Book Release Announcement!

 Most of us live with both feet planted resolutely on Terra Firma. Others, however, live with one foot in the physical realm and one foot... someplace else. Victoria Marina-Tompkins is one such person, and clearly has the ability to walk in balance between 

 natural and supernatural. 

A Little Book of Spirit Stories is the latest offering by this talented and otherworldy author. An avid reader of her writings, I wasn’t quite sure what to expect with this one. However, I was hooked from the very first story. The anecdotes alternated between sweetly humorous and somewhat quirky. A couple of them were downright creepy and made me shiver. My favorite, Music to Their Ears, was a complete joy; I’ll read that one often. No doubt about it; this little book is a big treat.  Tessa Jones, author

Fascinating, surprising, and compelling, A Little Book of Spirit Stories is a collection of first hand encounters with the paranormal. With insight and humor, Victoria Marina-Tompkins shares her experiences with ghostly apparitions, playful spirits, and voices outside the range of every day perceptions, giving the reader a glimpse into the realm of the supernatural. Beginning in 1978, the stories include, “The Ghost at the Top of the Stairs,” when a seemingly unfriendly ghost appears in all manner of ways, “Troll," an enduring tale of a young child’s perceptions and ingenuity, and “The Michaels and Our Friend Bob,” an in-depth look at mediumship from the author’s viewpoint that also includes verbatim examples of spirit transmissions. A Little Book of Spirit Stories is an unforgettable journey into the mysterious world of the occult.

Available online through AMAZON 

http://www.amazon.com/Little-Book-Spirit-Stories-ebook/dp/B009I4S5GA/ref=sr_1_4?ie=UTF8&qid=1348839899&sr=8-4&keywords=marina-tompkins

Soon to be available through Ibooks, Barnes and Noble, and all major booksellers!

Favorites from our Archives: The Life Made By Hand

During the middle ages craftsmen would sometimes take their entire lives to create a personal masterpiece. Stained glass windows would be created one pane at a time without the need to rush or have a product they could show off to family and friends. Weavers would create entire tapestries one thread at a time and it wasn't until many years later that the true beauty of the piece would emerge as the last threads were put into place.

In today's world, we have become focused on product rather than process, on completing many tasks in order to keep our lives running and manageable. Certainly, order can be a bi-product of this approach but at what expense? For some, the feeling of creative chaos may be uncomfortable and in fact may be avoided in favor of a task oriented approach to life. When we are in the midst of process, the threads of our life may feel like they are undone or unraveling, when in fact we are creating the larger tapestry that may be difficult to see.

What Are Your Personal Vignettes?

Looking at our lives as a series of vignettes can be a helpful way to bring to light both significant events as well as time periods that were marked by people, places, and things. What were you doing in your twenties? Were there certain people who come to mind, events that were important, changes made? If you were creating a stained glass window, what would the theme of that time period be? Think of a word or catch phrase such as education, meeting the world, marriage, children, or any other phrase that describes the gem or pearl of your experiences. Is there a symbol that represents the time without words? A spiral,  pyramid, a tree. Then follow the thread into your thirties and look to see what the new theme might have been. Did the tree of your twenties grow or did you change direction and plant something else? 

During our lives we create different stories or Personal Vignettes that encapsulate the gist of the time period  and when woven together later, create the whole of our lives. Think of a snapshot or picture-what would your personal snapshot look like when you were in your youth, mature adulthood? Decide on the setting for your Vignette. What was the tone? Calm, energizing, chaotic, fearful, adventurous? A combination of all of the above! You are painting a picture of your life and part of that picture is the way it felt to you. Then there is color- blues, reds, greens, all of the above? Once you have pulled together the threads of the past, then take a look at how they relate to where you are now. See the bigger picture. Nothing happens in isolation and every moment of life relates to every other moment, eventually blending together to weave the life we are living now. Enjoy these moments and trust in the process. 

Your Daily Gandhi

Certainty? Maybe not.

How can we truly know with any degree of certainty that we what hold as true is in fact true?

Our thoughts, attitudes, perceptions, affections, and relationship to the world and others are often based on feelings of surety, that what we are experiencing is truth. But what is a personal truth ("I like chocolate") cannot always be translated into a world truth ("Everyone likes chocolate") or certainly a Universal truth because it's unlikely that as much as we like or love chocolate that it exists in every corner of the Universe :)

Take another example: The roles in essence.  Many of us reading this blog know about The Michael entity and what they have to say about the 7 roles in essence, (slave, artisan, warrior, scholar, sage, priest, and king) that our world is composed of millions of people who are all one of these 7 roles for each and every incarnation, a choice they made at the beginning of ensoulment. We read about this, and then apply it to the world- can you validate the 7 roles by looking around you? Do you see slaves serving the common good, artisans creating? Yes.

Here is the intersection of a personal truth with a Universal truth.

So we adopt this truth as our own and begin to apply it to our personal world view.

Then, a question might occur to us which goes something like "How can I with absolute certainty know that this is true?".

We can't. But we can look to see if there is evidence to support our beliefs (which in the case of the roles in essence there is enough supporting evidence for me to validate it) and decide whether to adopt it as a probable truth. We can allow for the possibility that some of what we have come to believe as true could not be (think The Matrix) and some could be. Here we have the opportunity to hold our thoughts lightly which then allows for us to be open, receptive, and joyful without the need to be right, or to know. We can allow for different perceptions without the need to change others for in truth how do we really know what is true?

Lots to think about.

Music to Their Ears (Book excerpt)

When They Came to Shore  

                                

"All that said, once the ritual on the beach was in full swing, it was time to call in the directions. After the east and the south had been honored through invocation, it was my turn. I had been denoted to call in the west. On this particular day I did this by singing to the ocean:

Spirit of the West Carry Me

Spirit of the West Carry Me Home

Spirit of the West Carry me home to myself.

As I continued to sing the chant, the most remarkable thing happened

I looked up as the group became restless, whispering to each other. Jeannie, who was standing next to me and very fond of the ocean which she called “grandmother”, pointed to the water and said, “Look look, the dolphins have come!”

And there they were, about six of them. Little heads poking up out of the water, all lined up and bobbing up and down as they blew water out of their blowholes, and made making clicking sounds. I kept singing, as they seemed to enjoy it, plus I didn’t want them to leave. Imagine that, dolphins! We were all facing the ocean by now, big smiles on our faces, completely captivated and amazed by our visitors.

Of course, my song did end, the dolphins left, and we continued on with the ritual. But that wasn’t the end of the story."

 Excerpt from Music to Their Ears from the upcoming ebook "A Little Book of Spirit Stories"

Sneek Peek!

 TROLL  

by Brendan McCarthy c. 2012

from the upcoming ebook 

"A Little Book of Spirit Stories: Encounters with the Paranormal"

(late Sept release)

The Rose Cottage at the Old Mill Inn (book excerpt)

"The cottage was one room with two double beds and God-awful wallpaper that seemed to make it feel even smaller than its 450 square feet. A teakettle sat on the cutting board in what looked to be a quickly put together kitchenette, outfitted with the basics, including silverware, plates, and a small fridge. Not exactly the Ritz, but it would do for the night. We decided to unpack only what we needed for a quick walk down to the creek before dark. We took our jackets and wore sensible shoes for climbing.

Once down by the creek, we noticed the lower level of the inn with one room that opened directly onto the hill just above the water. At first glance it looked quite lovely, but soon that unsettled feeling began in my gut again, and I had no desire to take a peek inside even though Charlie was interested. It was like looking at a bright, shiny apple but knowing there might be a dark bruise inside or, worse yet, a half eaten worm. Something didn’t feel right. We headed into town for dinner and, since everyone was tired, we decided to drive back to the cottage after we’d eaten to get some sleep. It was shortly after that the “fun” began."

from A Little Book of Spirit Stories Upcoming Book Release late September 2012  c. 2012

Kindness

"Kindness is a language which the deaf

 can hear and the blind can see."  

Mark Twain