The “Just One Night” story that changed my life

I have been in the coaching business since the mid-eighties and I generally felt happy after I did a good job imparting some insights and practical applications for a client’s take away. However there was this occasion when I felt I was being counselled by Someone else (but I pocketed the money just the same for myself); a Source of Intelligence much smarter than myself. This knowledge was clear because I had to decipher the given message for my own understanding. So here it is:

More than two decades ago, I received a phone call from overseas while I was working at my Wellness Centre. This person said I came highly recommended and she would like to travel to Australia to have several sessions with me. She arrived and shared how she had attempted to kill herself several times as she felt she had committed a sin so great that to die would be the only solution to repaying a life for a life. Many professional people had failed to help her up to that point.

I recognised that any advice I could provide would seem meaningless as she had heard them all before - so I silently (and desperately) called out for “Divine Help”. Why “divine” you might ask; because experiences have told me that pockets of pain exist so deep in our human psyche that only the Divine has the ability to touch and heal. As a coach, I often feel that I am just being “used” as an instrument - a piece of plumbing/piping if you like, to allow the energy of love, wisdom and compassion to flow through but I am not the embodiment of Love itself.

It came to me as a surprise when I felt the impulse to ask her to show me her children’s photos (she had four beautiful children)....good move, I uttered to myself, I really needed to buy some time here, but whatever is coming out next would be anyone’s guess.

Now these words would “appear” without me quite knowing what would follow next, can you imagine how embarrassing it would be to stop half way through a sentence and have no idea how to attach more words to it, but I needed not to worry so much:

….. and I heard myself saying

“Can you forward your life to say eight years from now but you are dead as you killed yourself but now living in Heaven. You can see that your eldest daughter has just given birth to a baby boy but she is not coping due to lack of sleep. How she wishes her mother is here to help her as at a time like this only a mother can fill the gap.

You hear her plea so you go straight to God/Divine Source begging Him/Her to allow you to go back to earth for JUST ONE NIGHT so you can calm and feed the baby allowing your daughter to catch up with some sleep. You are not greedy as you realise that you can offer so much love and support even within so short a time”.

Dead silence we were facing and you could have heard a pin drop. The coach was now in trouble; “what does that mean?” I asked of myself and hoping that the client did not notice my eyes rolling heavenward for the answer.

She kept on repeating these three words “JUST ONE NIGHT” like a mantra and started to weep. She shared that this new insight seems to be the truest Truth she has ever known (but now can remember) and commented that I must be the best therapist on earth. Little did she know I had nothing much to do with this. She said that she had never looked at life in this perspective before (nor did I) and assured me that with these three words, she felt HEALED. She cancelled all the following sessions and took a plane home that evening pining for her four little kids waiting at home for her.

I was relieved about the cancellations as this powerful message of Love could only be felt and needed no further words. She did become a grandmother of a baby boy many years after that as she informed me in a postcard.

So what is this message trying to show us? I think it has to do with how we can find our motivation to live even though the burden of guilt (as in this case) has become unbearable. It is about choices, choosing to forgive ourselves and focus our life energy to help others. It is also about “living in the moment”, doing our best and being contented with that. I felt at that “sacred” instant, this young mum understood that her unique gifts meant something and that her “giving” mattered.

What has this story has to do with “stress” then? A lot really because my past unwillingness to acknowledge my unique gifts (due to false humility, laziness and fear) so to utter a “YES” to contributing my part to the whole have caused me stress. I often attempted to cover the hole within by engaging in things that were going against the grain. We are capable to consciously and deliberately creating opportunities and possibilities to extend that “something” only we alone can give.  When we resonate with our heart’s yearning, the “doing” becomes almost effortless as we are placing ourselves in the “zone”. Have you ever tried to push a square peg into a round hole?

Someone once shared:

Happiness is not so much in having as sharing.

We make a living by what we get,

But we make a life by what we give.

Hope you like this story. I will share more stories next time, remember to keep on telling  yourself positive and uplifting stories every day of your life. You deserve them. Thanks for reading my blog.