I sometimes receive email from people, or do readings for people, where they believe they were trapped or in the wrong place, and they want information on how to get out of that wrong place into the right place. Or, people want to know what "the truth" is—how to sort it out from all the bewildering morass of often-conflicting information that is out there. They turn to me, a psychic, because they feel that I could help them better than they could help themselves.
However, although I will offer information and guidance as led by my own inner sense and inner knowing, I tell people that they have it within themselves to access this information as well. Yes, it is helpful to consult with others you trust to help affirm your own inner sense of knowing, but ultimately it is up to you to decide what is true for yourself. Once you develop that inner sense of knowing, you can read news reports and "feel" or "know" what parts are true (if any), and what parts are lies. You can listen to what others say to you and sense whether they have integrity or whether something "feels wrong" about them. You can even find yourself driving down a road and suddenly know that you need to turn and go in another direction—perhaps avoiding an accident that you would otherwise have experienced, or perhaps ending up in the right place at the right time for something good to happen to you or for you to be able to help someone else.
I do not believe that any of us are in the wrong place. We are where we are because of one of two choices we have made:
- Your greater soul (or self) and you as yourself in this lifetime or in a span of lifetimes both think it is the place for you.
- Or you (again, as yourself in this lifetime or in a span of lifetimes), in opposition to your greater soul, have decided to be there.
Either way, you are where you are because of choices you have made. There are no victims.
What Is Your Greater Self?
What is your greater self? It is nothing more than a wider expression of your greater existence. It is not something apart from you or some soul or group of souls that have ulterior motives or bad intentions toward you. Instead, you and your greater self are one, and your greater self, at least, has only good intentions toward you. (It is possible for a person to have bad intentions toward themselves, but normally that arises out of having condemned themselves for wrongdoing. See my discussion later on our inner sense of right and wrong.)
To explain this by analogy, think of your emotions. Your emotions each represent a part of you. None of your emotions by themselves represent the totality that is you. When you are angry, you are still yourself—you are just expressing an angry aspect of yourself. When you are happy or sad or pensive, you are still, always, yourself—you are just expressing a particular aspect of yourself.
Just so, your expression as yourself on this earth is a part of your greater self. That greater self that exists outside of time is a single entity that has certain goals for its spiritual development and growth. It expresses itself into time to attain those goals. (And yes, it uses the same body each time—a body made of light and energy. This fact, coupled with the fact that each incarnation is an expression of a single entity, is why it is possible to both incarnate many times and still be the same person. This also explains why it is that we resemble our selves in different lifetimes, whether we are male or female in those lifetimes. The outward body that we perceive is just an expression of who we are being in our most physical existence, not who we are as a totality of being.)
So I, Marina, am a part of my greater self. There might also be a “John” in AD 1776 in colonial America who is an expression of that greater self, and a “Samuel” in AD 1864 who is an expression of that greater self, and so on. Each of those incarnations is an expression of my greater self. Regardless of their outward earthly accomplishments, none of them is any more important or powerful than the others. All are in touch with each other through dreams and through their connection with the reality of that greater self as it exists outside of time, and all share in the overall purposes and intentions of the greater self.
Unremembering
However, once a part of the greater self is expressed into time and space, things become a little more difficult, because the individual expression doesn’t necessarily see the “big picture,” and may lose touch with that inner sense of guidance that tells it whether it is on the right track. This can happen because the individual expression allowed cultural programming or peer pressure from others to override its awareness of its connection with its greater self.
For example, many parents tell children, when those children speak of other lifetimes, that they are lying or speaking nonsense or making it up. Eventually, the child may decide to side with the parent rather than trust itself, and hence lose track of those memories and thus the awareness of its greater reality. (And it is a decision the child makes—not something the child is forced to do. The child also has other choices, such as the choice to remember the other lifetimes but to stop speaking of them to those who can't be trusted to honor their sense of knowing.)
Other ways we choose to disregard the messages that are available to us are to ignore our dreams in the belief that they are somehow wrong or an aberration of some sort, rather than one of the principle ways we experience the greater reality we all reside within.
Or, the individual expression rebels and says that it wants to go its own way. In other words, ideally, both your greater self and you as you are on earth in this moment have decided for you to be in the same place and situation, but there are times when we rebel against the advice of our greater self, and then we are not in harmony with what is ultimately our best and happiest path. In those cases, we can end up in situations where we feel that we are drowning or spinning out of control and we can’t seem to get help or find our way out. Often, those situations were not part of the original plan of our greater self.
I have even, on occasion, done readings for people where they have so rejected the internal guidance and advice from their greater self that their greater self has also turned its back on them until they decide on their own to return to being a part of their own greater self. This is extremely rare, and I was startled the first time I encountered it, but it also affirms one of the basic truths of the universe: No one can be coerced to do anything they do not want to do, no matter how “good” for them the would-be-coercer thinks it will be.
The answer to this problem is simple: Get back in communication with your greater self. This is easier said than done, and often requires outside help, such as from a psychic or other kind of teacher, to be able to make the initial re-connection. However, as with many things, practice and intention will make this re-connection happen more and more clearly and frequently. Being open to messages coming to you in odd forms, such as words on a billboard or the radio or even on someone's license plate, can help. Also, being aware of your dreams can greatly increase your ability to connect with your greater reality. (For a good overview of what dreams are and how to remember them and relate to them more clearly, read Dreams For Dummies, by Penney Peirce and Carol Adrienne. Don't be put off by the title!)
More Guidance Is Available: Our Inner Sense of Right and Wrong
In addition to the guidance and information that is available to us when we are in harmony and communication with our greater self, we each have within us a sense of inner right and wrong that tells us when we are behaving in a way that is right for us, and when we are not. This sense of right and wrong is an individual thing—what we feel is the right thing to do may seem wrong to others, but we know in our hearts that it is right for us.
Or, as Mark Twain so aptly put it, “It is agreed, in this country, that if a man can arrange his religion so that it perfectly satisfies his conscience, it is not incumbent on him to care whether the arrangement is satisfactory to anyone else or not.”
It is my belief that this sense of right and wrong is a part of our own internal moral compass, not necessarily a thing that has to do with our greater self.
It is also my experience that we all know perfectly well when we have listened to this inner voice, and when we have not, without needing any outside guidance or advice. The more we act against our inner guidance, the more frantic and trapped we feel, as we see the results of our choices come crashing down around us. It is difficult to say to ourselves that we will just start making things right, as facing the consequences of admitting to our own wrongdoing can sometimes be an overwhelming and frightening task.
If you are feeling trapped or out of place, then both the most difficult and the easiest thing to do is to ask yourself whether you have been behaving in accordance with what your inner guidance or inner sense of rightness has advised you to do. You don’t need a psychic to tell you the answer to that. It is difficult because it is hard to face up to our choices that were not made in integrity. It is easiest because it feels good to face up to the truth inside ourselves and to vow to do differently in the future.
If this is not the case, then the next step is to contact your greater self to see what it has to say to you. It is best to try to create that contact on your own, as this is a very personal thing between yourself and your greater self. However, if you cannot or don’t wish to initiate that contact on your own, then a good psychic should be able to help you get in touch with your greater self.
Just always remember that even when you are in touch with your greater self, it is a part of you just as you are a part of it, and you have as much say as it does. If you have questions or wish to challenge some course of action you think it is requiring, by all means go ahead and do so. You may get more information that will help you better understand the situation, or you may get a change of course as a result of your request. Just remember that one thing your greater self has that you do not is a greater perspective and a lot more information: It is possible that what doesn't make sense to you makes a whole lot of sense for your overall spiritual development.