Dr. N: How do you manage to hold each other with no bodies?
S: (with a sigh of exasperation at me) We envelop each other in light, of course.
Dr. N: Tell me what that is like for spirits?
S: Like being wrapped in a bright-light blanket of love.
Dr. N: I see, then ....
S: (subject interrupts with a high pitched laugh of recognition) Tim! ... it's my brother-he died so young (a drowning accident at age fourteen in her last life). It's so wonderful to see him here. (subject waves her arm) And there is my best girl friend Wilma-from next door-we are laughing together over boys like we did while sitting up in her attic.
Dr. N: (after subject mentions her aunt and a couple of other friends) What do you think determines the sequence of how all these people come here to greet you?
S: (pause) Why, how much we all mean to each other-what else?
Dr. N: And with some, you have lived many lives, while with others perhaps only one or two?
S: Yes ... I have been with my husband the most.
Dr. N: Do you see your guide around anywhere?
S: He is here. I see him floating off to the side. He knows some of my friends, too ...
Dr. N: Why do you call your guide a "him?"
S: We all show what we want of ourselves. He always relates to me with a masculine nature. It's right and very natural.
Dr. N: And does he watch over you in all your lives?
S: Sure, and after death too ... here, and he is always my protector.
Our reception committee is planned in advance for us as we enter the spirit world. This case demonstrates how uplifting familiar faces can be to the incoming younger soul. I find there are a different number of entities waiting in greeting parties after each life. Although the meeting format varies, depending on a soul's special needs, I have learned there is nothing haphazard about our spiritual associates knowing exactly when we are due and where to meet us upon our arrival in the spirit world.
Frequently, an entity who is significant to us will be waiting a little in front of the others who want to be on hand as we come through the gateway. The size of welcoming parties not only changes for everyone after each life, but is drastically reduced to almost nothing for more advanced souls where spiritual comfort becomes less necessary. Case 9, at the end of this chapter, is an example of this type of spiritual passage.
Cases 6 and 7 both represent one of the three ways newly arrived souls are received back into the spirit world. These two souls were met shortly after death by a principal entity, followed by others of decreasing influence. Case 7 recognized people more quickly than Case 6. When we meet such spirits in a gathering right after our death, we find they have been spouses, parents, grandparents, siblings, uncles, aunts, cousins, and dear friends in our past lives. I have witnessed some gut-wrenching emotional scenes with my clients at this stage of their passage.
The emotional meetings which take place between souls at this interval in a spiritual passage are only a prelude to our eventual placement within a specific group of entities at our own maturity level. These meetings provide another emotional high for a subject in superconscious recall. Spiritual organizational arrangements, involving how groups form and are cross-matched with other entities, will be described in subsequent chapters.
For the present, it is important we understand welcoming entities may notbe part of our own particular learning group in the spirit world. This is because all the people who are close to us in our lives are not on the same developmental level. Simply because they choose to meet us right after death out of love and kindness does not mean they will all be part of our spiritual learning group when we arrive at the final destination of this journey.
For instance, in Case 6, Uncle Charlie was clearly a more advanced soul than my subject and may even have been serving in the capacity of a spiritual guide. It was evident to me that one of the primary tasks of Uncle Charlie's soul was to help Case 6 as a child in the life just ended, and his responsibility continued right after my subject's death. With Case 7, the important first contact was Larry, a true soulmate on the same level as this subject. Notice also in Case 7, that my subject's spiritual guide was not conspicuous among her former relatives and friends. However, as the scene unfolded, there were indications of a spiritual guide orchestrating the whole meeting process while remaining in the background. I see this in many cases.
The second manner in which we are met right after death involves a quiet, meaningful encounter with one's spiritual guide where no one else is revealed in the immediate vicinity, as in Case 5. Case 8 further illustrates this sort of meeting. What type of after-death meeting we do experience appears to involve the particular style of our spiritual guide along with requisites of our individual character. I find the duration of this first meeting with our guides does vary after each life depending upon the circumstances of that life.
Case 8 shows the very close relationships people have with their spiritual guides. Many guides have strange sounding names, while others are rather conventional. I find it interesting that the old-fashioned religious term of having a "guardian angel" is now used metaphysically to denote an empathetic spirit. To be honest, this is a term I once denigrated as being foolishly loaded with wishful thinking and representing an out-dated mythology at odds with the modern world. I don't have that belief anymore about guardian angels.
I am repeatedly told that the soul itself is androgynous, and yet, in the same breath, clients declare sex is not an unimportant factor. I have learned all souls can and do assume male and female mental impressions toward other entities as a form of identity preference. Cases 6 and 7 show the importance of the newly arrived soul in seeing familiar "faces" identified by gender. This is also true of the next case. Another reason why I selected Case 8 is to indicate how and why souls choose to visually appear in human form to others in the spirit world.
Case 8
Dr. N: You have just started to actually leave the Earth's astral plane now, and are moving further and further into the spirit world. I want you to tell me what you feel.
S: The silence ... so peaceful ...
Dr. N: Is anyone coming to meet you?
S: Yes, it's my friend Rachel. She is always here for me when I die.
Dr. N: Is Rachel a soulmate who has been with you in other lives, or is she someone who always remains here?
S: (with some indignation) She doesn't always stay here. No, she is with me a lot-in my mind-when I need her. She is my own guardian (said with possessive pride).
Note: The attributes of guides as differentiated from soulmates and other supportive entities will be examined in Chapter Eight.
Dr. N: Why do you call this entity a "she"? Aren't spirits supposed to be sexless?
S: That's right-in a literal way, because we are capable of both attributes. Rachel wants to show herself to me as a woman for the visual knowing and it is a mental thing as well with her.
Dr. N: Are you locked into male or female attributes during your spiritual existence?
S: No. As souls there are periods in our existence when we are more inclined toward one gender than another. Eventually, this natural preference evens out.
Dr. N: Would you describe how Rachel's soul actually looks to you at this moment?
S: (quietly) A youngish woman ... as I remember her best ... small, with delicate features ... a determined expression on her face ... so much knowledge and love.
Dr. N: Then you have known Rachel on Earth?
S: (responding with nostalgia) Once, long ago, she was close to me in life ... now she is my guardian.
Dr. N: And what do you feel when you look at her?