatingly sad results.

Huki and Simon

Huki came first, a sweet ginger and white kitten sleeping on the top tier of a kitty condo, away from the rambunctiousness of the rest of the kitten-filled room at the Animal Care League in Oak Park, Illinois. Our first family feline, who was quickly claimed by our school-aged daughter Lanie, is a sweet ball of love. Two years later, Simon, complementing Huki with grey and white downy fur, arrived and captured our hearts in that same kitten room.

In contrast to Huki, Simon was the life of the room, bouncing off the walls, jumping and leaping. While Huki was a lion—slow, big-hearted. and deliberate—Simon was a jaguar—cunning, quick. and agile. His flights through the air to catch gliding feathers on strings, his climbs to the highest shelves and cabinets, and his legendary tightrope walks along the exposed second-floor bannister (all while peering down at me in the room below) showed us his prowess, his fearlessness, and his desire for adventure. Simon sustained his essence right up until that final day.

Beloved family cat, brother, protector, and furry lover. “You always had something going on the side with Simon,” John, my beloved, quipped as we began to share sweet memories.

How happy I was to have him home, to hold him, love him, and allow him to hide away in solitude. The quiet darkness of the closet made sense to me now, away from sensory stimuli. And away from me. A hospice nurse with whom I once worked enlightened me about the importance of giving our dying loved ones the space to detach so that it might be a little easier to go. This, coupled with granting permission to the dying one, is powerful and sacred medicine. I honored Simon in the end by respecting his need to be in the closet away from me.

Here it was that I embraced his dying. Here it was so clear, the gift of planning his death. At home. In my arms.

My trust in Dr. Levesque and the veterinarians at the Boulder Valley Humane Society brought me to surprisingly immediate acceptance. More importantly, so did the messages I was receiving clearly from Simon. I knew that the best thing I could do for him was to accept and make space for being present with Simon and all those who loved him. 

Midwifing Death

The altar manifested with relative ease: a photo of his sweet face tucked in a crystal cluster and a white selenite rock candleholder aglow, illuminating his face with candlelight. Red roses in a vase formed the backdrop on the table in the center of our living space.

One call to Pet Loss at Home connected me to a local veterinarian, Dr. Robin Teague, and my request for an evening appointment time was confirmed. Calm infused our home as grace and gratitude for the life of our beloved Simon took over.

I discovered Pet Loss at Home, private pet euthanasia in the comfort of home, at a time I was researching alternatives for my clients and their pet companions. I connected directly to founder Karen Twyning, D.V.M. and discovered this wonderful resource so that animals can stay at home in their final days instead of living out their last breaths in the sterile veterinary-clinic environment. What a gift! “Say Good-bye in the Comfort of Home, 8 a.m.–8 p.m., Seven Days a Week,” reads the banner on their website, along with the toll-free phone number. Pet animal home hospice and euthanasia is available to anyone in most states.

Consciously, I had not digested what connecting with Karen and Pet Loss at Home would mean for my cat boys Simon and Huki. This was priceless alignment. It made all the difference in the world in my experience, and Simon’s to be sure, on the day of his crossing at home. I called the phone number from the website, which prompted me to enter my zip code, and within moments, Dr. Teague, a local veterinarian in Boulder, answered and scheduled with me for that evening.

My compact light-filled painting studio jumped forward clearly and bravely to be the place of ceremony. Three glass-encased candles, a seashell to hold the ashes of the frankincense-resin incense stick, and a vase to hold the brightly multicolored summer blooms and fresh sweet red roses we bought on the way home became a floor arrangement as the place was transformed into a space of honoring, of mourning, of unconditional love, of grace, and of death.

Simon’s energy body was already out of his physical body. That was clear when I connected into his energetic field, and was a huge relief. I performed the shamanic death rites over his body intermittently throughout the day. Following what I’d been practicing for nearly a decade, in alignment with my Andean shamanic teachers with whom I’ve apprenticed, I swirled one hand counterclockwise, beginning at his heart— the energetic home. Midwifing death was not new to me. Midwifing the death of a beloved one was.

The death-rites practice supports the natural process whereby the energetic luminous body gently detaches so that when the physical (electromagnetic) heart stops beating, the crossing to the light—home—is easeful. This death ritual of swirling spirals of energy detachment seemed as much for me as it was for Simon.

The last eleven years of midwifing death, as opportunities arose and clients called on me, have graced me with incredible privilege. I fall into an inexplicable calm in that place, ever since my first experience holding a starved woman in a Kolkata mission as she took her final breaths.

In 2011, I embarked on my inaugural journey to Peru, subsequently spending two weeks in the high Andean Mountains apprenticing with Q’ero medicine people. The mountain expedition was followed by a planned five-day Amazon jungle adventure. I visioned traveling to be with the plants and animals of the rain forest. I had not intended on ayahuasca psychedelic plant medicine and rebirth the first night and an intensely grueling death experience the second night. Nor had I planned to die in the Amazon, but the experience felt as real as it gets. One gift from it, which caused me to leave the group and the trip two days early, was to have awareness of living and dying consciously, aware and with grace and dignity.

This gift, which was one I would wish upon no one to have to experience, ultimately has allowed me to sit with the dying: calmly, compassionately, and peacefully supporting the dying one as well as loved ones.

Experiencing my own death in the Peruvian Amazon was the most sacred, most holy experience of life. With Simon, it was no different. Except that with Simon, I was also the bereaved.

Making preparations in the room whilst caressing Simon and moving spirals of energy took up the rest of the day. His favorite white plush blanket was placed atop the lambskin rug on which he had so often sprawled himself out, on many a winter’s day, sunning himself indoors. The candles and incense now burning, blinds drawn, the space was set. I sat and cried next to the blanket, tears rolling down my cheeks, further accepting that we were close to the arrival of Dr. Teague.

Permission to Die: Saying Good-bye 

Holding Simon and saying good-bye, I wept and thanked him for being such a loving, devoted companion. John also held him and said his good-bye.

Next was Lanie, beamed in from Brooklyn via live video conferencing. We wept together. Simon was sedate, accepting our ritual of good-byes, resolute, it seemed, to the end of his bodily existence. The miracle I had asked for earlier that day was arriving in the form of peace and death at home. Sometimes physical death is the healing. I wished in those moments of saying good-bye that I had known weeks before that his last licks would never be felt again. We never know when might be the last touch, hug, lick or kiss.

Huki lay atop my drawing table, sleeping deeply, curled in a ball. He had spent many of the previous ten days in the closet with Simon. Perhaps this was his way of detaching now. As Huki slept, a small procession of invited neighbors, young and old, flowed through to say good-bye.

Lexi, my older daughter (who was thirteen—Simon’s age at his passing—when he joined our family), arrived with her husband. She joined me in tears, grounding as she sat on the floor facing Simon, candles flickering and frankincense and flowers scenting the darkened air. Tears flowed throughout the room. Tears flowed too, from Paul, Lexi, and Lanie’s dad, as he said his good-byes from Chicago via video viewing.

The Ceremony

Dr. Teague arrived and seamlessly found a place in the room, gently explaining that, first, an injected sedative would slowly render Simon’s body still and relaxed before a second injection would stop his heart.

We chose silence, honoring these final moments. I told Simon I loved him and I thanked him for finding us and for being our sweet loving kitty. I asked him to show me a sign when he visited in spirit form. I closed his eyes and laid him on his side on the blanket after Dr. Teague confirmed that his body breathed no more life.

Without planning, I offered the flowers to everyone present, and asked that after blowing their love and gratitude into the petals, they place them around Simon’s body. Lanie again joined us from Brooklyn via live feed as we simultaneously smiled and wept with the beauty of the moment. In that light-hearted space, we remembered his favorite food: raw shrimp. “Put it in,” Dr. Teague said. Amidst the colorful petals, we placed one shrimp.

The blanket was folded around his body, flowers inside and atop. As pallbearers, Lexi and I carried his body to the waiting van. The incense had burned down. We blew out the candles and breathed with relief as we moved from that ceremonial space. We toasted Simon, shared stories, and remembered.

His ashes were delivered within days, and it felt just right to place the tin in the rectangular glittered box on the studio floor that he had loved to curl up in while I worked.

Huki stayed asleep throughout the ceremony. “I’ll be back,” I assure him when I leave. And when I look for signs from Simon, I realize that I see and feel him in every living thing in nature.

Christina Pateros is a painter and healer. Her shamanic healing practice includes space and land clearing and blessing, and serves adults and children in life and in conscious living and dying. She cofacilitates powerful ketamine-assisted psychotherapy sessions with an integrative psychiatrist as a part of her healing practice. She combines her art with healing, integrating creativity as a dynamic part of living as she guides groups in ceremony and teachings for empowered living. Christina lives in Boulder, Colorado and welcomes art collectors and healing clients worldwide: Christinapateros.com; Whispering-stones.com.

VOLUME 107, NUMBER 3

CONTENTS

Simon's Crossing: The Death Ritual of My Beloved Animal Companion
Christina Pateros

The Grace Machine: Healing the Shock of Spiritual Darkness
Kurt Leland

Healing Tragedy and Loss: The How and the Why
Barbara Hebert

The Grand Duke Calls My Name
Robert Moss

Dimensions of Karma
Don Crawford

Answering Back: How to Reply to Slanders against Theosophy
Steven Otto 

From the Editor's Desk
Richard Smoley

Members' Forum: For Such a Time as This
Peggy Heubel

Viewpoint: The Importance of Karma
Barbara Hebert