Presencia
Yo Soy
One spring day, I was walking through
La Boca, a colorful artsy neighborhood in Buenos Aires, taking
pictures, when I became aware that a young couple had been following
me. All of a sudden, the woman pulled out a handkerchief and insisted
on wiping my back because she said there was a mustard stain on
my shirt.
I knew that local thieves sprayed tourists with mustard in order
to rob them while helping them clean up, so I politely thanked
the woman and told her mustard comes off in the wash. Then I walked
away, relieved that my purse was intact. I had just exchanged
a lot of dollars and had all of my bank and credit cards with
me, which was the only way for me to get more funds.
A short time later, while I was
waiting for a bus in front of the main train station, I was caught
off guard. A young man pointed to the stain on my shirt and the
minute I turned around, my wallet was gone. I asked the man to
give it back and he denied taking it. Then, I remembered these
thieves work in groups. I looked around and saw a man in his forties,
dressed in a suit, crossing the street whistling.
My intuition told me this man had my wallet, so I started chasing
him. He turned around and when he saw that I was coming after
him, started to run too. I ran as fast as I could, dodging all
of the buses and taxis that were coming at us with Latin speed.
“Para le, stop him,”
I yelled as people watched, but nobody moved. Eventually, I could
no longer keep up with him and he started to get lost in the bustle.
I knew this was a real crisis
situation, having no money to get home or to finish my stay. I
had just learned about the Mighty I AM Presence, the personalized
divine presence that hovers above us at all times, surrounded
by concentric rings of spiritual energy. I decided to call upon
this presence for help. “Presencia
Yo Soy,” I said, as I continued to run. I felt a renewed
burst of energy and within a minute or so, spotted the man in
the crowd again.
He turned around and decided to
give up, though he still had the lead. “Here’s your
cuero,” he said, throwing my wallet on the ground.
By that time, a crowd had formed
around us. I did not know whether to laugh or cry. My lungs were
burning and I was out of breath, but I felt elated because my
wallet was intact. I knew that my Mighty I AM Presence had intervened.
Only God could have made this man give up the chase when he was
still ahead. I was so grateful. I can’t even begin to imagine
the nightmare it would have been to be stranded in a city like
Buenos Aires with no money.
An
Angel in a Pick Up Truck
On our way home from a conference
in Montana, we decided to drive through the night to get back
to Minneapolis for my sister Marie’s flight. We took turns
driving and about midnight, I fell asleep.
It was extremely cold and pitch
dark on the highway. We were in eastern Montana, which is like
the middle of nowhere, and the roads were covered with a very
thick sheet of ice. All of a sudden, Marie accidentally jerked
the steering wheel.
I woke up, startled, as we headed
down a 15 foot ditch. The car softly stopped at the bottom, lodged
inside a snowbank. We were stuck. We hadn’t seen any traffic
for a long, long time and the car did not have much gas left.
I stepped outside the car and realized
we were in a life-and-death situation, so I started to call to
God and to Archangel Michael for immediate help. We had no time
to lose.
Within a minute or so of making
the call, a man showed up in a pick up truck. He was wearing a
flannel plaid shirt, overalls and some kind of cap on his head.
He was very friendly and completely calm.
“You girls are lucky I stopped
by,” he said, “because even highway patrol isn’t
out tonight in these road conditions.” He pulled out a tow
rope and told me to go inside his truck to warm up. I sat down
and waited, listening to the country music that was gently playing.
Then he told Marie, “Go check up on your sister because
she looks very upset.” Neither of us had told him we were
sisters.
The man pulled the car out of the
ditch and told us he would follow us to Miles City, where we must
stop and get a hotel room. We thanked him, got in the car and
drove off. I could see him in the rear view mirror, following
us. We were the only two cars on the road. Then, as we reached
the first signs for Miles City, I looked up in the mirror and
he was gone.
Since that trip, I have driven through
Miles City many times. There is no road that exits the highway
where this took place.
The
Yellowstone River
On a hot day later that summer,
I set out with some friends to go tubing down the Yellowstone
River. I had never done this before, but my friends were regulars
at it. We were each sitting on inner tubes, and no one had a life
jacket. We started downstream, having the time of our life, bobbing
up and down in the splashing rapids.
After we passed the first set of
rapids, the current separated me from the group and I started
to lag behind. All of a sudden, there was a huge boulder just
below the surface. Before I could steer away, the water swept
me into a giant hole. My inner tube flew into the air and I was
engulfed in a powerful whirlpool that was way over my head. Being
a good swimmer, I started to tread water but the whirlpool was
too strong. I struggled to come up for air but no matter how hard
I tried, I could not reach the surface.
Soon all of my energy was spent.
I had no strength left and was sucked down into the hole. Everything
was dark around me and I felt completely defeated. I knew I had
to give up my life even though it didn’t seem like the right
timing.
“The fallen ones have finally
got me,” I thought, referring to the force of darkness,
and I became acutely aware that a significant part of me would
be staying in the bottom of the river. It was my not-self, impermanent
and unreal, that I had identified with. This jarring realization
was even more disturbing than the physical experience of drowning
and I finally did let go.
At that point, time and space collapsed
and I found myself on top of the river, a couple of yards away
from the whirlpool. I was stunned. I did not experience my body
moving from the bottom to the top of the river and had no idea
how I got there. I started to swim frantically so I would not
get sucked into the whirlpool again, having no tube to hang onto.
One of my friends, Geron, who happened
to be a lifeguard, was floating by. He had been leading up the
rear when the accident happened. He knew that if he jumped in,
we would both drown so he watched me struggle and go under. Then,
when I surfaced, he said it was like an angel had picked me up.
Away from the whirlpool, Geron reached
out to me with his inner tube and helped me stay calm. As the
two of us swam to shore through more rapids, I felt a peaceful
light shine upon me. Even though I was still in shock, I knew
I would be safe.
Later, I went to the emergency room
to get checked out. I was all right physically, but it took me
several months to process what had happened mentally, emotionally
and spiritually.
Holy
Water!
Our construction was already underway
and it came time to drill a well. The cost of the well was an
unknown factor that would determine everything else, which had
stressed me out for months. We knew that our closest neighbor’s
well was one of the deepest and most expensive in the area, and
that if we were to run into the same terrain, we would completely
blow our budget. Every time I prayed to God about the well, I
had the sense not to worry but I was still extremely concerned.
“Lord,” I said, “you
know where the water is and I don’t. Please show me where
the water is and help me feel the light.”
I started to walk the land and came
upon a spot where I felt light on my crown chakra. The light was
focused in a circle. I could clearly feel the circumference of
the circle, about ten feet around, and the center point where
the energy was strongest. My neighbor and I put a stake in the
ground where I had felt the most light and then I went home to
work on my faith.
I could not come out on the day
of the drilling, so I asked our neighbor Orlando to show the drillers
the stake for the well placement. Some of the other contractors
started to suggest more preferable locations but Orlando thankfully
insisted that they drill where the stake was. In the meanwhile,
I was at home praying for the best possible outcome.
About thirty minutes later, I received
a phone call from the driller. “Lady,” he said, “I
don’t know how you did it but we found abundant water at
less than 50 feet. This is the shallowest well we have ever drilled
and you just saved yourself $10,000.”
I put the phone down, elated. I
was so grateful for this divine manifestation and for the joy
of co-creating with God. The savings on the water made it possible
for us to buy a hot tub, among other things, a luxury I had secretly
wished for but which up to that point, could not fit into our
budget.
