Dear Community,
This is a story of the unexpected. It is about how the tools and practical wisdom from people of Mexico and Mesoamerica, as transmitted and enriched now by Being Energy, have helped me meet difficulties.
There was a turning point for me back in February 2000. I was headed from my home city of San Luis Potosi to Málaga Spain to get a PhD in education. At the same time, my mother’s health had been deteriorating. She’d suffered from diabetes for 30 years—a disease that is often very aggressive and devastating in its later stages.
What should I do? I felt that going abroad would mean leaving her alone. I had been living with her and caring for things. My brother and sister were each married, and my father was older. So I talked with my brother, sister and father so that we could all decide together what was best. They agreed that it was best for me to go to Spain, and that they would help care for my mom.
So it was decided, and it was also set that I would return to Mexico on a certain date for a few days for reasons connected to my work with the University of San Luis Potosi
Once in Málaga, when the date arrived for my brief return to Mexico, I phoned home to tell my family that I was preparing for the trip. My father answered the call, and gave me the news that my mom’s health had entered a critical state and she had to be hospitalized. I was worried and also somewhat amazed and grateful at how this event was coinciding with the trip that had been planned some time ago. The trip involved my picking up some money for work from the University, which would also allow me to deal with the hospital expenses.
By that time, I had practiced the teachings of Carlos Castaneda for five years. I think I had already redistributed and accumulated enough energy to allow me to realize the truth of what at another time I would have called coincidence. It really was a magical gesture that spirit had given to me, because everything was flowing to favor my being able to travel home to Mexico so that I could say goodbye to my mother.
I recognized then how important it is to live in a purposeful and disciplined way—to make way for our bond with the Spirit. Far from a mythical tale, I now knew that now it was a clear and tangible reality.
I can say without a doubt that it was the gift of the Spirit to be able to be there with my family just, as it turned out, three days before the death of my mother. Being there also allowed me to participate in one of the most important decisions I’ve ever faced.
Shortly after I arrived, the doctor told our family that biological and clinically, my mom and had no chance of improvement, and asked us to decide whether or not to prolong her life artificially. The doctor told us this and then stayed in silence, watching us and waiting for an answer. My siblings and my dad, turned and looked at me, and I had the sense to say, “All we want for my mother is for her not to suffer.”
There can be no worse suffering than to see a loved one suffer, and it feels so powerless to know there is little if anything you can do about it.
In my imagination, I had thought of such a moment with great concern and anguish. However, in the moment of the reality of it, I felt different about death, more clear and grounded, thanks to trying to live the premises of the ancient seers and learning about death as an advisor. I also drew upon a memory of having heard years earlier that with the death of a member of a Chinese family, far from being a drama or tragedy, it is treated as a loving if solemn farewell serene.
To my surprise, I found that I was facing losing my mother with much serenity. Of course I experienced pain and sorrow. But I can say that I was privileged to mourn my mother, in time, place and form of my predilection, and without suppressing my emotions and feelings.
I also know that this was a magical moment because I realized and fully understood why it is important to gather and redistribute our energy to our vital centers. In this case, specially the center for feeling located on the right side of our body, consisting of the liver and gallbladder. I am sure that maintaining my energy levels and awareness was what allowed me to get sober in managing my emotions in this process.
But the story is not over.
A year after my mother’s death, another significant event occurred. One afternoon I was taking a nap, and I had a dream of my mother. She was standing in my living room—clearly there—and without words, she gestured and pointed to the right, where my sister was sitting on a chair. My mother wore an expression of concern and sadness.
I woke up startled by the vividness of the dream. No sooner had I finished waking up, than the phone rang. A lady called me to tell me that my sister and her husband had had an accident on the road. The vehicle they were in had crashed against a rock wall on a curved slope.
My sister came away from the crash with severe injuries and blows to her head. I’m still impressed by the way my mother—or the image of my mother—told me of the accident in the dream, almost at the same moment that it happened.
This event with my sister left me with more questions than answers. One of these questions is: Why did I choose this story to share?
Thank you very much for reading my story,
Javier Guerra Ruiz – Esparza
P.S. I’ve included pictures here of being with animals because they represent moments of great happiness. Since I was a child, I always wanted to be able to connect with and touch these creatures, and being able to be with them is a dream come true. Such a blessing. It’s something I pursued after my mother died—her death inspired me to go for my dreams and follow deep desires for connection and love.
In daily life awareness, we may consider pain and happiness as contrasting and contradictory feelings. However, from a higher state of consciousness, I appreciate pain and happiness as part of a same process, as Octavio Paz said, “The darker the night, the closer the dawn.”
