11:12 p.m., May 25, 2015

I was suddenly awakened by what sounded like an alarm – a sharp, ring and it sounded like it was right above my head – but when I instantly awakened, Seurat was quietly asleep, next to my legs – and Frida in the other room wasn’t stirring either. It was only an alarm for me. I glanced at the digital clock – and saw it was 11:12 – and thought that probably it had been exactly 11:11 when the alarm sounded – and the numbers were ‘message from Frank worthy’. I got up and it was cool inside – rain lightly falling on the roof. Frank’s soft red shirt was perfect when I sat down to prepare myself for listening to Frank. I figured he had a message since this time he had awakened me with an alarm. Settling into my chair – bare feet flat on the floor, back cushion adjusted for comfort as well as writing readiness, fingers lightly touching the keyboard ready . Deep deep breaths with long exhales and I noted hesitancy in myself this time. I was not ready for Frank to leave and I hoped this wasn’t a farewell message. Just as quickly, I decided it wasn’t my job to try to direct or hope anything… I was just the messenger. The transcriber. Several minutes passed as I pushed aside extraneous thoughts and finally reached the place where I could be open and mind quiet.

Dearest Jan – yes, I wanted to talk with you. Right now it is important to me that you really understand how connected we are – that you see that we are as close now as we were in life. I know you do – but often because you do not actually see with your eyes, you believe I am gone. I woke you with a sound , just as if I woke you by touching you in the night. I was there just now with the presence of Frida, touching you. I am there in the sound of the rain on the roof – I am all of these and in the shirt – my shirt that you are wearing. I am right here right now with you in so many ways.   Do you see how rich and full your life is now? It is. Think back over the fourteen months since I passed over and see how you have grown, who you are now. I am so very proud of you. Me? I am growing, too – and it is as if I am in class every day here. I meet teachers who are taking me to the deepest realms of learning and experiencing what it is to be complete and filled with the energy and life force of love. I have learned that there are no limits to our life force – not death, not change, not endings, not space. There are no limits. I know it is hard for you to understand what I mean so I have to image myself as I was to you – but oh, dear Jan, it is so much greater than any can imagine. Still, it is life – the repetition of the days, of time, of routine, of plans that are like a steady drum beat for you. Think of life as that drum roll….getting you ready for an anthem here beyond – a brilliant symphony. Try not to criticize yourself for the time you think you waste – with resting, with playing solitaire or half sleeping in the day…the times you are awake are spent working hard – helping others, reaching out, being with your animals, caring for others…and you need to see that all of that is energy. You are doing useful work and truly monitoring your negative thoughts and actively changing them – that is work. That is effort – and that is part of your drum roll days. I woke you to tell you how wonderfully you are doing now and how very proud of you I am. We have both progressed in the past fourteen months from where we were, and both of us are experiencing what it mans to be fulfilled. See it. do you hear Sage? Your animals are so in touch with you. It makes me smile to see that you are now feeling it – the power of this incredible life force of love. We are truly one, dearest Jan – and we are embraced by all souls, all life, all consciousness. You are now living what Raphael directed – you are conscious, and it means that you now are living it and feeling it. And I feel very close to you and important in helping you now to understand it because I can see it from an even greater perspective – beyond the limitations of the earth existence.   And I love you , dear Jan – with all of my heart and soul and consciousness.

Suddenly I got it. The difficulty I sometimes had around the inter-connectedness idea of consciousness was the difficulty I found in feeling connected to some people in my life. I thought about them. My irritation with my neighbors below would get in the way. My anger with a certain ExPat who appeared to be meddling in my life got in the way. My desperation over the loss of my friend that betrayed me.  At first I couldn’t accept it (denial), and then, when I did – I reacted by banishing him completely from my life and mind and heart. He had gotten in the way.

To fully embrace consciousness I needed to believe in and as much as is possible – feel my interconnection to all the others around me, including those I didn’t particularly feel good about in the current moment. My question to myself was how to do this and the answer also came from Frank. He asked me not to criticize myself for the times during the day when I believed I was ‘wasting time’ . Suddenly I saw the parallel. The key to seeing my inter-connectedness with everyone in my life was to embrace all the parts of myself – even those parts I secretly despised. Okay… and not to just say it – Do it.

Consciousness was a huge concept – and not one that I would be able to embrace easily. But I could come back to Raphael’s words and Frank’s directions…