Why I Changed My Life Focus at 57

It has been 40 months to date since the event that changed my life happened. What a day, I didn’t feel right and ended with the ambulance taking me to spend the night in the hospital. I got there they had me touching my finger to my nose and more, asking questions upon questions, sending me for a CT scan and MRI, to find out the next day I had experienced a very small stoke.

STROKE, what a scary word that can be, and indeed was, especially for my two children. Their dad had already died in 2007 after 15 years of cancer, including two bone marrow transplants for treatment, I can only imagine the emotions they were having. My daughter was just days away from her due date for my first grandchild, and she never had the experience of having maternal grandparents as I was an orphan at 17. Fortunately, the stroke was small, and I needed no physical or occupational therapy upon returning home the next evening.

The next several days I was extremely emotional and exhausted. I learned both were very normal. The previous two months had been engaging. I had dated a man who shared with me the work of Gregg Braden and Dr. Joe Dispenza and about a meet up where the book A Course In Miracles (ACIM) was studied. Also while visiting my cousin over Thanksgiving weekend a friend she had come over also shared she thought I should get involved with A Course In Miracles. A few weeks later I found myself at the meet-up for ACIM. I also found myself reading Gregg Braden's newsletter. One of the members of ACIM shared a mediation app., I started meditating and also saw in Gregg’s newsletter that he and Dr. Joe were going to be in Sedona participating in an educational retreat.

I knew I needed to make some changes in my life. I had already started, as I had lost 30 or so pounds, and was working toward living the 80/20 rule in regards to my eating. But I knew I wasn’t on the right path and had a pretty poor mindset about my future, though I was very excited about being a grandmother (MiMa) and enjoying little ones again.

It was only a week or so after meditating I heard a clear message in my meditation which was: “I showed you in the ’90s (I had been attending a series of weekend retreats learning about different aspects of the Holy Spirit.) that you have gifts of healing. You are to be using your hands as a healing vocation, not ministry.” I was by surprise and had never heard anything so clearly. I asked myself: but how does one pursuit this? I connected with my Naturalpath Dr. and shared with her what I had experienced - both the stroke and the message. She said ‘You damn right you are!” I had laid my hands on her once, and she had a healing experience. I asked: “what is my modality”? She suggested I start with Reiki; my thoughts were - oh back at the holy spirit retreats they warned us again Reiki, that it didn’t glorify Jesus. I had been spending several of the last years pondering many scriptures from the Bible, especially after I had been labeled the ‘forgotten widow’ by one of my pastors.

To me, Reiki being inappropriate didn’t make sense as Jesus taught his disciples to lay their hands on people and heal them. I talked to the recommended Reiki Master, who had happened to be trained by a Catholic Nun. I went and had a mini session and received healing of my uneven smile, eye, and speech; they were minor issues as a result of the stroke. I was so grateful and blown away and scheduled my training.

This Reiki experience and the retreat in Sedona were transformational. The meditation with Dr. Joe Dispenza at the end of his teaching and spending a few hours with two Reiki Masters working on me put me on a new path, which has resulted into me stepping into my God-given natural gifts and a way to now living an exciting life with more purpose, joy and adventure than I ever remember experiencing.