Visions

I have stark memories of my childhood, most of them beautiful - of smoky, orange sunsets; crickets singing into the night; a tempestuous, murky ocean; large sails on junk ships; dragon boat racing; and Buddhist temples decorating peaceful gardens. All this was a tapestry woven alongside architecturally impressive Roman Catholic churches where nuns sang as they played their guitars.
     Macau was a stunning place to grow up in the late seventies and early eighties. Nature was everywhere. Spirit was everywhere. And the bustle of a rapidly growing world was also everywhere.
     In those early years, I carried a secret I never told anyone: I dreamt of a Native American man who stood tall and wore his hair in a plait. He was with me every night, whispering important things - tales of free will and destiny; stories of purpose and mission.
     "Always call on the snakes - they are your medicine; they will protect you." He was referring to the shadow men that stoked my fear. They came at night, too, and stood by the window sill, whispering things of their own - stories of abduction and lessons that needed learning. They wanted to take me away. I didn't want to go. "The snakes will protect you." And they did.
     I grew up on a tiny island surrounded by water. The horizon across the sea always reminded me of a home I could not fully remember, but knew was there. I loved swimming - the ocean wrapping its arms around me in comfort and nurture. Waves of future consciousness can be found in the liquid waves that protect the earth.
     My mind was often filled with visions, and those visions would translate into words, and occasionally, there would also be words with no visions - usually when a message was urgent: "Be calm. You are safe. You are safe." And my five-year-old self was rescued from drowning in the waves that day, just as the voice said. I was safe. Trust and belief in whatever "Spirit" was, came easily to me.
     I first sensed Spirit in a crystal cave in Portugal just before I was one year old, as I heard stalactites drip and I held onto stalagmites so my still-clumsy feet would not lose their balance as I practiced how to walk. Spirit left me a vision that day in the form of my first memory which I have never forgotten: an ice-carved Snow White, dead in her glass casket having swallowed the poisoned apple, waiting for love to trigger her rebirth. It was a vision of hope. It was a vision of trust. It was a vision of ascension.