This is my no-holds barred essay that only I can write. I say that for a reason. I am the only one that knows me. Knows my unique way to responding to life. And I know it so well that I am ready to turn it in for the Christ Consciousness. It has been there all along just waiting for me to surrender. And I can only do it one moment at a time.

Because I have been studying my own consciousness for so long, I know when the subtlest changes take place. I know how dense I am and how likely I am to protect myself when I should be tearing down the walls.

Here’s the deal. When I first began to write, I bled all over the internet. Freely and to good effect. People were glad to feel their own reactions to my words. Well, there was one area where it did not go over well and that was in non-duality. People were so anxious to escape their stories. And yet when a story is unfolding, it cannot be ignored.

My child had died. I had a good twenty years to heal and then my husband began to die in the same way that she had. And I was out of gas. All I could do was push myself to keep on keeping on. Now I see how brave I was called on to be. To take my dog to be put down while a dying spouse looked sadly out the window. To celebrate Christmas two days after we buried my husband. On and on.

This is the tenth year of his passing and I can finally say I am doing fine. Or “almost doing fine,” as I said in a recent poem. I can never be sure of anything again.

I just read something that Jeff Foster wrote about dying. Jeff and I understand death very well. It is perhaps the greatest teacher. It asks us to die to ourselves. On some level that has happened to me. I know that my own physical death will happen when it happens and I will have no control over it.

In the meantime I live a simple quiet life. I have found my group of friends at long last. I love them. They play music and chant the names of God. I never grow tired of that.

Vicki Woodyard