A Cosmic Reminder

A “Nothing” – (c) Karl D. Weikel

Life is weird.

It’s just strange how you can be going along, living your life, basically minding your own business and doing your best to be as conscious as possible, when – thwack!– you get hit upside the head and challenged to hold your center.

That happened to me today.

And it wasn’t until I got home this evening that I felt the repercussions and even fully realized I’d received a spiritual thwack! upside the head – a cosmic reminder of why I engage in the discipline and commitment of my 1111 Devotion.

An Unexpected Flood of Sadness

Come to think of it, I was hit with the overwhelming wave of emptiness as I was driving home from my session. I told myself it was because I hadn’t eaten all day, but I knew that didn’t ring true. It’s not an unusual occurrence for me not to eat on days I see clients, and it doesn’t bother me at all. The truth was, I was missing Karl. And it was creating a pit-in-the-center-of-my-chest kind of sadness.

The short explanation is that my client had a connection to my son Karl that they didn’t even realize. When the appointment was initially set up, I’d had this vague tickle at the back of my mind. In the minutes before they arrived for their appointment, I literally wrote in my journal, “Why does that name sound familiar to me?”

I whipped out my phone and searched the name in my email, just to see if perhaps I’d seen this person a long, long time ago, perhaps in another context, unrelated to my shamanic practice. Maybe as their lawyer?

Nope. No record.

Realizing the Connection

There was no recognition on either of our parts when they arrived. They didn’t even mention that my name sounded familiar, so I shushed myself, opened Sacred Space, and began the session.

It didn’t take long before I realized that their son and Karl had had a strong bond back in high school. Indeed, so strong that, the last time Karl was home, the final Christmas and New Year’s holidays he spent in Pennsylvania, indeed, on Earth, he’d made a point of getting together with this friend specifically to give him permission to imitate Karl’s artwork – a unique art form he’d developed and honed since elementary school and eventually won awards for in high school, as well as in independent juried art shows.

An Uncommon Generosity of Spirit

I’d always wondered why Karl went out of his way to give this friend his ‘blessing,’ so to speak. I’d been shocked when he told me he intended to do it; and was even more shocked when he followed through with it. Perhaps on some deep level, both of us knew his time was growing short. Did he know? Did I know? It’s impossible for me to answer.

It was such a profoundly magnanimous gesture – loving and kind and generous. Made even more so because he’d only discovered through others that his art was being copied by this friend; his friend hadn’t disclosed it himself.

So why would he do that, I wondered. Why would he make it OK to be copied, imitated?

I remember standing in the kitchen and asking Karl, “Why?”

And I distinctly remember him shrugging and saying, “It doesn’t really matter in the end, Mom.” I just looked at him, struggling to keep myself from saying all the things that shrieked in my mind. Of course it mattered, I wanted to say.

Non-attachment and Serenity

“He knows,” Karl continued. “And I want him to know I know. But I also want him to know I give him permission.”

How could I argue with that? Karl’s attitude was intensely serene and – there are those words again – generous; magnanimous.

It was not unlike how I’d felt in Ann Arbor the year before, when I watched him give away to a homeless person the food we’d wrapped for him to take on the long bus ride back to California.

His non-attachment and serenity were profound. And I have to admit, I struggled to find them in my own heart. I wanted to feel ok about it; it was his art, after all. His talent and imagination. His vision.

In the End…

I was sad to notice that very same friend failed to come to Karl’s Gathering, held only two weeks after his death. Their meeting had occurred only ten months earlier. Surely it gave him pause?

And I was sad to realize my client didn’t even recognize his name. It was as if they’d never been friends.

I miss Karl. I miss his spirit. And most of all, I don’t want him to disappear.

Which reminds me of the entire point behind my 1111 Devotion.

(T-1022)