Head in Heaven

Book summary You have to get used to this!” I heard a voice say. I trembled as I experienced a presence at the right side of my dinner table. I managed to stay put, playing the guest-just-having-a-dinner role. I more or less rushed to my room when dinner was over. “What is this?” I thought. “You have to get used to this!” I heard again. Then I got a peaceful, personal explanation of how this cooperation will be done; me in a physical body on Earth and he being on the other side bringing higher frequencies and wider perspectives. It was now the third time the voice said: “You have to get used to this!” This time my answer came from all of me, clearly and determined. “Yes!!!”

In this personal way Barbro is sharing her inner journey with us. Time has come, she says, when we need to be more open about these kinds of experiences. In my practice, she continues, I have met many, who like me before, keep hiding away what is the greatest gift in their life. They do not want to be ridiculed as is often the case even in our open society. Barbro claims that today, we cannot a_ ord being ruled by this. We are facing a time in history, when we as human beings are on our way to destroy our beautiful home, our planet. It is urgent that as many as possible of us focus in our hearts and passion taking us beyond our survival strategies based on fear. Daring to receive unconditional love from beyond will be our greatest gift in opening our hearts. Although she is following her own intimate path, Barbro has been applying her gift in everyday life as a psychologist, organizational consultant and a Gestalt therapist since the 1970s. She believes in the power of the group and has great faith in what people are able to accomplish when and if they build their co-operation on trust and true intention. Among other things - this is what she teaches in her professional life.

Head in Heaven

by Barbro Curman

www.lightspira.com

Published by LightSpira, Sweden www.lightspira.com ISBN 978-91-86613-07-5 First issue, 2011 Author: Barbro Curman www.neweranet.org Cocreators: Åsa Rosén, art design Fabian Björnstjerna, photographs Jenny Widingsjö, photo postproduction Marie Örnesved, LightSpira, editing Kim Farnell, proof reading Recito Förlag/Förlagsservice.se, book design © Barbro Curman

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The calling

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I am finally on my way and am at Madrid airport waiting at the gate to board the plane to Palma, Mallorca. The pattern of going away now and then to spend some time alone has begun again. Everyday life is often so intense that I can’t hear the little voice from inside; there is too much disturbance. That does not mean that there is anything wrong with everyday life, quite the contrary, but I think most people need a break every now and then to be in silence.

The vague feeling of longing has been my inner lighthouse.

It has been stronger during those times when I have gone off track, and also during times when I have been at the gate to a new stage in my life journey. My inner longing has intensified on those occasions and I have had to take action of some kind, or I would have been untrue to myself. The process was tougher when I was younger. Now I know more and I respond without waiting too long.

The very special inner journey that I am now about to tell you about began five years ago. I had started to make daily notes of what was happening in my life. I remember taking my first stumbling steps towards listening to my inner voice and when I now read my notes I recall the whole situation. I woke up hearing a clear and urgent voice saying, “TELL THY TRUTH!” It was very early in the morning and I was in our lovely summer cottage by the shore of the Swedish west coast. My husband was sleeping beside me. The call was persistent and I took my brand new notebook and went to another room to be by myself.

I remember asking myself: “What is this?”

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Then I remembered the dream from which I had woken that morning. I was one of many prisoners walking in a very hot desert. We were chained together and had chains around our necks. I could clearly see the iron rings. Every one of us had our hands and feet tightly bound. My surroundings that morning were beautiful and in sharp contrast to my dream and inner state of mind. I was full of despair as I did not want to face the truth of what people did to each other. I was crying but without tears. What could I do? What can a single woman do about the cruelty and ignorance that has always been an integral part of us human beings? The voice returned. “TELL THY TRUTH!” I realised that there has always been part of my life that I have hesitated to share with others. Why? I guess I was afraid of being ridiculed, afraid of being looked at in a critical and scornful way. I was afraid that my inner treasures would be destroyed.

That was, of course, due to the doubtful and critical part of me.

I was a capable, organised woman, soon to be sixty years old, and used to keeping things together, both in my family and my working life. Like many people, I was afraid of losing control, despite all the years I’d spent in the therapy and organisational development businesses.

That morning I cried out in despair and was heard. Along with the words: “Tell thy truth!!!” came a wave of heat into my solar plexus. That heat gave me strength and hope. It was time to make crucial life decisions!

“Sing your song – your own,” the voice reminded me during the next two nights. And I received instructions as to how I could start organising a new professional life now I had left everything that I had been part of building and leading for thirty years.

Here I am now at Madrid airport several years later. In my heavy suitcase, besides some books that are dear to me, are all my handwritten notebooks dating back to that first night in July 2004. I had to pay for excess baggage but I knew it was worth every Swedish krona.

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Sitting here by the gate I again hear an inner voice: “Maybe your fear is heavier than your books?” Sometimes this voice is just too much to the point. Quite correct! How come that I still fear sharing my spiritual life with others?

I bring to mind one of my earliest childhood memories. I was sitting in my room with the huge family Bible in front of me.

Although I was only four or five years old I was fascinated by the book, its size, the special drawings in it and mystical air around it. This was the first time I’d heard an unexpected inner voice. It came clearly from my left side, like it was coming out of the wall. There were no real words, just a loving wordless presence. Already, as a little child, I knew that this was the presence of Jesus Christ.

Although I am privileged, coming as I do from a loving and open family, I did not share this experience with anyone, until I met the person I used to call my spiritual brother. I was thirty and he was thirty-five. There was a special connection between us that was the foundation for almost thirty years of creative work together. He died in October, 2003. Five of us were with him at the time. When he took his last breath, there was light in the room. It felt as if a bird had been set free.

My thoughts return to airport practicalities and my need to show a ticket to prove that I had paid for the extra weight at Stockholm airport. I start worrying that my suitcase won’t arrive in Palma. It is again this need for control! Suddenly, I see the smiling face of my spiritual brother. “Oh, you brought your camping wagon!” he said as he looked at my big suitcase. He himself was carrying hardly more than a plastic bag.

It is interesting how dealing with small details like a ticket can grow into such an important matter. Being the good girl I am, I showed my ticket as I reached the first place in line. The woman at the desk just looked at it and tore it apart. So much for its importance.

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Yesterday had been a strange day. In the morning I finished planning a crisis management seminar for managers. I went to the office to say goodbye to my colleagues and I got warm hugs and good wishes for my trip to Mallorca. On the quiet street outside the office a car zoomed by at extreme speed, driving against the red light and being chased by a police car. I was a couple of metres away from being hit and so was another woman. We looked at each other. There had been a spectacular helicopter robbery in Stockholm the day before where they’d entered a deposit vault from the roof of a building. My guess was that there was a link.

I imagined how people could have been killed by this car. What if a child had stepped out? What kind of world is this? Surely enough, just a couple of blocks ahead, they crashed. I was in shock and walked the streets like a zombie.

My mobile rang. “Coming tomorrow? I will pick you up at the airport and drive you to Puerto de Andratx.”

“Do you really have time?” I asked my friend Johannes, who was working as a doctor in his private practice in Palma. “Of course.”

The contrast was so huge that warm tears came. I was still trembling, when I returned home to my husband Mikael. I was frozen, touched, and eager to tell him what had happened. We shared a nice dinner. Then I disappeared into a state between sleep and meditation. As I had so many other times during the last five years, I woke up filled with a new, fresh energy and ready to pack.

Later that night I couldn’t sleep. A new wave of energies came to me and a voice said: “Don´t forget that you are carried!” Those words made me totally calm. I slept for two or three hours and was ready to go. Again I learnt that I am taken care of. My task is to make myself available and inspire others to do the same.

The rest is cared for by life itself.

I am finally in Puerto de Andratx, Mallorca! What a gift to be here. I am on what for a couple of weeks I can consider to be, “my” terrace. There is a big flower growing there (called a bou21

gainvillea) with magenta coloured flowers that are like honey to your eyes. When I sent a text message to the woman from whom I was renting the apartment, and thanked her for her welcome, I also asked if there was anything I should take special care of. “Nothing right now, except please, just water the flower!” was her answer. I am myself like a flower needing water. Two months of hard work. Now it is time to be still, enjoy, listen to the silence and open myself for what life wishes to tell me. And to day by day to read all my notebooks and trace the wisdom I have been taught.

Today I found a little beach just five minute’s walk away, and enjoyed the sunset close to the special lighthouse at the harbour.

I have also been walking to the village at the other end of the harbour to buy fresh fruits and vegetables grown on the island.

While sitting on my terrace in the evening I can see the water, the lights from the other side and all the boats going in and out.

I hear the beautiful sound of a flute far away. I feel safe and at home already. I have the time I need to be alone and I don´t feel lonely as I often used to earlier in my life. “Don´t forget that you are carried!” the voice repeats to me again. And that is true. The words vibrate within me and I feel like I am surrounded by soft hands. Gratefully, I receive.

I reflect on this beautiful flower on my terrace and how we human beings receive our water of life. Today I have been watered from my inner source several times; it’s like bathing in mild, but strong energies. I became electrified throughout my whole body - or rather bodies. These energies act on me like photosynthesis does to flowers. They create a force field between heaven and earth keeping us alive.

My physical body has changed immensely through my last years receiving of high frequencies energies by allowing them into all the energy centres (chakras), and also into the parts of me holding resistance and blockages from old patterns. I am lighter, happier and more creative and I feel like I am walking around in my daily life from a place of light and joy. Maybe 22

this sounds like a fairy tale; still, it is true. Other people notice as well from the outside.

Of course, it has not always happened in such a natural way.

This is what my “training camp” was about. To develop skills you need to practice. If you want to be a good flute player and create the nice music that I heard from the terrace, it takes training. Many people practise hearing their inner guidance, but in different ways. This is the profound meaning behind yoga and many spiritual paths in different cultures. People in the old days went to mystery schools in order to practice and learn.

In my case it happened right in the middle of a busy working life. I’d been a mother and a grandmother in a big family and a wife for twenty-five years. I am so thankful for this gift! To be in your daily life and learn how to be true to that inner seed within you, your blueprint, I believe is a challenge and at the same time a beautiful gift to all of us.

When a few friends and I founded what is now The Gestalt Academy of Scandinavia in 1976, we made “Head in Heaven, Feet on the Ground, Hands in Society“ our slogan. The divine energies are not only for you or me to dwell in. They are meant to inspire concrete work in the physical world to help us to heal and develop our society, our planet and ourselves as human beings.

Again I recall the summer of 2004. That was when I felt my first impulses towards taking the journey that I am now on. I have already mentioned the first words that came to me: “Tell thy truth!” Along with these inner experiences books “happened” to come in my hands, becoming like teachers. That summer the book “Secret of Shambhala” by James Redfield was in the bookshop in the little town close to our summer cottage. And a box of pencils in different colours was waving to me. So I bought both. My legs almost walked themselves from the food shop to the bookshop, as if they were saying to me: “There is more to life than having a good meal.” This was the day before I woke up from that dream in the desert. What stood out to me was what they called “The Field of Prayer”. My inner longing was to discover 23

how I could be a constructive tool in today’s world. This had been my heartfelt intention long before I read this book.

The book said: − First extension: When you are clear about your intention, you build energy by connecting to your Higher Self. − Second extension: Conscious awareness, being alert of synchronicity. − Third extension: The contagious consciousness of influencing the Higher Self of others. − Fourth extension: Daring to have faith that the human world is able to get closer to Shambhala. Keep our high vibrations/frequencies also when facing fear and hostility. The wish and ability to surrender to and recognise the dekinas/angels is necessary.

Why is that necessary, you may ask? When you believe that a loving force exists then you are able to ask for help, to surrender.

You need to ask for help to be able to get help. As human beings, we are not allowed to intervene in each other’s lives unless we are invited to. Angels and other divine beings are invited by our longing.

I start reading from my notebook. Again I see the link between what is said there and what is needed for organisations at this time on earth. The words coming to me were: Leadership in the New Era - the power of trust. Little did I know then that I had received the title of my business book that would be published in 2008.

My inner guidance provides further important details of directions: “Dare to have faith even against and beyond your own personal experience. Dare to address the higher self within my enemies or within those whom I worry about. Make decisions in a state of trust, confirming the living as opposed to decisions based on survival coming from

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fear. Teach this to managers and other leaders because they influence so many people.”

This is a day for me and my husband Mikael to be quietly together. It is our last summer weekend in our cottage. I am again reading the book, “Anna, Grandmother of Jesus” – a wonderful inspiration of many dimensions, containing spiritual, historical and esoteric wisdom. This book awakens my longing for deepening and continuing my inner path. Thank you Aniesa for giving it to me at the right time!

I experience a strong meditation later that same afternoon, the sea, the light over the sea. A soft and still strong energy is coming to me – as an opening towards light in my forehead and my head.

Looking in my notes I see a drawing of a tall light figure approaching my head and forehead with a kind of light beam. The sea makes a border to the picture.

I remember being awake almost all night. There was so much energy within me. It was time to express it in some way. What form? How should I communicate? Through different situations illustrating the power of trust? How personal should I dare to be? What am I afraid of? What about my faith? Thinking about how many books already exist, I wonder, why me? Am I able to? And yes, I have things to tell! – I have pricking sensations all over my hand. I have to drop the pen. I get the picture that my hands are supposed to be used for healing. Instead of writing?

I don´t know…

What I did not understand until years later was that I had been given light energy directly into my two hands, so that they would be able to guide me beyond my intellect. My notes say that I was receiving answers to all my questions that night by taking notes from the book I was reading. But what is actually meant by strange words like “initiation”? In the old days, mystery school tales say that disciples went through scary things, like tests. This is not how we do things today. Life itself has enough challenges if we are open to receive and learn from them. So when I read 25

this definition I felt fine with it. “Initiation is an experience from inside that takes us over a threshold of a change that is not possible to return from.”

Another important statement: “It is simply a matter of choosing to be more aware of where you are placing your attention! The threshold is about trusting that we all have a spark of God within ourselves. From that part of us we are able to love all that lives, also our own shadow parts.”

Five years later I read this in my notebook and notice how today my whole body is electric like a transformation system, where the different pieces are linked to one another. My arms and legs, throat and cheeks loosen up step by step, and it happens in connection with the energies from the other chakras. I have asked for release of tension, so that I can be the vessel for creation I am meant to be.

How far this first action of trust in the summer of 2004 has brought me! And it is true that there is no way back, only forward, and I am very happy about that fact.

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