Chapter 15

Eppie Explains

Monday evening

Eppie had asked me to call her at eight o’clock this evening, so I did. She answered on the first ring and right off started telling me what she thought I needed to know. 

“I did some research today on dreams. It’s possible you have some kind of connection with a person who’s desperate for your help.” She paused to take a breath and continued, “I realize that sounds strange, but there are many reasons that might be so. It could even be related to something real. Are you following this?”

“Well yes, I’m listening, but I don’t understand. I wasn’t asleep when they happened, I was awake. It seemed more like some kind of vision.”

“Yes, that’s what I call a waking dream. They’re unusual, but not unknown. Waking dreams generally happen to someone right before or after a spiritual awakening.”

“A spiritual awakening?”

“Yes, I think it’s possible you’re about to have a spiritual awakening; or maybe you’ve already been awakened, but don’t realize it.”

I thought about that and didn’t know what to say, so kept quiet. I did wonder what she meant by ‘about to have a spiritual awakening.’ So far, I didn’t feel ‘awakened’ or different in any way before or after I had them.

“OK, here’s what I think this means. You’ve received a call from someone; and that someone may be in the past, because I saw an ancient-style Roman sword, a short weapon used in close combat.”

“Yes, I saw that sword too.” I wondered how she could have seen the same thing I saw.

“There were a number of people near you in the battle and ancient books and scrolls were burning all around. It looked like you and others had been attacked by men who wore blackened animal skins. Maybe you were trying to defend an ancient library; but the building was already burning. Your group was outnumbered and overwhelmed. Then everything was destroyed.

“Eppie, I saw that fight; but it wasn’t like a dream, and I didn’t fight. I just watched, like in a trance. Why would I have that kind of vision?”

“That’s the real mystery isn’t it? I think, John, that someone in the past is trying to get your attention; either to send you a message or connect with you.”

“Isn't that kind of strange?”

“Not at all, I see it a lot in my work when transcendent kinds of experiences are involved.”

“Transcendent experiences?”

“Yes.” She hesitated. “How shall I say it? That’s when one experiences a presence beyond our ordinary material world. Sometimes it’s called a spiritual experience.”

I was puzzled, this sounded complicated. “Eppie, do you mean I could be losing touch with reality or my sanity? If I am, what can I do about it? I don’t want to see a shrink and get involved in all that gobbledygook about my subconscious mind surfacing or whatever.”

“I understand your concerns about mental health, but I don’t think you need that kind of help.” she paused, “John, psychologists deal mainly with symptoms. They don’t often consider, look for or recognize transcendent experiences, especially the type you seem to have had. Many mental health professionals might be inclined to give you medication to calm you down. But that would only suppress what you experience, it wouldn’t resolve any causative issues. Many people are fearful and never talk about such visions because they don’t want to be labeled as unstable.

“I can’t say how your experiences might be explained. But I sense that you’re being summoned to help someone, maybe to help solve a problem.”

“What do you mean, Eppie? I don’t know how I could help someone with a problem. What kind of problem would that be?”

“Well, I’ve been thinking about that. Here is how I see it so far. You’re most likely being called on by someone who’s in a lot of trouble, maybe even facing death.” She hesitated as if considering what and how much to tell me. I was a little uncomfortable as I waited.

“It’s most important that you realize there’s a lot we don’t know about this kind of event. There’s no hard science to fall back on that can give you a simple formula or equation to create a satisfactory result.”

I didn’t like the sound of that; I knew I didn’t want to be part of an experiment.

“It’s experimental in the sense that each individual’s situation and experiences are unique. While we recognize that certain kinds of unexplained phenomena could and sometimes do happen; we don’t understand why or how something like that happens. Both the conscious human mind and the dreaming mind still hold much mystery.

“Sometimes, through dreams or meditation, we may come into what Jung called the collective unconscious, which is known in some cultures as the spirit world. Many indigenous peoples and very old cultures believe there’s more beyond our usual range of day-to-day consciousness; and that ‘more’ is important, accessible and shouldn’t be ignored. Dreams and visions are most often available to us when our normal perceptual barriers are lowered during sleep or meditation.

“We can go into space and walk on the moon. But we miss out on a lot when we don’t know our inner selves, who we are beyond our physical bodies and our five senses. Our culture is not much interested in the search for an inner self.

“And remember that people in many other cultures often call on the spirits of their ancestors for help in a crisis. I don’t think most of us are aware that those calls can go forward in time as well as back. It’s the same physics only in a different direction. Some call it shaman physics.”

“Eppie, are you talking about New Age stuff? Are you saying that we’re all connected by unseen forces, or whatever you want to call it; which means our present reality can be affected in ways we don’t understand or even know are possible?”

“Something like that. Those who call uncommon phenomena New Age are often people with closed minds who live in younger, western cultures. I’ve had experiences that couldn’t be explained; and been privileged to counsel clients who’ve received a forward request for assistance. The forward requests I’ve dealt with were channeled to the world beyond the future; and then sent to me by an entity there.

“But, in this case, John, you received an intense, urgent message that was strong enough to cross the barrier of the past and break through into the present, direct to you. Someone from the past has made contact with you through these visions and is asking for your help. If you continue to ignore that request, it might get stronger until the connection that transcends time barriers becomes so powerful you’ll feel as if the person making the request is in your presence. So far, that’s been my experience with these kinds of episodes.

“That’s what it felt like in the kitchen.”

“I think I can help you, John. We’ll have to approach this problem logically; and resolve it completely for you to be free of it. You’ll have to listen carefully and do as I tell you.

“Can you do that?” She was serious.

“Yes, Eppie, of course I can. I feel better just talking to you. And thank goodness I don’t have to see a shrink.” I laughed as I felt a little self conscious about the whole thing. I sure hoped I could handle whatever I had to do and keep my work and career on track.

“I’m so glad, John, I’ll do my best to help you. It’s important for you to believe I can help and that you follow all my instructions. There must be a reason I’ve been brought into this struggle, or whatever it is.

“Right now I feel as if I’ve been asked to be a channel to guide and help you through it. I assume the first thing I should do is help you interpret those violent visions and then we’ll figure out what to do next. That’s all we have to go on, but it should be enough to give us a good start.”

“OK, Eppie, I agree to work with you. Your insights have already helped me relax a little; and I appreciate your help. Tell me what to do.”

“Very good, the way it looks right now, I don’t think you’ve seen a dead spirit. We’re working in real time with someone who is alive in their own time and frantic, in need of your help right now.”

“But if the call is from the past, someone must already be dead. I mean the past is the past; it can’t be now or the future.”

“Think about it this way: past and future all exist in the present. We can’t see it that way because we don’t know how to think and experience in broader, deeper ways.” I knew she would have to explain a lot before I could understand all this.

“We learn about time as a linear progression, where one event always happens before another later event, and so on. That is scientific dogma, a simple template for perception of our current reality and the flow of time.”

I got that part OK.

“Reality is taking place all at once, but on different planes. The past and the future are all here now, but each is on a different level, or you might say, frequency. However, our ability to see or experience these different planes is limited by our five senses. Cultural conditioning and centuries of orthodox science and orthodox Christian theology all insist there must be certain limits on how we process signals that come from the different planes of reality.

“Many indigenous peoples, without our mind-confining standard education, are able to let their minds wander, wonder and perceive other dimensions, times, and worlds.

“But for most of us, science and our minds tell us that reality is linear. We’re conditioned to think that all time is linear even if, on occasion, some of us may experience something different. So due to our education and cultural mores, when the past leaks through into our present, we intentionally ignore it as if it weren’t real.

“In some cultures where ancestor worship is valued, voices from long-departed ancestors are heard as real. Other cultures train people to see and experience beyond the physical world, and often describe it as ‘having a gift.’ But when someone in our culture experiences something outside normal conditioning, it’s difficult for the person to explain and for others to accept or believe that it’s real. Often it’s automatically discarded by the mind because it doesn’t conform. Do you follow?”

“I think I’m getting the idea. The visions I’m having are sort of like a mirror image of an ancient reality. And they were sent to me as a desperate call for help. Does that sound right?”

“Yes it does. So let’s begin our work with your visions.”

“But Eppie, what should I do?” That was my only question; I was drained, done.

“It’s imperative that you answer the call, sooner rather than later.”

 NEXT.....Chapter 16
Lights Out