Pure White Light, Visions, + JOY

My first & most recent vision + a reminder that the Kingdom of God is WITHIN.

Photo by Nitin Mendekar on Unsplash

The joy that comes.

Yesterday, I wrote a little something that kind of became an introduction/ re-introduction for this space. If you missed it, you can read it here. I’m not re-branding. I’m taking you in a little deeper to my inner world. Some people will appreciate this. Others will leave, but I want my writing to flow. And what flows is what’s alive in me. I arrive with the reminder that pursuing wisdom, the Divine, and growth can be a journey full of whimsy and wonder. That doesn’t mean there won’t be pain and shadows. But it does mean that you don’t have to carry pious heaviness and shame and fear as you explore yourself and the Divine.

Today, what I feel led to share is actively tender to me. I remind you that I’m here for WITH — beside you in this journey. That means I value bringing things that are raw. I’m not interested with getting you to believe one thing or another. I’m just sharing. And if it sparks even one person to have the courage to experientially explore deeper into connecting with the One that breathes air into our lungs, then it’s worth it for me.

My first experience having a vision was my first time at a summer Christian camp, the summer going into my sophomore year. It was during a worship session (singing songs to God in a group setting). I was in it DEEP. Totally in love with Jesus. And then it hit. A vision. I didn’t know what was happening, but I let it move and I watched. Later that evening, I was talking to a girl at camp I connected with. She was an outsider, like me, but we were outsiders in different ways. See, for me it was a miracle to get to go to camp. For her, she was forced to. So, we were talking and when I looked in her eyes the vision came flooding back with electricity. The part I didn’t mention is that the vision began with an eye. Her eye. Her exact eyes. And that’s how I knew this was about her.

Not knowing what to do, I did the first thing I could think - “It’s you! It’s about you!” — yep, no context just burst out with crack-head enthusiasm. Long story short, we found ourselves in the largest bathroom stall sitting on the ground chatting while everyone went to sleep. I told her the vision. Every part. Described every person in it. Every event. Every location. And she wept. You see, one evening she went with some friends she trusted and they gave her some substances. Unfortunate things happened. And all she had in her memory were flashes of the evening. There were pieces missing in her memory and they were haunting her. She named every person I described. She named every location I described. And she felt like she received the missing links to what had haunted her. The progression of the night that I described was also in line with what she remembered experiencing.

So— that was my kickoff into visions. Just a gift, handed to me, no warning, no context and I was a brand new baby Christian. But in LOVE with Jesus. Not the church. Not the system. Jesus.

Fast forward.

So, my spirituality has expanded beyond what my baby Christian brain could have foreseen at the time — even with the spontaneous visions. And now, there’s a whole lot I explore. Because I believe that the One that breathes breath into our lungs is beyond one religion, one text, one mythology, one culture, one group, one system, or one type of experience.

The PEACE that comes.

There’s a peace that comes that is not of this world. In writing this, I am reminded that it’s PEACE and LIGHT that actually saved me from who and where I was and ushered me in to the love and experience of meeting and knowing the Divine. I’ll tell that story another time…

Earlier this year, I explored quantum leaping for the first time. I’ve done several meditations since then. Over this weekend, I attended a group Reiki healing session. In those meditations what stands out in the visions that come to me is this PURE white light. There are no words to fully describe it. It is not like the light we see. It’s brighter and purer. And that’s the best way I can describe it to you. And it does something to you. You can’t see it and not be impacted. It activates everything and draws in your full attention.

Sitting on the floor, she began the grounding meditation. I have no memory of what she said, but she was just trying to ground us.

At first my mind was busy, noisy… I was carrying a lot. I saw all the noise in it’s tremor and then it faded away. BOOM - the White Light. It flooded my mind’s eye. And then, a forest started to fill in. Trees, birds, a gentle trickle of a river. And then me. I was there. Some version of me. With palpable, life-changing JOY. And I felt it all for a few moments.

Then, it was time to come out of the meditation.

And I WEPT.

Because every time this happens, it is so bittersweet. The light brings this PEACE that is other-worldly. And I sincerely mean other-worldly. Then, I come back into my present reality, and I cannot help but cry at the dissonance. How even on the most peaceful of days, on this earth, we hold this heaviness that we can’t seem to escape. Maybe you can’t relate — but for me, the heaviness lingers. Sometimes, like bricks sitting in my heart. And I LONG for that joy I experience in these visions. That joy is pure peace.

The visions aren’t the universe’s way of teasing me. They’re a gift reminding me of something I have accessible to me— somewhere, in some dimension, in some inner depth of “me”.

Jesus said the kingdom of God is already within you. I’ve never understood that verse properly until about 1-2 years ago when my spiritual awareness began expanding and I said YES to walking in through the journey of exploring and said GOODBYE to the indoctrinated shame in regard to the pursuit of “TRUTH”.

The Kingdom of God is within. Not outside. Not in a system. Not on a different planet. Not after death. It is ALREADY WITHIN YOU.

And I find great comfort in this. Because what that means for me when I experience a TASTE of Divine JOY and then juxtapose it with the heaviness of embodied existence on Earth — I know that the JOY and PEACE and LIGHT is available to us. But we must go WITHIN. And the deeper we go, the more we are required to clear out. The more we clear out, the more fire we feel. But that fire purifies and cleanses and brings us closer and closer to the purity of the light, peace, and joy meant for us. If the Kingdom of God is within, then it is never separate from you. It is available to you in every pain, question, shadow, and joy. You are not alone.

---