Seeing the Bigger Picture
A Woman's Trust in Divine Spirit Leads to a Spiritual Healing
By LH
When I was sixteen years old, my parents bought a motorized bike for us kids to share. Overconfident in our skills, my brothers and sisters and I rode the bike at only one speed—full-throttle. We wanted to go as fast as possible.
One day, I decided to ride the moped to sports practice. It had been raining, and the sand I rode in was soft. But that didn't slow me down.
As I was coming around a wide curve, the gym bag I had strapped to my back began to slip. When I turned to grab the slipping bag, the bike began to fishtail wildly out of control. I struggled to stay upright.
Then I heard a calm inner voice say, "Let go, or things are going to be much worse."
I did, and the next thing I knew, I was sliding in the sand until I came to an abrupt halt. Immediately I got up and walked around. I didn't seem to be injured. A kind neighbor who witnessed the accident drove me and the bike home.
When I got there, I refused to let anyone take me to the hospital. I didn't want to believe the accident was serious.
But my father noticed something was wrong with my neck. I couldn't stand up straight. He quickly lifted me up into the air by the back of my neck.
Suddenly, I had full range of motion again. After that, everything seemed fine, and we all believed I had walked away from the accident injury-free.
But over the years, little problems began to emerge. I began to fall down frequently. Then I developed pains in my arms and had constant headaches. The problems didn't seem connected, and I just learned to live with the pain and discomfort.
Eventually, I found the teachings of Eckankar and began practicing the spiritual exercises. The techniques I learned showed me how to listen to the whispers of Divine Spirit.
One day, I had an inner nudge to do a particular spiritual exercise. I imagined the ECK, the Holy Spirit, filling my being from my head to my toes. As I opened myself completely to Its loving flow, I imagined Divine Spirit clearing away any blockages I had within me. I practiced this exercise every day for a while.
A short time later, I developed bronchitis twice in one month. During the second bout of illness, I was coughing quite a bit.
During one coughing fit, an intense burst of pain shot down my arms. It felt as if someone had hit me hard in the back of my neck. I found I couldn't move my arms without pain for twenty-four hours.
I decided to see a health professional. I told her my entire medical history, including the accident on the motorbike. She agreed it was unusual for someone to be sick that often and sent me for an MRI.
The test revealed the motorbike accident had actually broken my neck. Now, twenty-eight years later, a calcium deposit from the healed break was interfering with my spinal cord. I needed surgery to repair it.
It made me nervous to think about having surgery so close to my spinal cord. But I knew the Mahanta would be there for me and I needed to trust him. He had gotten me this far and would help me get through the rest.
On the day of the surgery, things went very quickly. I had the surgery done at nine, and I was up and walking by noon! By five o'clock that night, I was home. And although I was on pain medication, I needed very little. The ECK took care of everything. My healing is ongoing. I still have pain, but every day I feel a little bit better.
When I step back to look at the bigger picture, I can see how the Mahanta and the ECK had been protecting me all my life.
From the inner nudge to "let go" during the motorbike accident to the second bout of bronchitis that led me to the real cause behind all my medical problems, the ECK has always been there to help me.
Seeing the bigger picture, I see only divine love. I feel so grateful to know the Mahanta is always with me. He loves and protects me, and always encourages me to take another step closer to God.
Excerpted from the 2010 Eckankar Journal, copyright © 2009 ECKANKAR. All rights reserved.
