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Spirit
guides, meditation, astrology, the "higher Self," raising the kundalini,
developing psychic abilities, praying to gurus, astral travel, numerology,
Tarot cards, contacting the dead, hanging out with witches, Sufis, followers
of Muktananda, Rajneesh, Sai Baba, Maharaji, -- all these and more were part
of my journey. How did I get on this path? |
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The
Beginnings |
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I grew up
with an agnostic father and a mother who was raised going to church. My
sister and I had to attend church, because my mother thought that was the right
thing to do, although she did not always go. Due to my father’s job in the
Foreign Service, we moved around a lot, so we ended up in different churches
located overseas and in the |
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That
journey continued through college where I had paranormal experiences, made
friends with someone who said she saw auras, and attended spiritualist
meetings where the ministers received messages from the dead. One bright
sunny |
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The
journey stretched into the 70's when I visited psychics and an astrologer,
and did a lot of reading on the paranormal, and about Hindu and Buddhist
beliefs. I remember reading a book on Vedanta (sect of Hinduism) each morning
in the cafeteria of the building where I worked. I started to see connections
in my life with the colors of the chakras, the seven psychic centers of
energy in the body according to Hindu beliefs. This and other experiences
pushed me into an active plunge into the alluring worlds of the paranormal
and Eastern beliefs. |
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Into the
Fire |
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In an Inner
Light Consciousness class, I was introduced to my "spiritual
master" during a guided visualization. This guide, a spirit being,
looked kind and wise. I felt his presence with me and sometimes saw him in
dreams and meditations until 1990. I also had unpleasant, scary and weird
experiences and visitations, once seeing a tall hooded figure in dark robes
looking at my body in the bed as I hovered out-of-body nearby. Although
extremely frightened by this apparition, I rationalized it by telling myself
that I was being tested. Another time, as I was out-of-body, I not only saw
my body on the bed, but also saw a double of myself floating across from me.
I had spontaneous out-of-body experiences that sometimes kept me from
sleeping and that were also often very eerie. But to me, the paranormal was
spiritual, and spiritual was good. |
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Another
reason I accepted the scary stuff was my attitude. I liked to think I was
tough and nothing could frighten me away. So I would think, “Go ahead, scare
me. I can take it!” I had a lot of anger and defiance in me which probably
came from dealing with an alcoholic parent. This angry defiance proved useful
to me in many ways. It helped me get through a lot of painful situations, and
it was going to help me deal with the bizarre experiences I would face. But
anger and defiance over a long period of time easily turn into cynicism. I
did become cynical although it was usually hidden, even from myself, behind a
desire to help people. This defiant cynicism was my defense, as in “No one is
going to stop me doing what I want; nothing can scare me away; and don’t try
to impress me.” Later, after many occult experiences, the cynicism was
deeper. I knew a lot of people had not done what I had, and I thought most
people were wimps and satisfied with superficial lives, not searching deeply
as I was. But this was my defense against getting hurt or feeling helpless. |
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I also
learned to meditate, do psychic healing, analyze dreams, and chant. It was
mystical and magical. When I first started to do Eastern meditation, I felt
an incredible peace. I felt that I was fading away and merging with something
greater. It seemed I was literally one with the universe, and the teaching
that we are all connected to one force seemed true. After all, I believed
that truth was in experience, and here my experience was confirming that
belief. At last, I thought, I was connecting to that spiritual realm. Later,
my studies took me on many paths -- Tibetan, Hindu and Zen meditation and
philosophy, spirit contact, numerology, psychic development, past life
regression. Reincarnation seemed to answer questions and I experienced what I
thought were memories of past lives. However, it was sad to think that my
next life might not be so great so if I did not learn lessons from this or
previous lives. But why dwell on that? |
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Finally,
it seemed I was on the edge of a hidden wisdom, a truth higher than the
everyday superficial thinking around me. Books by Edgar Cayce, Ruth
Montgomery, Chogyam Trungpa (Tibetan Buddhism), Annie Besant (Theosophy),
Hanz Holzer (ghosts), and Ram Dass (Hinduism/New Age), and titles like Seth Speaks, The Tao of Physics by
Fritjof Capra, The Metaphysical
Dictionary, and Autobiography
of a Yogi by Yogananda began to fill my shelves, along with books
on astrology, tarot cards, numerology, and other occult teachings. My
spiritual progress seemed assured, especially since I was having so many
paranormal experiences. The natural result was that I felt I was an “insider”
in the spiritual realm. |
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Unanswered
Questions |
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Over the
years, my psychic experiences escalated. I studied astrology and took a
7-hour exam on astrology in |
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I noticed
that while doing chart readings for clients, I would “tune in” to the chart
in a paranormal way, during which I felt an energy connecting my mind to the
chart, and felt guided through the chart. It often seemed that I was being
fed information or led to specific things to say about the client. After so many
years of Eastern meditation techniques, I was slipping without effort into an
altered state of consciousness while doing astrology. I gave credit to my
“past lives” as an astrologer and spiritual counselor, to the help of spirit
guides, and to astrology itself. In those years, the only source of such
information could be good since I did not believe in evil. |
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Yet, with
all the knowledge and experience I had acquired, what were the answers? Since
I came to believe there was only ignorance, not evil, stories of vicious
cruelty and murder made me uncomfortable. Though I believed I would be come
back after my death, where would I go in between and for how long? Some
taught that we would go somewhere that was like a school, then choose our
next life. Others taught that we go somewhere to be spiritually purified -
how, it was not explained - then our next life would be chosen for us. By
whom? That was not explained. We were supposed to just trust the process. |
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There was
also the disquieting teaching that whatever thought was in my mind at the
moment of death would determine the after-death experience for some time.
Better not have a bad thought for too long! Better not fall asleep with
fearful images! This was scary to contemplate -- but that contemplation was
itself a negative thought! I would try to chase away these fears by
meditating or chanting something -- maybe the "Hare Krishna" chant
I had taught myself, or repeating a Tibetan Buddhist mantra like "Om
Mani Padme Om." |
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I sought
peace in Zen Buddhism. Trying to detach myself from all desire involved a
meditation that allows thoughts, fears, or desires to come up and then not to
respond to them. This was to be applied to life outside meditation as well.
For someone like myself, carrying a lot of emotional pain from my past and my
present, this was appealing. But though detachment sounded good in all the
books, there was a price to pay. The detachment seemed contrived and
unnatural. Seeing “the emptiness” behind my surroundings, another sign of
spiritual acumen, struck me as nihilistic and depressing. Maybe if I had
pursued these practices more devoutly, I might have gradually replaced my
natural reactions and feelings with non-feeling. But is it human to be
non-feeling, to accept every thought, action, and emotion without judgment? |
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Being
taught to be natural and “holistic” on one hand, but then learning to let go
of my natural reactions on the other, seemed a contradiction. Of course,
rational analysis like this was discouraged, even attacked. Therefore,
contradictions could and should be accepted. If it didn’t make sense, so much
the better. The idea was to transcend the rational mind which was a barrier
between me and enlightenment. Although I failed in achieving detachment, I
clung to the paradoxical teachings of Zen, reading books with Zen tales, and
continuing the meditation. I noticed that the peace I had felt with my
initial meditations had decreased, causing me to meditate more in an attempt
to re-capture that elusive peace. |
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I also
learned that the nature of occult and New Age thinking is that there is no
one answer. There is no one single truth, and there is no one reality. Truth
is based on your experience, so it changes and can differ from person to
person. If there are multi-levels of reality and there is no absolute truth,
then there must be many contradicting truths and realities. In the abstract,
this was fascinating food for thought, and led to being comfortable with
whatever truth I wanted. But on the practical level, what difference did
truth make if one finally discovered it? Or how did we know if there really
was such a thing? And if not, what did anything that anyone believed matter
anyway? These teachings gave answers that only raised more questions. |
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Death and
Love |
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We are
just drops in the ocean, I learned, and the goal is to eventually, after many
lifetimes, rejoin the cosmic oneness that some call God. This God-force was
what we came from and was our final destiny. So that meant my identity,
memories, talents, and personality would be swallowed whole into the cosmic
One. Where would I be? The disturbing answer was that I would no longer be.
Death became an absorbing but uneasy topic for me. |
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The best way
to help others and stay true to your path, I heard and read over and over,
was to work on yourself and love yourself. Although talk of “love” was common
and was taught to be the basis for everything, it also seemed as if everyone
used it to justify whatever they were doing. So, if your husband was not your
spiritual match, then “real love” allowed you to leave him or find another
with whom you had a true bond. After all, this was a “law” of the universe:
the law of love. But this love was not defined. It was just sort of out there
- a love force that pervaded the universe. There was no personal being to
love me; there was this energy coming from the cosmic One and that was it.
Could a force care? |
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Despite
the meditations, trying to live in “the now,” and the talk of love, I
continued to have frightening experiences. One of the worst was waking up to
see an older woman staring at me from the bottom of the bed. I knew she was
not flesh and blood, but a spirit. She did not speak, but I heard her in my mind
say to me, “I am here to take over your body.” Too scared to speak, I said in
my mind, “No! No!” This seemed to go on for a long time, although I have no
idea how long it really was. Finally, she simply faded away. I was left
trembling, perspiring, and my heart racing. By the way, I was not doing
drugs. |
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The
Compulsion |
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An
unexplained compulsion to go to a church gripped me in the spring and summer
of 1990. Since I hated Christianity, churches and Christians by now, this made
me angry. I first ignored this compulsion, then resisted it, and then, after
struggling against it for awhile, I decided to give in, hoping that it would
go away. It was probably from one of my former lives as a priest or monk, I
reasoned. |
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In the opening
minutes of a service in a large church in downtown |
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After
several weeks, I began to feel unclean about astrology although no one in
this open-minded church said anything about it. All I knew was that it was
somehow separating me from this God of love. I then got the impression that
God did not like astrology and wanted me to give it up. Give up my life's
work? Give up my identity and purpose? Outside of my son, nothing was more
important to me than astrology. But I felt I had no choice; it was so clear
to me that God did not like astrology. Not even believing what I was doing, I
decided to give up astrology in late 1990. At the time, I was chairperson of
the curriculum committee, a member of other committees at the astrological
society, and scheduled to teach an upcoming class. I had to find another
teacher. I had to tell clients who called I was no longer an astrologer. (I
did give a talk in February, 1991, after bad advice from a pastor and not
liking what I was doing but not strong enough to get out of it. It took over
a year for full comprehension of what I had been involved in to sink in.) Now
what happens? Thinking I should read the Bible, I started reading in Matthew,
the first book of the New Testament. Reading the Bible put me in touch with
something pure, but I didn't know what it was. Although I had read the Bible
before while growing up and had quoted from it for astrological articles,
this time it was different. I felt as though I was being cleaned from the
inside out as I read it. |
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As Real as
it Gets |
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This
person Jesus fascinated me. It was as though I was learning about Him for the
first time. One evening while reading part of the 8th chapter of Matthew,
right before Christmas of 1990, I saw who Jesus really is. On the boat with
His disciples, a terrible storm arose. The disciples were afraid and woke
Jesus up, telling Him that they were going to perish. Jesus stopped the storm
in its tracks! How? He did not visualize calm waters, He did not perform
sorcery. He rebuked the winds and the sea, and they obeyed him. That means He
has authority over nature. I was separated from God by everything I had done
in my past -- I had lived my whole life based on my will, a will that had
rejected and defied God and His word. I realized that the only way to be
forgiven, the only way to be reconciled with God, was through Jesus, the
God-man who suffered and died for me out of a great and unconditional love. I
realized Jesus is the Savior, He is the Son of God and God the Son. I
understood for the first time why Jesus died on the cross. In those several
minutes sitting on my bed with the Bible, I knew that the truth and the
answer to all my questions were one and the same: Jesus Christ. What a simple
but awesome truth! And so I gave myself to Christ and knew I belonged to Him
from that moment on. Several months later, I found out that a young Christian
man at the part-time job where I worked had been praying for me with a
fellowship group at his church during 1990. |
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Jesus was
different from the masters I had studied. He was more real than the spirit
guides, the Ascended Masters, the Higher Self -- all those airy, elusive
things that gave no evidence of their existence -- because He came to earth
in flesh and He hungered, thirsted, felt pain and sorrow. He did not give a
message that denied the dirt and dust of life, but He sat with the outcasts,
the prostitutes, and the hated tax collectors yet remained sinless. He was as
real as it gets. Though fully man, Jesus was fully God incarnate, equal to
God in nature but setting aside that glory (not deity) to be among suffering
men and women. Jesus Christ willingly was tortured, laid down His life and
died an agonizing death to pay for our sins. He bodily rose on the third day,
conquering death, so that we can have eternal life with God. No sorcerer, no
spiritual master, no Buddha, no shaman, no witch, no psychic has conquered
death, but all still lie cold in their graves. But Jesus has power over death
and is living today. |
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Truth and
Satisfaction |
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Spiritually,
I had been in a grave with the buddhas and the sorcerers and the seekers of wisdom
who had rejected the truth of Christ. The complicated and intricate studies
that had enthralled me, the endless layers of truths and realities I had
pursued, the constant effort to evolve, the paranormal experiences, the need
to believe in one’s own goodness at all costs, were all a maze and a trap.
The truth was simple enough for a child because the truth is a Person. Jesus
did not teach the way or say He had a way. He said that He is the way -- not
a way, but THE way. |
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Many
people want to know if I had to wage spiritual warfare after trusting Christ.
Well, a few months later, as I was about to go forward in a church to
publicly proclaim faith in Christ, I got incredibly ill. When I went home, I
got sicker. I felt an angry presence in the room and I thought it was my
spirit guide. I basically told him I belonged to Christ and there was nothing
he could do about it, that even if I died, it was too late. “You lose,” I
said. I was addressing Satan, although I was really talking to my spirit
guide. I do not believe in doing this now; I do not address demons nor Satan.
They have already been spoken to and defeated by Christ. I prefer to speak to
the ruler of the universe, Jesus Christ. I do not want to give demons any
attention at all. Yes, I have had a few strange attacks that could be
construed as demonic. But I do not like to focus on them. My focus is on the
One who is worthy of attention: Jesus Christ, who has power over all rulers
and principalities, in both the physical and spiritual realms. |
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What is
the biggest difference between my former life and my life in Christ? That I
am happier, that life is easier? Not at all. The difference is that I am
spiritually satisfied. There is more to learn and much room to grow, but the
learning and growth spring from Christ as the foundation, not from a search
outside Him. The search has ended; the thirst has been quenched; the hunger
within has been filled. |
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Jesus
Speaks |
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"I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the
Father except through me," - John 14:6. |
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"But whoever drinks of the water that I shall give him shall
never thirst; but the water that I shall give him shall become in him a well
of water springing up to eternal life." - John 4:14 |
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"I am the bread of life; he who comes to Me shall not hunger, and
he who believes in Me shall never thirst." - John 6:35 |
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"And Jesus came up and spoke to them, saying, 'All authority has
been given to Me in heaven and on earth.'" - Matthew 28:18 |
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"Here I am! I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my
voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with him, and he with
me." - Revelation 3:20 |
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Marcia Montenegro |
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E-mail: cana2000@erols.com |