I was having a discussion with a friend tonight about my beliefs and Christianity. It was great to share with each other about how she experiences Jesus and my relationship with Jesus. She was curious about my beliefs and I asked if she had read my blog about my trip to India and she hadn’t. I didn’t realize I had first published it in 2011, so I am re-posting to share with her and you!

I realized that the first few days of my trip to India were to be about learning to listen to my intuition. One of the experiences where I didn’t listen to this gentle inner voice was at the train station in Mumbai.

On the platform a young crippled man came up to me. He was scooting himself across the dirty cement of the station with his hands. His feet were twisted, and he appeared to be sitting with his legs curled up to his body. I reached into my purse to give him some coins. My intuition said to give him 500 rupees, but I thought my travel mates would say no so I didn’t. When I gave him a few rupees from my purse, his eyes and mine met, and there was an incredible light in his eyes. I felt like I had touched a power source with jolts of electricity running through me. A few minutes later he crossed my path again, and when our eyes met, we smiled, connected and waved.  The feeling was so intense, that even days later, as I write this, my eyes are tearing. When I went to our train compartment I shared my experience with my Indian friend. He said, “This is the first of many you will meet. That is why you were so touched.” I explained to him that I agreed I would meet many, but that this one was different. My intuitive self knew he was an enlightened being. My friend asked, “Then why would this man have that kind of body?”

I entered trance and began to share the information I received. I understood that we are not our body. This physically crippled man had transcended his body. The reason he took on this body is that he came to the earth this incarnation to be a Light and to mirror to others. Everyone who looks at him will see him differently. Some may experience anger, sadness, judgment or joy. What I saw was an enlightened being! He was mirroring to us what we needed to see in ourselves at that time. I needed to see an enlightened being in a form that I did not expect. Another time I may experience him differently.

If this experience was all that happened to me spiritually on this trip to India, it would have been enough. This incredible being gave me a healing I will remember forever.

As the trip continued, I realized an important recurring theme was: We are all connected, and we gift each other. In this case, I gave him rupees, and I saw who he actually was. He gave me an incredible spiritual activation and awareness of myself, an understanding of what my life is about at this moment.

We can look at others in our lives and experience the healing of being mirrored by them. This is the sacredness of relationship. Whatever it is you are seeing in your life, take time to see it symbolically.

Recently, I was sitting on my patio reading a novel. Suddenly, I saw a spider on my knee, right there as if it was looking at me. I am not extremely frightened of spiders, but I jumped up: “Aahhh!!!” and knocked it off my leg. Then I asked myself, “What message did this little creature have for me?” In answer, I quickly saw a spider web holding all the projects I have in play right now. I saw myself spinning my own web. Then I saw the spider in the corner of the web resting. I realized I need to sit in the corner of my web at times and rest. Later, when I was sharing this story with a friend of mine who teaches dream interpretation and who I knew would understand the symbolism, I also realized my reaction to all my projects, was: “Aahhh!!!” I laughed at myself. I loved the mirroring gift from this spider.

Whether you are traveling the trains in India, sitting on your patio in your back yard or sharing with a friend, the gift of seeing yourself in the mirror of others is available to you daily. What a gift to expand the awareness of the magnificent being that you are! What a gift to shine your light as you remove the veils and stand in your Light!

Since I wrote this, I read the book  The Yoga of Max’s Discontent by Karan Bajaj. If you enjoyed this story and have not read his book, I highly recommend it. His teaching about yogis transcended anything I understood before and expanded my mind and I will be forever grateful.

“A sickly body does not indicate that a guru is not in touch with divine powers, any more than lifelong health necessarily indicates an inner illumination.”

Autobiography of a Yogi – Paramhansa Yogananda