Speak Up, Don’t Shut Up

Posted on by riverflowhealing

My mother talks a lot. I mean, a lot. I’m not saying this to be mean; it’s a statement of fact. She will start talking and continue for an hour, repeating herself several times and not stopping even when someone leaves the room. As a child, I sometimes witnessed her talking to empty chairs if she didn’t think anyone else was home, not because she believed anyone was in the chair but because she needed to talk.

The problem was, she didn’t believe other people had any reason or right to talk. If someone was speaking and she had something to say, even something completely unrelated, she would talk right over them. If someone else started speaking and didn’t finish fast enough for her tastes, she would tell them they were finished and go on with whatever she wanted to say.

And heaven help anyone who interrupted her, even unintentionally or with something as innocuous as a deep breath.

Putting words together into a form I can speak that others will understand has always been a bit of a struggle for me. So you can imagine that my need to stop and think for more than half a second to form a sentence didn’t mesh well with my mother’s need to fill any silence–any at all–with her own words. Nor did my anger at being interrupted and disrespected mesh well with her belief that she had the right to interrupt anyone, but they had no similar right.

I learned early to shut up. Whether it was with my mother, or with people who bullied me, or with other family members. If I didn’t like something, I learned, I had no right to say a word. If someone treated me badly, I was expected to just accept it. As an adult, in my marriage to my children’s father before it ended, I learned that not only did I not have the right to speak up if he said or did something hurtful or harmful, but speaking up was a dangerous thing to do. I learned not to speak for the sake of my own safety and, sometimes, my kids’.

That “put up and shut up” tendency still follows me, having become so deeply ingrained that sometimes I don’t even realize when I’m holding in something I need to express. If someone hurts me, I often keep it to myself. If I have an issue with someone or something, I don’t say a word.

Of course, that doesn’t solve anything, and often worsens a problem. If I’m feeling angry or upset about someone’s behavior and I hold it in, eventually the lid is going to blow off the pot of anger and resentment. Usually at a time when something that seems, even to me, quite small happens, so no one, including me, can figure out why I’m “overreacting.” It isn’t an overreaction; it’s a built-up reaction from weeks or months of not expressing those emotions when I needed to. And obviously that isn’t healthy or helpful.

I am better about it, thanks to a husband and a partner who both have a lot of patience and have worked to show me that it is safe for me to speak. Because they have listened when I needed to express anger, even if I didn’t do it in a particularly constructive way, I’ve learned how to express it more constructively. To ask for a moment of quiet so I can put words together. To say, calmly and respectfully, “I’m feeling this way and I need to tell you why,” instead of just going off.

Having had to hold in anger, and having been told that “good girls don’t get angry” and other such bullshit, since early childhood, learning to manage anger in a healthy way has been a difficult but vital part of my journey. And I think it’s one a lot of us struggle with when we’ve been in situations where we weren’t allowed to show anger or other negative emotions. If you’ve had to bury something, sometimes it gets away from you–and sometimes you just continue to bury it because you don’t know what else to do.
You have the right to speak up for yourself when someone has hurt or harmed you. When you feel angry. When someone’s behavior is disrespectful to you. You have the right to speak those things instead of swallowing them and pretending they don’t exist. Obviously you don’t have the right to cause hurt or harm to someone else, but you can speak your feelings without causing harm. And not speaking them may be harming you.

Imposter Syndrome Happens

Posted on by riverflowhealing

I started learning Chios Energy Healing after the first time I had a Chios healing session, which I blogged about recently. After I’d trained a bit, it was time to start *doing* Chios sessions.

This was not as easy as I’d thought it would be.

I didn’t have a lot of confidence in my skills. I knew I was a good healer; I’d been told things since childhood that indicated it. But actually doing a session with another person, intentionally, with skills I was still learning and didn’t feel I’d mastered, was a different prospect entirely. Especially since the first person who requested a session from me was my mentor.

He was someone who had studied energy and energy healing for years. He was a Reiki master as well as a Certified Chios Master Teacher, and from my perspective in the sewer of low self-esteem, he knew more about everything than I did. How could I dare do a healing session with him?

By this point, he knew me well enough to understand my fears. It wasn’t that I didn’t know how to do the healing. I had a massive case of what some people might call Imposter Syndrome. “I don’t know enough, and this person’s going to realize I’m a fraud! Or worse, I’m going to totally screw everything up!”

I didn’t screw anything up. I did the session perfectly competently, though he pointed out afterward that I had been noticeably nervous and I might want to work on that before I did sessions with anyone else. He understood the nerves, but a client who was relying on me to provide healing might not. But, he told me, I brought him a lot of benefit through that one session.

Imposter Syndrome happens, especially for someone from a background like mine. I was taught most of my life that I knew nothing, was worth nothing, and had no business “pretending” otherwise. I also was a perfectionist before I could even pronounce the word; even as a toddler, I refused to do anything unless I was sure I could do it completely right the first time around. Which meant there were an awful lot of things I never did.

I’ll be honest. I still get nervous before healing sessions. Not nearly as much as when I did that first session back in 2006, fortunately, but still, every time there’s that little niggle of “What if I don’t actually know what I’m doing? What if they think I’m a fraud?” It’s normal to have those questions. It doesn’t mean I’m not an effective healing practitioner. It means that as I help others work on their healing, I’m still working on my own, and there’s nothing wrong with that.

I was angry the day I did that first healing session, because I was afraid and my mentor refused to let me back out. He was right not to let me. Fear will become an insurmountable obstacle if you let it win even once. So even though fear still follows me around and whispers in my ear, I’m thankful my mentor pushed me through it that one time, so that now, I can push through it on my own.

I Was Skeptical About Chios…

Posted on by riverflowhealing

In 2005, I became friends with someone. We bonded over a shared love of reading and writing, but as we spent more time together, I found out he had other interests as well. Things like energy healing, which I’d never heard of or at least had heard extremely little about.

As our friendship grew, I shared things with him about my life. Traumas I’d experienced as a child and was still experiencing in my marriage at the time. Healing didn’t occur to me; I didn’t know it was a possible thing. I just knew it felt good to talk to someone who seemed to care.

After a while, he offered me a Chios Energy Healing session. Once he explained it to me, I figured maybe it wouldn’t hurt, but I didn’t expect much to come of it. To be honest, mostly I only agreed to it because I wanted to spend more time with my friend, and this would be a reason to do so. Plus I didn’t want to disappoint him or upset him; my fear, irrational though it was, was that if I didn’t let him do a healing session with me, he wouldn’t be my friend anymore. I needed the friendship; it was the only thing in my life at the time that I felt like I was doing right. (I loved my kids, and they were my heart, but I knew I was screwing up as their mother.)

The day of the healing session, I was nervous. I didn’t know what to expect, and my friend couldn’t tell me much because healing sessions are different for everyone. When I realized I had to lie down on a massage table, I almost gave up then and there; I was afraid to do that. But I swallowed the fear and lay down, and my friend closed the door of the room so his cats wouldn’t try to “help,” and we got started.

Fourteen years later, and without notes to refer to, I don’t remember everything about the session. I remember crying a lot, and apologizing for it, and my friend telling me to stop apologizing. Trauma memories I’d intentionally buried resurfaced, along with memories I didn’t even recall suppressing. I talked throughout the session, telling my friend what was coming up, and he gently reassured me but refused to stop the session unless I explicitly said to. Which I didn’t, because as hard as facing these things was for me, I knew it would ultimately benefit me.

Afterward, he gave me something to eat and drink. I don’t remember what it was, only that it was something I liked, and it was vegan (because everything he ate or drank was vegan). I felt exhausted and shaky, and stabilizing my emotions seemed impossible. But I also felt triumphant, because I’d allowed the session and I’d gotten through it.

For over a week afterward, as the energy filtered through my system, memories and ideas and thoughts continued to surface. My friend patiently waded through pages of emails to address my concerns and offer support as I dealt with the memories. He never once told me to get therapy (we both knew I needed it, he knew I couldn’t get it at that point because of my husband, and he knew I knew I needed it). He never told me to get over anything, or to let it go, or to stop whining, or any of the other things I’d heard from people who claimed they wanted to “help.” He simply listened–well, read, anyway–and reassured.

I kept having sessions with him, but after just that first session, I knew I needed to learn Chios. It had had such a profound impact on me, and I wanted to share that impact with others. My friend strongly recommended I have one or two more sessions myself before I started learning, which I did. He was my instructor, and I was so excited to learn it that I went through all three levels in under four months.

That friendship and those healing sessions made an incredible difference in my life, and although the friendship itself only lasted about two years, the impact has lasted ever since. And that friend is a huge part of why I do what I do.

Sharing Chios

Posted on by riverflowhealing

Since Chios Energy Healing, the modality I practice, isn’t very well-known, one of my chosen missions is to bring awareness of it to more people. That’s part of the aim behind my #Healing100, in which for 100 days, all private Chios and channeling sessions are discounted by 40% to make them more accessible to more people.

But private sessions don’t necessarily help get the word out, so I also am always thankful for the chance to offer Chios sessions or teach Chios workshops in other venues. This weekend, I get one of those opportunities! I’ll be at Elemental Energies, 27 North Berwick Road, Wells, ME from 10-4 offering Chios healing sessions. (These sessions are slightly different in terms of length and logistics from the private sessions, so the rate is lower and the #Healing100 discount does not apply.)

People are welcome to contact Elemental Energies in advance (you can find contact info on their website, http://www.chrisann-jeff.com) to guarantee a spot, or just walk in. 

Elemental Energies is a great store to visit, in my opinion. A couple of weeks ago, I brought my offspring and grandsons there, and all of them enjoyed the energy. Jeff, one of the owners, even took some time to teach my 6-year-old grandson about runes, which fascinated my grandson! So if you come in and decide not to have a Chios session, you’ll still have a wonderful experience visiting this high-vibration store.

Yeah, okay, I know this post sounds like an ad, but it does come from the heart. I teamed up with Chris Ann and Jeff to offer Chios at their store because of the incredible positive energy, and because of the chance to spread the word about Chios. And I hope to see you there!

Trance Channeling–An Inside View

Posted on by riverflowhealing

In the years since I learned channeling, I’ve practiced two types: relayed and trance. Relayed channeling is pretty easy to explain and describe. I sit with my client, listen to their questions, and listen to the answers my guide Shiva gives. Then I pass those answers along to the client in Shiva’s words, or as close as I can get, and give clarification when asked.

Trance channeling is harder to describe, both from the perspective of an observer and from the perspective of the one doing it. But I’m going to try, because trance channeling is something I’ve found people don’t always understand.

As the name might imply, when I do trance channeling, I’m in a trance. My body is relaxed and, if I’m doing it right, so is my mind. I have a process for getting into trance that simply involves slow counting backward, and when I reach the right level of trance, I invite Shiva to “come in.”

Basically what that means is that my consciousness, in a sense, steps aside to allow Shiva’s consciousness to use my body to communicate with a client. It isn’t the same as possession; Shiva’s consciousness is just visiting, so to speak, and I can break out of the trance–thereby displacing him–at any time. 

It also is not something Shiva will ever do without my invitation. Sometimes, when I’m getting into trance to do a channeling, I forget to explicitly say, “Shiva, please come in,” and when that happens, he won’t do it. He might prompt me to say it, because he knows sometimes my memory doesn’t work as well as it could, but he won’t do anything more unless I ask.

While Shiva’s doing his thing, my body gets very hot. This happens to a lesser extent even when I do relayed channeling, because Shiva’s high energetic vibration causes heat, but it’s more intense when I’m doing a trance channeling. No matter how cold the room is, if I’m doing trance channeling, I’ll probably be sweating by the end of it.

I can hear everything that’s said, because I haven’t gone anywhere. My consciousness is still in my body; it’s just moved over a bit like someone might move over on a bench to make space for someone else to sit down. But hearing doesn’t mean remembering. Another side effect of the energy shifts as Shiva shows up and leaves is that the energy tends to interfere with memory. That’s why I recommend clients who are having trance channelings either take notes or record the session on an audio device (I don’t allow video), because they might not remember everything either, and I won’t be able to help them.

On the plus side, since I don’t remember much of what’s said, confidentiality is pretty much assured. Shiva definitely isn’t going to tell anyone what happens in a session!

I can’t see anything, because my eyes remain closed. Shiva could open them if he wanted to, just as he can move my mouth and sometimes my hands if we’re doing an email channeling. But I’m extremely visually oriented, and if my eyes were open, even with Shiva’s consciousness at the forefront, I might get distracted by something visible and end up breaking trance. So my eyes stay closed.

When the session’s over, Shiva leaves. That feels like something is exiting my body, and I usually end up slumping over for a second or two, until my consciousness moves back into place. Depending on how hot my body got during the session, I might feel cold and even shiver until my body temperature readjusts.

Trance channeling is definitely an interesting experience, and one that pushes my comfort zone. Even though Shiva won’t do this unless I ask, and I know I can break trance at any time, giving up even some control over my body is a scary thing for someone with my trauma history. I’m also sometimes afraid I’ll “do it wrong,” or that the client will either think I’m faking or get freaked out, both of which have happened in the past. That makes it hard for me to take the final step of inviting Shiva in. It’s something I’m working on, and when I’m able to get out of the way, trance channeling has been a good experience for the majority of the clients for whom I’ve done it.

If you’d like to learn more or schedule a channeling session with Shiva and me, please visit my Channeling page.

Much-Needed Respite

Posted on by riverflowhealing

Every year for the past few years, in May, I’ve gone to a spiritual event/retreat. Sometimes it’s relaxing. Sometimes, depending on what’s going on in my life, it isn’t.

This year, I wasn’t really looking forward to going because of some issues in my personal life that were taking most of my emotional bandwidth. I almost backed out of going at all, but I’d made some commitments I needed to fulfill during the event, and I don’t break commitments if I can help it. So I went.

One of my commitments was teaching a Chios Energy Healing Level 1 workshop. I’d done the workshop at this event before, a couple of years ago, and was looking forward to sharing Chios with more people. Although fewer people came than I’d hoped, the important thing was people came! And learned, and seemed interested. A few people later mentioned having wanted to go, but they weren’t able to because of scheduling conflicts. So hopefully I’ll be able to offer the workshop again next year.

Aside from that, I wasn’t able to put as much energy into the event as I usually do. My body decided to rebel against me, leading to my needing shuttle rides around the campground where the retreat is held and to my going to bed before 10 every night. (Usually more like 8. Which is earlier than I ever go to bed at home.) During whole-group activities, I had to sit down and observe for the most part, though I was able to take an active role in one.

I wasn’t happy about it. I seriously dislike not being in control of my body, and the pain and exhaustion were beyond my control. But at the same time, at least I was at the retreat. I was able to participate to some extent, and I had plenty of time to reset and relax. Maybe that’s *why* I was exhausted and in pain. Maybe it was the Universe’s way of telling me to use the retreat to slow down and rest for a while.

Sometimes that’s the way things go. If you don’t take the gentle nudges toward the best course for you, the Universe steps in and gives you a not-so-gentle shove.

I came home from the retreat feeling more positive than I had beforehand, and feeling more rested as well. And I’m looking forward to being there again next year.

How I Channel

Posted on by riverflowhealing

I learned channeling from the same person from whom I learned Chios Energy Healing. The circumstances were a little different, though. I didn’t know anything about channeling, and definitely didn’t know it was something I was meant to do. Even though I’d known my guides since I was a very young child, I hadn’t spoken to one of them in a very long time, and had pretty much forgotten about him.

My introduction to channeling was through my mentor doing a channeling session for me with his guide, a being of light. What I didn’t realize was that this being was in communication with Shiva, my primary guide (the one I hadn’t spoken to in a very long time). It wasn’t exactly conspiring, though I teased them by calling it that for a while. Basically, Shiva felt I was ready for us to work together again, and wanted us to do so. So through additional channeling sessions and some training from my mentor in going into trance and allowing another consciousness to work through me, my mentor’s guide helped recreate the bond between Shiva and me.

Shiva is a being of light, and that took some getting used to for me. For one thing, I associated the name with the Hindu deity, and I damn sure wasn’t “good enough” to work with a deity. Once I got past the name thing, I didn’t believe I was “good enough” to work with a being of light either, though my mentor’s guide pointed out to me during another channeling session that I’d been working with him for six months at that point. (I said it was different; I wasn’t the one doing the channeling, and he wasn’t my guide.)

After a while, I got used to the idea, and began channeling for others. Over the years that I’ve done trance and relayed channeling, I’ve gotten some varying reactions.

For me, whichever type of channeling I’m doing, there is a noticeable energy shift in the room, just as there is when I do a Chios session. I get very warm, sometimes to the point of sweating. If I’m doing a trance channeling, I feel like I’m just kind of relaxing off to the side while Shiva speaks. In a relayed channeling, I’m the one speaking, but I feel like I’m not completely in the same world as my client; I’m kind of halfway between the “real” world and the off-to-the-side one.

For my client, it depends. When I did a channeling for the manager of one store where I’d hoped to offer the service to customers, Shiva gave her information about a situation she hadn’t talked about to anyone, and it freaked her out. She stood up so fast the chair almost fell over and said, “You aren’t allowed to channel here. You aren’t even allowed to mention it. Don’t ever do this again.” And then hurried away.

At another store where I was allowed to offer channeling, during one group session, one of the clients asked about her financial situation. Shiva responded by saying, “You’ll have the money for the center you’re planning.” She hadn’t told anyone–including her friend who was at the channeling with her–that she was hoping to open a holistic or retreat center within a few years. My mentor was also there, and told me afterward that the woman looked completely astonished, and then completely happy and at ease.

Some clients feel absolutely no change in the energy of the room. Some complain that the temperature is too high once Shiva is present. One employee at yet another store found the energy shift so intense that he had to leave the room. He was clear with me afterward that the energy was entirely positive, just very, very intense.

When I do a trance channeling, the voice coming out of me is different from my normal speaking voice. Shiva speaks more slowly, at a deeper pitch, and with an accent I haven’t been able to identify. This was one of the things that upset the manager at the first store I mentioned; she was expecting the voice to sound exactly the same as my usual one. (She was also conflating channeling and mediumship, and expected me to talk to her about her departed family members.) It can be a little weird if you aren’t anticipating it.

My eyes stay closed; because I am extremely visually oriented, Shiva believes that if he were to open my eyes, the visual input would distract me and I would end up breaking trance. And Shiva, since he isn’t and never has been human, doesn’t always hold back what he has to say. He can be very blunt, and while he has no wish to upset or hurt anyone–quite the opposite, actually–it doesn’t always occur to him that his bluntness might be upsetting to some. He also refers to me as “Ganatram,” a name he gave me a few of my lifetimes ago, which has confused some clients.

Image (C) 2006 Christopher S Harris. Since it’s my name–Ganatram–in Sanskrit, I was given permission at that time to use it.

During a relayed channeling, the only thing that changes is the energy in the room. I’m listening to Shiva speaking to me and then passing along what he says. I’m the one speaking, so it’s my normal speaking voice, though I do need to pause, sometimes longer than a client is comfortable with, to be sure I’m hearing Shiva correctly and conveying what he wants the client to know. My eyes stay open, because since I’m actively engaged in this form of channeling, I’m less likely to get distracted.

Relayed channeling can be more comfortable for the client, but it can sometimes be more difficult for me to be sure I’m speaking the correct information in a way that won’t upset the client but is still accurate to what Shiva is telling me. I prefer trance channeling, but I offer both services because my clients’ comfort level is more important than mine.

On June 3, I’ll officially be introducing channeling as a service of River Flow Healing. 30-minute sessions of either trance or relayed channeling will be available in person at Vita Therapia in Westford, MA, or online via Skype or Facebook video messenger. Email channelings, in which the client sends me 1-3 questions and I channel Shiva’s reply and send it back, will also be available. If you contact me at schedule@riverflowhealing.com by June 2, with “Channeling session request” in the subject line, you’ll receive 20% off your first channeling.

“How Do You Know It Isn’t a Demon?”

Posted on by riverflowhealing

NOTE: Because I like to be clear and honest, I want to point out that the dialogue in this post is paraphrased.

At a fair in which I participated recently, I was talking with the woman at the table beside me about the services I offer. I mentioned that I would be offering channeling beginning this summer, and she seemed a little upset. “How do you know it’s safe? What precautions are you taking?”

I didn’t have an answer for that right off the bat. I’ve known my guides since I was very young, so young I couldn’t quite conceptualize what they were or what their names were. (I called the three primary ones “Big John, Little John, and Jesus.” I was three. Names weren’t my strong point.) I told her this, and she said, “Well, you know, demons have a way of getting to people who’ve suffered trauma and making the person think they’re good when they aren’t.”

I had to step away from the conversation for a few minutes. First of all, weird as it may sound, in the course of my work with my mentor years ago, I encountered a couple of demons. One was masquerading as a guide who treated their “host” like shit. The other’s energy clung to me after I did a Chios Energy Healing session on someone, and until my mentor recognized the situation, I was physically ill and in a seriously crappy mood. So I have a pretty good sense of what demonic energy feels like.

Second, as I said, I’ve known my guides most of my life. I’ve worked with Shiva in previous lives. Apparently one of my other guides–a spirit guide–and I were friends and partners in his last incarnate lifetime, a few hundred years ago. I know how their energy feels, too. Warm, loving, patient even when I’m being kind of hard to deal with. They’ve kept me alive for almost 49 years. They guide me, as their label would imply, and keep me going on the right path for me even when I’m ready to give up.

So I was kind of ticked off when this woman asked how I knew my guides weren’t demons, and I didn’t quite have words to explain. After a few minutes, though, I resumed the discussion and was able to give a few answers to her original question of what precautions I take when channeling.

  • I’m an impermeable channel. That means that only my own guides can communicate with me unless they or I give permission for another being to do so. (The demon thing I mention above wasn’t a case of the entity communicating with me; its energy stuck to me. And in discussing it with my guides, I’d apparently, subconsciously, given consent for that to happen to help my client.) Shiva is the only one of my guides whom I actively channel; the others talk to me, but I don’t consider it quite the same thing. And even if I wanted to channel another being, Shiva wouldn’t allow it.
  • I work a lot with light energy, something my mentor and Shiva taught me after the demon incident. When I’m preparing to channel, I’m also surrounding myself with light and/or golden energy, which I extend to encompass anyone in the room.
  • I’m careful about where I channel. I do an energetic cleansing of my apartment at least a couple of times a month. If I’m doing an in-person session, it’s at a location I know is equally diligent about cleansing. Sometimes I even cast a circle, like I do before performing rituals as a witch. I invite my clients to do whatever they need in order to feel safe, as well.

Other people might have different means of protecting themselves and their clients. The woman with whom I was speaking said something about how she “calls on the true God for protection.” That’s VERY paraphrased; I can’t remember the exact term she used, but she was clearly referring to God in the sense that most religions view God. Since my spiritual path doesn’t include belief in a “one true god,” that isn’t really applicable to me, and her phrasing unfortunately put me in mind of the “true Christians” who’ve tried converting me over the years.

The last thing I’ll risk is putting my clients or myself in harm’s way, during either a Chios or a channeling session. As I said, that includes inviting my clients to take their own precautions if they feel the need to do so, though I have had an incident where a client’s “precautions” actually allowed negative energy into the session.

Not everything works for everyone. I believe in an ultimate creative power, but I also believe that power has many aspects. I believe Shiva is as benevolent as he seems because I feel the energy. I believe in my own power, and I believe I take the precautions I need to take in order to protect my clients and myself. People who don’t trust this don’t have to have channeling sessions with me; there are plenty out there who channel.

On June 3, I’m officially introducing channeling as a service of River Flow Healing. 30-minute sessions will be available in-person at Vita Therapia in Westford, MA, or online via Skype or Facebook video messenger. Email channelings consisting of the answers to 1-3 questions will also be available. If you contact me at schedule@riverflowhealing.com with “Channeling request” as the subject line between now and June 2, you’ll receive your channeling at 20% off the regular price.

Who Are My Guides?

Posted on by riverflowhealing

I’ve been connected with my guides (beings who work with me to help me find my way through my life and experiences) since I was a very young child. I’ve been told that it’s rare for someone to connect with their guides as early as I did. In my case, it was because the humans around me were either overtly dangerous to me, or those who were intended to protect me chose not to. I needed help and protection, and so subconsciously or unconsciously reached out for those things.

I was very fortunate. Many people who open to channeling and to their guides are permeable, which means that any being who chooses can connect to and communicate with them. Sometimes that results in them connecting with beings who are not what they claim to be, and do not have the person’s best interests at heart.

In my case, the beings who responded to my call were my genuine guides, and they put protective measures into place to prevent other beings from connecting with me. This makes me an impermeable channel, since only my own guides can connect with me unless I request otherwise, or another being receives consent from me and from my primary guide.

My earliest memory of my guides comes from when I was about three. Two of them manifested to me as “people” whom I called Big John and Little John. (Hey, I was three. Names weren’t my strong suit.) My parents called Big John and Little John my “imaginary friends.” I was very adamant in correcting them; my friends weren’t imaginary, they were just invisible.

Big John and Little John, whom I now know as Dominic and Blake (though they’ve given me other names to use for them over the years), are spirit guides. Once, they were human, but they completed the incarnations they needed in order to learn what their souls had come to learn. They stopped incarnating and instead took on the role of guides. Dominic and I knew each other in one of my past lives, which was his final lifetime as human, several hundred years ago. Blake hasn’t been quite as forthcoming with why he’s chosen to work with me.

When I was about four, “Jesus” came to play with me quite a bit. This wasn’t the Christian Jesus, nor was it the being some know as an ascended master. Nor, for that matter, is Jesus one of the names this being generally uses. I was brought up in a nominally Christian household. A being with extremely high energetic vibration, who manifested as protective, safe, and loving, wasn’t something I could conceive of outside the “Jesus” I’d learned about in church.

That being, who I now know as Shiva, though again he’s had other names, is my primary guide. He’s a being of light, which is one of the highest-vibration beings among those who choose to work with humans, and he’s the guide I channel.

Some pretty horrible things happened to me as a child. Although my guides protected me to the extent they were able, free will plays a role in beings’ dealings with humans. My soul chose certain lessons to learn and patterns to address in this lifetime, and certain events occurred because of those soul-level choices. Since I was unaware of these choices on a conscious level, I wasn’t able to ask my guides to help or protect me from the events, and without that request, they could only be with me, support me, and try to ensure that I survived. At times, they advised me on courses of action that might prevent trauma, but if I chose not to listen, they couldn’t do much else.

With each subsequent traumatic event, my energetic vibration decreased. In order to work with a being of light, a human has to have a proportionately high vibration. By the time I was seven or eight, my vibration was too low for Shiva to work with me safely. He never left, but he “stepped back” and observed and protected me from a distance, figuratively speaking, so his vibration wouldn’t become painful for me or cause me harm.

For nearly thirty years after that, I remained connected to and communicated with my other guides, often wondering why what I’d come to believe were imaginary friends (because that’s what I was told by everyone around me) didn’t disappear as I “outgrew” them. Then, around 2005, I became friends with a man who channeled; he was also the one who taught me Chios Energy Healing. Through channeling sessions with him and his guide, I learned techniques for raising my vibration, and his guide, working in concert with Shiva, restored the connection Shiva and I had had when I was a child.

It took work for me to believe I was “worthy” of channeling a being of light, and to be honest, sometimes I still struggle with that lack of belief in my worth. But he is my guide, though I’m not the only human with whom he works directly, and I did learn to channel him.

Beginning on June 3, Shiva and I will be offering relayed channeling and trance channeling services. We did this together over a decade ago, but then life, including raising my children, got in the way of my practices. I’m thrilled to be able to offer it again.

Channeling

Posted on by riverflowhealing

The Merriam-Webster online dictionary reveals several different definitions of “channel,” both as a noun and as a verb. The one that’s most relevant to this post is, as a verb, “to serve as an intermediary for.”

Channeling is a skill with a long history. In ancient temples, those who were designated as priests or priestesses sometimes channeled the deity they served. It’s a skill that has met with suspicion and fear; often it’s confused with possession, and those who are able to act as channels are believed to consort with demons if not to be demons themselves.

In channeling, a human is serving as an intermediary, or a conduit, for a higher-vibration being. This being might be a deity, or at least at the same frequency as one. They might be a being of light, or a spirit guide, or an angel. When the human is channeling the being, they might be listening to the being speak to them and then relaying that information to others, or they might go into trance and allow the being’s consciousness to enter their body, enabling the being to communicate directly with other humans.

The trance channeling thing is one of the reasons channeling is sometimes conflated with possession. There are differences. Possession is often done against the human’s will, with an entity just deciding to take over, though even in those cases the human might subconsciously want it to happen. An entity that might possess a human doesn’t have anyone’s best interests in mind, except maybe their own, and isn’t likely to do or say anything that will give help or wisdom. And the possession ends when the entity decides it’s ready to leave–if it leaves at all. The human gets no say. No free will is involved on the humans’ part.

Trance channeling, on the other hand, is a cooperative effort between the human and the being. The human chooses to go into trance, and asks that the being’s consciousness enter them. The being generally won’t do this until the human specifically asks, and sometimes will even ask for additional confirmation from the human before actually entering them. The human can choose at any time to end the trance, which essentially ejects the being’s consciousness.

Beings who choose to be channeled do so because they want to work with humans to bring us to our highest benefit, both on an individual level and as a whole. Information they give is intended to bring wisdom and insight to guide the humans listening to that highest ideal. For most such beings, free will overrules everything. Some will refuse to answer certain questions because the answer might violate the questioners free will, and they may offer advice with the addition of something along the lines of “Of course, you don’t have to do what I say” (which is what one of my guides constantly says to me).

Some beings or collectives of beings work with and through any human with the ability and willingness. Other beings choose to work closely with only one or a few humans. Beings who are closely connected with a human are called that human’s guides, and they help to protect the human and guide them through their life. While not all beings choose to act as guides, all humans have guides. Many people are unaware of their guides, but have had the experience of hearing “a little voice in their mind” telling them to take or not take a certain action. That “little voice” is one of their guides.

For people who choose to channel, it’s important to take steps to make sure they’re doing so safely. I’m not an expert in that part of things, so my best advice is that if you’re interested in learning to channel, you do so under the instruction of someone who is experienced and legitimate. When you first try to connect with your guides, you leave yourself vulnerable to some of those not-so-benevolent entities, and so it’s unwise to try to make that connection on your own.

I’ve been connected with my guides since I was a very young child, and I’ve been channeling one of them since 2006. Next week, I’ll share specifics about my own guides and channeling practice. Beginning on June 3, I’ll be offering channeling sessions in person and online, as well as channeled messages via email.