Saturday, December 13, 2008
Thursday, December 11, 2008
Turkey makes me choke. Try as I might I cannot swallow the stuff. I have had this affliction since I was a child.
I come from a huge family. So huge that for us all to be together for Thanksgiving we rent a hall. The mere mention of missing the holiday is met with deep sighs and the guilt inducing “your not missing Thanksgiving are you? This could be the last time you ever see your Grandmother.” Like many families children are segregated to a separated area. Our family is so big we actually have a children’s room. All the men watch football until dinner is served and large amounts of alcohol are consumed.
You would think that “going to thanksgiving” would mean showing up shortly before the meal is served and leaving after the pie. Not in my family. Thanksgiving begins the evening before Thanksgiving with all the women getting together to prepare food. Old stories are embellished, olives stuffed and stuffing made according to the only true and correct family recipe. No variation in the meal plan is allowed. Yams mashed with a thick layer of marshmallow. The potatoes whipped with butter and cream. Green beans made with Campbell’s mushroom soup and fried onion bits. No off brand soup for us, only the finest condensed soup was allowed.
No pre-Thanksgiving evening was complete without the Turkey Dance. Every year, I AM NOT KIDDING, passed down from generation to generation was the special moment when all the children are called into the kitchen. “Kids! Kids! You don’t want to miss this! Come in here right now!” At the sink my mother stood. A huge, raw turkey swaying gently with my mother holding it up by the wings dancing the poor bird around singing the Big Fat Turkey song. Everyone would laugh like this was the funniest thing they had ever seen.
In my mind the Turkey Dance and the special ability our turkey had after Thanksgiving were connected. Our turkey spent the next week in our garage covered with a large white tea towel UNREFRIGERATED. My father took a knife and a saltshaker out to the garage for “snacks”. To my knowledge no one every got sick eating this bacteria filled turkey. Okay, maybe a little sick, but this was always written off as pre-Christmas excitement.
The turkey must be cooked for a minimum of 8 hours and the cooking of the bird has to begin before dawn. My mother had been up for hours by the time we all awoke. We started the day with the traditional Thanksgiving fast. “We’ll be eating a big dinner later, so don’t fill up”, my mom would say. With the only actual meal later in the day my brothers, sister and I began the traditional all day sneak eating. Before noon we would have consumed half the celery and pimento spread that had been made the night before and a large amount of Chex mix – not the kind you can get now but the real kind that is made on the stove with 3 boxes of Chex, a sack of pretzels and secret ingredients. This recipe, plus many others are passed to the next generation only after you “grew up”.
Breaking into the adult woman club and being invited to Thanksgiving eve happened when I got married. For the first 5 years after I entered quasi-cooking status my big job was to bring rolls.
Entering into the inner sanctum of turkey dancers did not protect me from the onslaught of opinions about every area of my life. As a child I longed to find out I was actually adopted, but I am truly a member of this family. I have with age turned from youthful rebel into eccentric aunt.
As required by family tradition the turkey was carved in the kitchen with an electric knife and served on a huge platter. Turkey, dressing, mashed potatoes, green beans, marshmallow yams, cranberries (the jellied kind with no lumps), a fancy Jell-o salad and my rolls. I would sit, staring at the plate swirling around in front of me.
Leading up to this moment the following are some, but not all of the issues that would have been covered:
1. My weight.
2. The Roman Catholic church and my leaving it, and my mother’s reminder that “if you would only go to communion once a year you could still go to heaven”.
3. My disturbing pro-choice views.
4. That my artistic talent being wasted on “those lesbian paintings”.
5. The lack of a television in my house and “what exactly did we do with all that time?”
Slowly I placed a small piece of turkey in my mouth and began to chew. And chew. I added a sip of water to the growing mass in my mouth and tried to swallow. Even with water to flush it down the turkey would stick in my throat. I began to realize that if I simple took the food and moved it around on my plate no one noticed. I wrote HELP in the mashed potatoes and no one noticed.
To stem the onslaught of unsolicited opinions and chance being able to swallow turkey over the years I have tried a number of strategies. Strategy #1 Drink heavily. This actually worked for a few years but upped the choking potential. Strategy #2 - Bring a guest as deflection. A shaggy someone with more tattoos, bad table manners and BO was best. Someone my family could really focus on. Better them than me. This worked until they figure out who invited this person. Strategy #3 Pretend that I was visiting a foreign country and I was observing the local customs and rituals of this tribe. A successful technique, but do not under any circumstances mix this with Strategy #1. I realized this after I stood up to thank my hosts for the wonderful time in Japanese. Then I remembered I don’t speak Japanese. Oops.
The Big Fat Turkey Song
There is a big fat turkey down on Grandpa’s farm
He thinks he’s might gay
He spreads his tail into a great bug fan
And he struts around all day
Oh, you ought to hear him gobble at he girls and boys
Because he thinks he’s singing when he make that noise
But he will sing another way, upon Thanksgiving Day!
I come from a huge family. So huge that for us all to be together for Thanksgiving we rent a hall. The mere mention of missing the holiday is met with deep sighs and the guilt inducing “your not missing Thanksgiving are you? This could be the last time you ever see your Grandmother.” Like many families children are segregated to a separated area. Our family is so big we actually have a children’s room. All the men watch football until dinner is served and large amounts of alcohol are consumed.
You would think that “going to thanksgiving” would mean showing up shortly before the meal is served and leaving after the pie. Not in my family. Thanksgiving begins the evening before Thanksgiving with all the women getting together to prepare food. Old stories are embellished, olives stuffed and stuffing made according to the only true and correct family recipe. No variation in the meal plan is allowed. Yams mashed with a thick layer of marshmallow. The potatoes whipped with butter and cream. Green beans made with Campbell’s mushroom soup and fried onion bits. No off brand soup for us, only the finest condensed soup was allowed.
No pre-Thanksgiving evening was complete without the Turkey Dance. Every year, I AM NOT KIDDING, passed down from generation to generation was the special moment when all the children are called into the kitchen. “Kids! Kids! You don’t want to miss this! Come in here right now!” At the sink my mother stood. A huge, raw turkey swaying gently with my mother holding it up by the wings dancing the poor bird around singing the Big Fat Turkey song. Everyone would laugh like this was the funniest thing they had ever seen.
In my mind the Turkey Dance and the special ability our turkey had after Thanksgiving were connected. Our turkey spent the next week in our garage covered with a large white tea towel UNREFRIGERATED. My father took a knife and a saltshaker out to the garage for “snacks”. To my knowledge no one every got sick eating this bacteria filled turkey. Okay, maybe a little sick, but this was always written off as pre-Christmas excitement.
The turkey must be cooked for a minimum of 8 hours and the cooking of the bird has to begin before dawn. My mother had been up for hours by the time we all awoke. We started the day with the traditional Thanksgiving fast. “We’ll be eating a big dinner later, so don’t fill up”, my mom would say. With the only actual meal later in the day my brothers, sister and I began the traditional all day sneak eating. Before noon we would have consumed half the celery and pimento spread that had been made the night before and a large amount of Chex mix – not the kind you can get now but the real kind that is made on the stove with 3 boxes of Chex, a sack of pretzels and secret ingredients. This recipe, plus many others are passed to the next generation only after you “grew up”.
Breaking into the adult woman club and being invited to Thanksgiving eve happened when I got married. For the first 5 years after I entered quasi-cooking status my big job was to bring rolls.
Entering into the inner sanctum of turkey dancers did not protect me from the onslaught of opinions about every area of my life. As a child I longed to find out I was actually adopted, but I am truly a member of this family. I have with age turned from youthful rebel into eccentric aunt.
As required by family tradition the turkey was carved in the kitchen with an electric knife and served on a huge platter. Turkey, dressing, mashed potatoes, green beans, marshmallow yams, cranberries (the jellied kind with no lumps), a fancy Jell-o salad and my rolls. I would sit, staring at the plate swirling around in front of me.
Leading up to this moment the following are some, but not all of the issues that would have been covered:
1. My weight.
2. The Roman Catholic church and my leaving it, and my mother’s reminder that “if you would only go to communion once a year you could still go to heaven”.
3. My disturbing pro-choice views.
4. That my artistic talent being wasted on “those lesbian paintings”.
5. The lack of a television in my house and “what exactly did we do with all that time?”
Slowly I placed a small piece of turkey in my mouth and began to chew. And chew. I added a sip of water to the growing mass in my mouth and tried to swallow. Even with water to flush it down the turkey would stick in my throat. I began to realize that if I simple took the food and moved it around on my plate no one noticed. I wrote HELP in the mashed potatoes and no one noticed.
To stem the onslaught of unsolicited opinions and chance being able to swallow turkey over the years I have tried a number of strategies. Strategy #1 Drink heavily. This actually worked for a few years but upped the choking potential. Strategy #2 - Bring a guest as deflection. A shaggy someone with more tattoos, bad table manners and BO was best. Someone my family could really focus on. Better them than me. This worked until they figure out who invited this person. Strategy #3 Pretend that I was visiting a foreign country and I was observing the local customs and rituals of this tribe. A successful technique, but do not under any circumstances mix this with Strategy #1. I realized this after I stood up to thank my hosts for the wonderful time in Japanese. Then I remembered I don’t speak Japanese. Oops.
The Big Fat Turkey Song
There is a big fat turkey down on Grandpa’s farm
He thinks he’s might gay
He spreads his tail into a great bug fan
And he struts around all day
Oh, you ought to hear him gobble at he girls and boys
Because he thinks he’s singing when he make that noise
But he will sing another way, upon Thanksgiving Day!
Thursday, September 11, 2008
Looking for Casper
Looking for Casper
Dear Cathy:
I’m planning on having a haunted house this Halloween, and I would like to use real poltergeists. Is there any way that I can temporarily bring poltergeists into my house for the holidays?
Signed,
Looking for Casper
Dear Looking:
I am glad you have asked me this question. This important holiday information was not even mentioned in Martha Stewart’s special Halloween addition of her magazine!
Most people get confused about the different hauntings available. If you are looking for something along the lines of a shrieking form holding it’s head and walking down the hall you are actually looking for a repetitive image haunting. This is the kind of ghostly occurrence that repeats the same sequence over and over again. These instant replay ghosts are like looking at a tape recording of high intensity emotion. This is why these images are often associated with grief and trauma. In Bellingham there is a hotel where you can hear a man pacing and a woman screaming in pain where a woman died in childbirth. In my house a woman repeatedly comes down a stairwell and puts away laundry in a cupboard. Neither the stairs nor the cupboard currently exists in the house. I don’t know what her great trauma was but she is an intent housekeeper. I have however been unable to get her to also fold my clothes while in this state of angst.
If you are looking for the interactive variety of haunting this becomes a bit more complicated. An aspect or fragment of the person does not go into the light and they avoid the other-side-welcoming committee that comes to pick them up. This can happen because they have unfinished business, died in a confused state or because they have a feeling that they are going to hell for stealing that eraser in 4th grade. Often they will stay connected to their house and think they are still the owners. Some are gracious hosts and some want you out.
The E.R. Rodgers restaurant in Steilacoom is a great example of both types of ghosts. My father grew up next door to the house that has served as a private residence, boarding house and now a restaurant. He had many stories about the “ghost with red eyes” that looked out the front windows of the house overlooking the water. Recently I was walking into the downstairs women’s bathroom and actually excused myself and moved to the side as an upset women in a long taffeta dress cut directly in front of me hurrying to some unknown destination, disappearing into the bathroom wall. The interactive ghost, a scruffy old man, resides upstairs and stands on the stairs and harasses the restaurant guests and staff, turning lights on and off and moving things around in the kitchen. You can often smell his pipe smoke upstairs in the late evening. I understand nobody wants the job of being the last one out.
If you would like a list of some of the other haunted places in the area you can go to and for online sounds of ghost wailing and photos go to . A good list, but they neglected the very haunted Capitol building and the old woman that haunts the women’s bathroom at the Olympic Hotel across from Sylvester Park.
If you are looking for a true poltergeist experience, (poltergeist means, “to knock” and “spirit” in German), I have two words – adolescent girls. Loud knocking, objects moving about on their own, voices, particular odors and apparitions are the hallmark of poltergeist experiences. These experiences tend to focus around a preteen female who's hormones and the stress of that age combine and finally release subconsciously in flinging dishes and loud rapping’s. Activity has also been associated with very stressed teens and young adults of either sex but there is nothing like a group of 14 year old girls to stir up a bit of Halloween haunting. The energies surrounding adolescence is a very powerful force.
In other times and cultures young adults were initiated into adulthood and taught skills to begin to run energy through their bodies and direct these emerging energies into effective creative forces. Today’s adolescents move into this energetically powerful time unassisted by the older wise ones in the village and end up flinging things through the air willy-nilly. This might be a little disconcerting for the family down the block, but can assist you wonderfully in creating the atmosphere you desire for that special Halloween effect. Be sure to get a note from the girl’s parents before proceeding.
Place 4 agitated teens in the corners of the room, for best results keep large amounts of Halloween snack sized snicker bars close at hand. Encourage them to look in the mirror by candlelight repeating the name “Bloody Mary” until totally worked up. Place an assortment of small easy to fling objects in the center of the room and enjoy!
Dear Cathy:
I’m planning on having a haunted house this Halloween, and I would like to use real poltergeists. Is there any way that I can temporarily bring poltergeists into my house for the holidays?
Signed,
Looking for Casper
Dear Looking:
I am glad you have asked me this question. This important holiday information was not even mentioned in Martha Stewart’s special Halloween addition of her magazine!
Most people get confused about the different hauntings available. If you are looking for something along the lines of a shrieking form holding it’s head and walking down the hall you are actually looking for a repetitive image haunting. This is the kind of ghostly occurrence that repeats the same sequence over and over again. These instant replay ghosts are like looking at a tape recording of high intensity emotion. This is why these images are often associated with grief and trauma. In Bellingham there is a hotel where you can hear a man pacing and a woman screaming in pain where a woman died in childbirth. In my house a woman repeatedly comes down a stairwell and puts away laundry in a cupboard. Neither the stairs nor the cupboard currently exists in the house. I don’t know what her great trauma was but she is an intent housekeeper. I have however been unable to get her to also fold my clothes while in this state of angst.
If you are looking for the interactive variety of haunting this becomes a bit more complicated. An aspect or fragment of the person does not go into the light and they avoid the other-side-welcoming committee that comes to pick them up. This can happen because they have unfinished business, died in a confused state or because they have a feeling that they are going to hell for stealing that eraser in 4th grade. Often they will stay connected to their house and think they are still the owners. Some are gracious hosts and some want you out.
The E.R. Rodgers restaurant in Steilacoom is a great example of both types of ghosts. My father grew up next door to the house that has served as a private residence, boarding house and now a restaurant. He had many stories about the “ghost with red eyes” that looked out the front windows of the house overlooking the water. Recently I was walking into the downstairs women’s bathroom and actually excused myself and moved to the side as an upset women in a long taffeta dress cut directly in front of me hurrying to some unknown destination, disappearing into the bathroom wall. The interactive ghost, a scruffy old man, resides upstairs and stands on the stairs and harasses the restaurant guests and staff, turning lights on and off and moving things around in the kitchen. You can often smell his pipe smoke upstairs in the late evening. I understand nobody wants the job of being the last one out.
If you would like a list of some of the other haunted places in the area you can go to
If you are looking for a true poltergeist experience, (poltergeist means, “to knock” and “spirit” in German), I have two words – adolescent girls. Loud knocking, objects moving about on their own, voices, particular odors and apparitions are the hallmark of poltergeist experiences. These experiences tend to focus around a preteen female who's hormones and the stress of that age combine and finally release subconsciously in flinging dishes and loud rapping’s. Activity has also been associated with very stressed teens and young adults of either sex but there is nothing like a group of 14 year old girls to stir up a bit of Halloween haunting. The energies surrounding adolescence is a very powerful force.
In other times and cultures young adults were initiated into adulthood and taught skills to begin to run energy through their bodies and direct these emerging energies into effective creative forces. Today’s adolescents move into this energetically powerful time unassisted by the older wise ones in the village and end up flinging things through the air willy-nilly. This might be a little disconcerting for the family down the block, but can assist you wonderfully in creating the atmosphere you desire for that special Halloween effect. Be sure to get a note from the girl’s parents before proceeding.
Place 4 agitated teens in the corners of the room, for best results keep large amounts of Halloween snack sized snicker bars close at hand. Encourage them to look in the mirror by candlelight repeating the name “Bloody Mary” until totally worked up. Place an assortment of small easy to fling objects in the center of the room and enjoy!
About Ghosts
Halloween – my favorite holiday. I love costume parties, trick or treat and late night contact with the dead. Halloween falls exactly between the Fall Equinox and the Winter Solstice. It is the time when the veil between the worlds is the thinnest and the best time to peek over and see what the dead people are up to.
I grew up seeing dead people. I had no idea that seeing spirits was unusual until I was older. In my experience there seem to be a couple different types of haunting.
Sometimes an aspect of the person does not go into the light and they avoid the other-side-welcoming committee that comes to pick them up. This can happen because they have unfinished business, died in a confused state or because they have a feeling that they are going to hell for stealing that eraser in 4th grade. Often they will stay connected to their house and think they are still the owners. Some are gracious hosts and some want you out.
The most common ghostly appearance is a repetitive image haunting. This is the kind of ghostly occurrence that repeats the same sequence over and over again. Watching one of these instant replay ghosts is like looking at a tape recording of a highly intense emotional experience. If the ghost story begins with something like “every night at midnight you can see the headless huntsmen…” you are dealing with an emotional repeat. This kind of ghost is intent on its course and will walk right through you if you are in the way. Ghosts like this do not interact and though scary, are predictable.
For many years we owned an old farm and like many old houses ours came with a previous tenant. The previous owner who came with our house was named Alta.
My neighbor had grown up on the same street and knew the story of the unusual woman who used to live in our house. She was the scandal of the neighborhood. She walked around in the house naked, planted many of the trees in the backyard and read Tarot cards. Apparently Alta liked the place very much and decided to stay.
In 80 plus years the farmhouse has been remodeled more than a few times. When the house was very quiet I could hear someone bustling around upstairs. I could hear the stairs creaking as Alta walked down the old non-existent stairway into the dining room and the non-existent cupboard door creak open as she places items inside. She did exactly the same thing pretty much every day. My children grew up in the house knowing that Alta was just doing her housework. I don’t know what Alta’s great emotion was that kept her there year after year, I think it was her intense joy.
In the backyard, which Alta probably planted herself, was a perfect circle of trees. We used this circle for many things - a children’s play area, drumming circles and candle lit spirals for the Winter Solstice. We would hang out in hammocks between the trees on warm summer nights and enjoy the stars. Falling asleep in the circle was a bit hard though. There was this constant little tickle, like someone was touching me, and just as I would start to fall asleep I could hear children laughing. Pictures taken in the circle often contained energy balls or if you were lucky, you could spot Alta walking across the yard.
Olympia is a great town for ghost hunting. If you want to experience some ghostly images try the little old lady ghost in The Olympia Hotel women’s bathroom, or the ghosts in the Capitol Theater complete with a strict usher, or the whole gang of ghosts all dressed up for a ball in the Capitol Rotunda.
Have a Happy Halloween. I think I will run around naked and read the Tarot and see if I can leave some imprints for a future generation of ghost hunters!
I grew up seeing dead people. I had no idea that seeing spirits was unusual until I was older. In my experience there seem to be a couple different types of haunting.
Sometimes an aspect of the person does not go into the light and they avoid the other-side-welcoming committee that comes to pick them up. This can happen because they have unfinished business, died in a confused state or because they have a feeling that they are going to hell for stealing that eraser in 4th grade. Often they will stay connected to their house and think they are still the owners. Some are gracious hosts and some want you out.
The most common ghostly appearance is a repetitive image haunting. This is the kind of ghostly occurrence that repeats the same sequence over and over again. Watching one of these instant replay ghosts is like looking at a tape recording of a highly intense emotional experience. If the ghost story begins with something like “every night at midnight you can see the headless huntsmen…” you are dealing with an emotional repeat. This kind of ghost is intent on its course and will walk right through you if you are in the way. Ghosts like this do not interact and though scary, are predictable.
For many years we owned an old farm and like many old houses ours came with a previous tenant. The previous owner who came with our house was named Alta.
My neighbor had grown up on the same street and knew the story of the unusual woman who used to live in our house. She was the scandal of the neighborhood. She walked around in the house naked, planted many of the trees in the backyard and read Tarot cards. Apparently Alta liked the place very much and decided to stay.
In 80 plus years the farmhouse has been remodeled more than a few times. When the house was very quiet I could hear someone bustling around upstairs. I could hear the stairs creaking as Alta walked down the old non-existent stairway into the dining room and the non-existent cupboard door creak open as she places items inside. She did exactly the same thing pretty much every day. My children grew up in the house knowing that Alta was just doing her housework. I don’t know what Alta’s great emotion was that kept her there year after year, I think it was her intense joy.
In the backyard, which Alta probably planted herself, was a perfect circle of trees. We used this circle for many things - a children’s play area, drumming circles and candle lit spirals for the Winter Solstice. We would hang out in hammocks between the trees on warm summer nights and enjoy the stars. Falling asleep in the circle was a bit hard though. There was this constant little tickle, like someone was touching me, and just as I would start to fall asleep I could hear children laughing. Pictures taken in the circle often contained energy balls or if you were lucky, you could spot Alta walking across the yard.
Olympia is a great town for ghost hunting. If you want to experience some ghostly images try the little old lady ghost in The Olympia Hotel women’s bathroom, or the ghosts in the Capitol Theater complete with a strict usher, or the whole gang of ghosts all dressed up for a ball in the Capitol Rotunda.
Have a Happy Halloween. I think I will run around naked and read the Tarot and see if I can leave some imprints for a future generation of ghost hunters!
Things that go bump in the night
Here in the Pacific Northwest Fall seems to have come early this year. There is a rumor that it will get warm again but I think that hope always springs eternal and that simply the idea of warm days keep us happy.
These cold days have me turning towards October and my favorite time of the year, Halloween. I have more Halloween decoration by a long shot than any other holiday and already a pumpkin man on spindly legs has taken his place along side the goddess on my altar.
We have been doing some remodeling at the house and have stirred up a ghost from the attic. My husband Chuck and grandson Oliver where looking in the attic when a ball of light can down in front of them and out into the living room. My daughter and son-in-law - who are both clair-everything - and I stood there and watched a shy spirit search for a comfortable space to land.
This spirit seems very interested in our new bathroom, which was the former bedroom, so I have a visitor with me while I am in there. While I bush my teeth I talk to it and let him know that he is okay and welcome. I have assured him that things will calm down construction-wise and he will find a space to settle. I am considering creating a small spirit house for him up in my closet.
I will write more about ghosts as the days shorten, be well!
In grace and ease,
Cathy
These cold days have me turning towards October and my favorite time of the year, Halloween. I have more Halloween decoration by a long shot than any other holiday and already a pumpkin man on spindly legs has taken his place along side the goddess on my altar.
We have been doing some remodeling at the house and have stirred up a ghost from the attic. My husband Chuck and grandson Oliver where looking in the attic when a ball of light can down in front of them and out into the living room. My daughter and son-in-law - who are both clair-everything - and I stood there and watched a shy spirit search for a comfortable space to land.
This spirit seems very interested in our new bathroom, which was the former bedroom, so I have a visitor with me while I am in there. While I bush my teeth I talk to it and let him know that he is okay and welcome. I have assured him that things will calm down construction-wise and he will find a space to settle. I am considering creating a small spirit house for him up in my closet.
I will write more about ghosts as the days shorten, be well!
In grace and ease,
Cathy
Monday, August 18, 2008
Home from Ocean Shores
Greetings All:
Saturday I attending a wonderful small fair in Ocean Shores Washington. Fine assortment of vendors including Dolly Mae, a wonderful readers and intuitive who taught workshops on Indigo Children and The Power of Your Name.
I saw clients at my booth and also taught a workshop on intuition called "Hogwarts Adult Continuing Education" I had a full house of students all wishing they had recieved an invitation to Hogwarts like Harry Potter did!
I am teaching a one day workshop in Intuition in Olympia, WA on a Saturday at the end of September. If youare interested in attending it is $100.00 and class space is limited so contact me soon!
All is well in Olympia, Washington. Blessings to you!
In grace and ease,
Cathy Pfeil
Saturday I attending a wonderful small fair in Ocean Shores Washington. Fine assortment of vendors including Dolly Mae, a wonderful readers and intuitive who taught workshops on Indigo Children and The Power of Your Name.
I saw clients at my booth and also taught a workshop on intuition called "Hogwarts Adult Continuing Education" I had a full house of students all wishing they had recieved an invitation to Hogwarts like Harry Potter did!
I am teaching a one day workshop in Intuition in Olympia, WA on a Saturday at the end of September. If youare interested in attending it is $100.00 and class space is limited so contact me soon!
All is well in Olympia, Washington. Blessings to you!
In grace and ease,
Cathy Pfeil
Thursday, August 7, 2008
Dreaming
I have written several articles about the transformational experience I had because of a car crash in 1988. I spoke with Angels, had a near death experience with all the bells and whistles and was offered an opportunity to remain on this planet as a healer. Like many people who’s lives are transformed because of a near death experience, I tried to avoid the new spiritual direction I was being guided towards. Even in the middle of talking to Angels I believed I knew what was right for me in my life. All this healing stuff was just a little too far out for me. I had been a kindergarten teacher before the crash. I had an identity and group of ideas about who I was and what I was about in my life. I was in control.
After the crash all my identifying labels fell away. I was no longer the person I had been. The only thing I knew about myself for sure was that I now was a patient. Maintaining my amateur status, but taking my being a patient seriously enough to have been able to qualify for some weird patient Olympics. I was still just learning to walk, Physical Therapy was a regular event in my life and I still had more surgeries ahead of me.
I felt I needed to connect back into my previous life and though I made an attempt to move back into my old life but it became clear teaching kindergarten was not going to work. I took a position working for the local congresswoman helping constituents who needed assistance with federal government agencies. I am very grateful for having that job. It occupied my time in a worthwhile way during a time of intense personal healing and growth.
I continued to have people seek me out for healings while I worked for the Congresswoman. I even arranged to use the back of a small downtown shop to see my first clients, and I was surprised that people actually came in to see me. Every thing was going well until one day when the congresswoman came in. “ I am going to downsize this office”, she said. “I am going to need one of you to quit by the end of the year”. I was very surprised to see my hand shoot up and I heard myself say, “I’m ready to go”. I had to break it to my husband Chuck that I had just quit my job. I had no idea what I was going to do. I did not know what had made me say I would quit. I worked until the end of the year and started the New Year off by sleeping a lot. I was scared. I had no idea what I was to do next. I felt as if I was falling and had no control over what was happening to me. I still was having a steady stream of clients coming to me, more than before even, but I felt out of control. I was used to living my life with both my hands firmly on the steering wheel and my foot on the break. What was happening to me was not normal. I felt weird and I didn’t have a normal job. I didn’t even know what to call myself, “What do you do again? Clairvoyant? Intuitive? Healer? What does that mean exactly?” The dreaded word psychic kept creeping into my explanation. So I slept, a lot. Somehow in this dream world that had begun to open for me, a picture began to form. A picture of who I was and what I was about. I dreamt I was in a gazebo surrounded by a field of flowers. There were people around me. They had come to see me and to have a cup of tea. They were there only to be with me and to experience this intense feeling of compassion. I was not being expected to be anything I was not. I just had to be available.
One day as I was walking in downtown Olympia I heard my teacher’s voice. “There is an office available for you in this building”, he said. “Go in now and ask about it”. I stood before the Security Building downtown. I had never been in the building before. As I walked in my fears rose up, “There probably isn’t a space for rent”, I said to myself. “It will be too much money”. During this intense mind chatter I heard my teacher say ”there is a space for you, just a small space, just big enough and it is just the right price.” Angels pushed and prodded me up stairs and to the building’s office manager. “No I am sorry, there is nothing available right now”, the woman behind the desk said. “Thanks anyway” I said and turned to leave. “Oh, wait a minute. I do have one opening coming up at the end of the month, but it is kind of small.”
She showed me into a small narrow room. The ceiling was very high with a tall window. “I’ll take it,” I said. Then I had to go home and break it to Chuck that not only had I quit my job but also now I had rented an office. I had taken my foot off the break petal. I had said “yes “ to whatever the adventure held, and I went for it.
Today I can talk about marketing strategies and the importance of an active database. I have years of experience promoting my successful private practice and classes. But when I started all I knew was to raise my hand and say, “I’m ready to go” and be continually willing to take my foot off the brake and to simply be what I am.
In your life right now there is a place where Spirit is asking you to take your foot off the break. You will know where you are breaking because it is the place of the most resistance in your life. There is not a trick to move toward this thing called faith; it is only in the doing of it that it becomes your way.
As the time to move into that first office approached I made a flyer that said “Clairvoyant Healings” and began to put them around town. I bought two chairs and an appointment book just in case someone called. They did.
After the crash all my identifying labels fell away. I was no longer the person I had been. The only thing I knew about myself for sure was that I now was a patient. Maintaining my amateur status, but taking my being a patient seriously enough to have been able to qualify for some weird patient Olympics. I was still just learning to walk, Physical Therapy was a regular event in my life and I still had more surgeries ahead of me.
I felt I needed to connect back into my previous life and though I made an attempt to move back into my old life but it became clear teaching kindergarten was not going to work. I took a position working for the local congresswoman helping constituents who needed assistance with federal government agencies. I am very grateful for having that job. It occupied my time in a worthwhile way during a time of intense personal healing and growth.
I continued to have people seek me out for healings while I worked for the Congresswoman. I even arranged to use the back of a small downtown shop to see my first clients, and I was surprised that people actually came in to see me. Every thing was going well until one day when the congresswoman came in. “ I am going to downsize this office”, she said. “I am going to need one of you to quit by the end of the year”. I was very surprised to see my hand shoot up and I heard myself say, “I’m ready to go”. I had to break it to my husband Chuck that I had just quit my job. I had no idea what I was going to do. I did not know what had made me say I would quit. I worked until the end of the year and started the New Year off by sleeping a lot. I was scared. I had no idea what I was to do next. I felt as if I was falling and had no control over what was happening to me. I still was having a steady stream of clients coming to me, more than before even, but I felt out of control. I was used to living my life with both my hands firmly on the steering wheel and my foot on the break. What was happening to me was not normal. I felt weird and I didn’t have a normal job. I didn’t even know what to call myself, “What do you do again? Clairvoyant? Intuitive? Healer? What does that mean exactly?” The dreaded word psychic kept creeping into my explanation. So I slept, a lot. Somehow in this dream world that had begun to open for me, a picture began to form. A picture of who I was and what I was about. I dreamt I was in a gazebo surrounded by a field of flowers. There were people around me. They had come to see me and to have a cup of tea. They were there only to be with me and to experience this intense feeling of compassion. I was not being expected to be anything I was not. I just had to be available.
One day as I was walking in downtown Olympia I heard my teacher’s voice. “There is an office available for you in this building”, he said. “Go in now and ask about it”. I stood before the Security Building downtown. I had never been in the building before. As I walked in my fears rose up, “There probably isn’t a space for rent”, I said to myself. “It will be too much money”. During this intense mind chatter I heard my teacher say ”there is a space for you, just a small space, just big enough and it is just the right price.” Angels pushed and prodded me up stairs and to the building’s office manager. “No I am sorry, there is nothing available right now”, the woman behind the desk said. “Thanks anyway” I said and turned to leave. “Oh, wait a minute. I do have one opening coming up at the end of the month, but it is kind of small.”
She showed me into a small narrow room. The ceiling was very high with a tall window. “I’ll take it,” I said. Then I had to go home and break it to Chuck that not only had I quit my job but also now I had rented an office. I had taken my foot off the break petal. I had said “yes “ to whatever the adventure held, and I went for it.
Today I can talk about marketing strategies and the importance of an active database. I have years of experience promoting my successful private practice and classes. But when I started all I knew was to raise my hand and say, “I’m ready to go” and be continually willing to take my foot off the brake and to simply be what I am.
In your life right now there is a place where Spirit is asking you to take your foot off the break. You will know where you are breaking because it is the place of the most resistance in your life. There is not a trick to move toward this thing called faith; it is only in the doing of it that it becomes your way.
As the time to move into that first office approached I made a flyer that said “Clairvoyant Healings” and began to put them around town. I bought two chairs and an appointment book just in case someone called. They did.
How I started my practice
I have written several articles about the transformational experience I had because of a car crash in 1988. I spoke with Angels, had a near death experience with all the bells and whistles and was offered an opportunity to remain on this planet as a healer. Like many people who’s lives are transformed because of a near death experience, I tried to avoid the new spiritual direction I was being guided towards. Even in the middle of talking to Angels I believed I knew what was right for me in my life. All this healing stuff was just a little too far out for me. I had been a kindergarten teacher before the crash. I had an identity and group of ideas about who I was and what I was about in my life. I was in control.
After the crash all my identifying labels fell away. I was no longer the person I had been. The only thing I knew about myself for sure was that I now was a patient. Maintaining my amateur status, but taking my being a patient seriously enough to have been able to qualify for some weird patient Olympics. I was still just learning to walk, Physical Therapy was a regular event in my life and I still had more surgeries ahead of me.
I felt I needed to connect back into my previous life and though I made an attempt to move back into my old life but it became clear teaching kindergarten was not going to work. I took a position working for the local congresswoman helping constituents who needed assistance with federal government agencies. I am very grateful for having that job. It occupied my time in a worthwhile way during a time of intense personal healing and growth.
I continued to have people seek me out for healings while I worked for the Congresswoman. I even arranged to use the back of a small downtown shop to see my first clients, and I was surprised that people actually came in to see me. Every thing was going well until one day when the congresswoman came in. “ I am going to downsize this office”, she said. “I am going to need one of you to quit by the end of the year”. I was very surprised to see my hand shoot up and I heard myself say, “I’m ready to go”. I had to break it to my husband Chuck that I had just quit my job. I had no idea what I was going to do. I did not know what had made me say I would quit. I worked until the end of the year and started the New Year off by sleeping a lot. I was scared. I had no idea what I was to do next. I felt as if I was falling and had no control over what was happening to me. I still was having a steady stream of clients coming to me, more than before even, but I felt out of control. I was used to living my life with both my hands firmly on the steering wheel and my foot on the break. What was happening to me was not normal. I felt weird and I didn’t have a normal job. I didn’t even know what to call myself, “What do you do again? Clairvoyant? Intuitive? Healer? What does that mean exactly?” The dreaded word psychic kept creeping into my explanation. So I slept, a lot. Somehow in this dream world that had begun to open for me, a picture began to form. A picture of who I was and what I was about. I dreamt I was in a gazebo surrounded by a field of flowers. There were people around me. They had come to see me and to have a cup of tea. They were there only to be with me and to experience this intense feeling of compassion. I was not being expected to be anything I was not. I just had to be available.
One day as I was walking in downtown Olympia I heard my teacher’s voice. “There is an office available for you in this building”, he said. “Go in now and ask about it”. I stood before the Security Building downtown. I had never been in the building before. As I walked in my fears rose up, “There probably isn’t a space for rent”, I said to myself. “It will be too much money”. During this intense mind chatter I heard my teacher say ”there is a space for you, just a small space, just big enough and it is just the right price.” Angels pushed and prodded me up stairs and to the building’s office manager. “No I am sorry, there is nothing available right now”, the woman behind the desk said. “Thanks anyway” I said and turned to leave. “Oh, wait a minute. I do have one opening coming up at the end of the month, but it is kind of small.”
She showed me into a small narrow room. The ceiling was very high with a tall window. “I’ll take it,” I said. Then I had to go home and break it to Chuck that not only had I quit my job but also now I had rented an office. I had taken my foot off the break petal. I had said “yes “ to whatever the adventure held, and I went for it.
Today I can talk about marketing strategies and the importance of an active database. I have years of experience promoting my successful private practice and classes. But when I started all I knew was to raise my hand and say, “I’m ready to go” and be continually willing to take my foot off the brake and to simply be what I am.
In your life right now there is a place where Spirit is asking you to take your foot off the break. You will know where you are breaking because it is the place of the most resistance in your life. There is not a trick to move toward this thing called faith; it is only in the doing of it that it becomes your way.
As the time to move into that first office approached I made a flyer that said “Clairvoyant Healings” and began to put them around town. I bought two chairs and an appointment book just in case someone called. They did.
After the crash all my identifying labels fell away. I was no longer the person I had been. The only thing I knew about myself for sure was that I now was a patient. Maintaining my amateur status, but taking my being a patient seriously enough to have been able to qualify for some weird patient Olympics. I was still just learning to walk, Physical Therapy was a regular event in my life and I still had more surgeries ahead of me.
I felt I needed to connect back into my previous life and though I made an attempt to move back into my old life but it became clear teaching kindergarten was not going to work. I took a position working for the local congresswoman helping constituents who needed assistance with federal government agencies. I am very grateful for having that job. It occupied my time in a worthwhile way during a time of intense personal healing and growth.
I continued to have people seek me out for healings while I worked for the Congresswoman. I even arranged to use the back of a small downtown shop to see my first clients, and I was surprised that people actually came in to see me. Every thing was going well until one day when the congresswoman came in. “ I am going to downsize this office”, she said. “I am going to need one of you to quit by the end of the year”. I was very surprised to see my hand shoot up and I heard myself say, “I’m ready to go”. I had to break it to my husband Chuck that I had just quit my job. I had no idea what I was going to do. I did not know what had made me say I would quit. I worked until the end of the year and started the New Year off by sleeping a lot. I was scared. I had no idea what I was to do next. I felt as if I was falling and had no control over what was happening to me. I still was having a steady stream of clients coming to me, more than before even, but I felt out of control. I was used to living my life with both my hands firmly on the steering wheel and my foot on the break. What was happening to me was not normal. I felt weird and I didn’t have a normal job. I didn’t even know what to call myself, “What do you do again? Clairvoyant? Intuitive? Healer? What does that mean exactly?” The dreaded word psychic kept creeping into my explanation. So I slept, a lot. Somehow in this dream world that had begun to open for me, a picture began to form. A picture of who I was and what I was about. I dreamt I was in a gazebo surrounded by a field of flowers. There were people around me. They had come to see me and to have a cup of tea. They were there only to be with me and to experience this intense feeling of compassion. I was not being expected to be anything I was not. I just had to be available.
One day as I was walking in downtown Olympia I heard my teacher’s voice. “There is an office available for you in this building”, he said. “Go in now and ask about it”. I stood before the Security Building downtown. I had never been in the building before. As I walked in my fears rose up, “There probably isn’t a space for rent”, I said to myself. “It will be too much money”. During this intense mind chatter I heard my teacher say ”there is a space for you, just a small space, just big enough and it is just the right price.” Angels pushed and prodded me up stairs and to the building’s office manager. “No I am sorry, there is nothing available right now”, the woman behind the desk said. “Thanks anyway” I said and turned to leave. “Oh, wait a minute. I do have one opening coming up at the end of the month, but it is kind of small.”
She showed me into a small narrow room. The ceiling was very high with a tall window. “I’ll take it,” I said. Then I had to go home and break it to Chuck that not only had I quit my job but also now I had rented an office. I had taken my foot off the break petal. I had said “yes “ to whatever the adventure held, and I went for it.
Today I can talk about marketing strategies and the importance of an active database. I have years of experience promoting my successful private practice and classes. But when I started all I knew was to raise my hand and say, “I’m ready to go” and be continually willing to take my foot off the brake and to simply be what I am.
In your life right now there is a place where Spirit is asking you to take your foot off the break. You will know where you are breaking because it is the place of the most resistance in your life. There is not a trick to move toward this thing called faith; it is only in the doing of it that it becomes your way.
As the time to move into that first office approached I made a flyer that said “Clairvoyant Healings” and began to put them around town. I bought two chairs and an appointment book just in case someone called. They did.
Traveling with Spirit
On a recent trip down to California I arrived at the San Francisco airport late and had missed my small commuter plane connection. I was told that because of overbooking it was highly unlikely that a stand-by seat into the small airport I was flying to would be available that day. They issued me a ticket flying to another location back up the coast and then on from there to my final destination. This would have delayed my arrival until late in the evening. After being on a plane since 6 a.m. additional flying up and down the coast several times was not high on my list of fun ways to spend the day.
I asked the ticket agent to put me on stand by anyway, just in case I could get on the plane. I went to work immediately. I sat facing the doorway that would lead me out to board the plane. I centered myself, I imagined a cord going down from the base of my spine to the center of the Earth and anchoring me. I imagined the top of my head open and energy from Spirit flowing through me. I began my prayer: I know there is one divine force at work in the universe. I waited until that truth resonated through me. I am part of that force, part of spirit manifesting in this body and this experience. I aligned myself with that truth and felt it deep inside. I am grateful for boarding the next commuter plane and arriving at my destination. I felt what it was like to hear my name being called to board the plane. I felt myself pick up my bags and hurry up to the line. I heard the ticket agent say, “You got on the plane!” I imagined the wind hit my face as I walked across the tarmac to board and climbing the steps up into the small plane. I imagined sitting down and facing my seatbelt. I imagined the take of, the flight and the landing. I imagined my friends greeting me at my destination and what that would feel like to receive their hugs. I moved into this experience until it was so real I could smell the smells and be totally in the experience.
I now give thanks for this experience and release it as in completion and done. I continued to repeat this process until the moment came that the plane was boarding. My name was called. I stood up and grabbed my bags just as I had envisioned. The ticket agent said, “I don’t know how this happened, but you are on this flight.”
Knowing there is one force in the universe, connecting to that force, stating my positive affirmation, giving thanks and letting go.
I asked the ticket agent to put me on stand by anyway, just in case I could get on the plane. I went to work immediately. I sat facing the doorway that would lead me out to board the plane. I centered myself, I imagined a cord going down from the base of my spine to the center of the Earth and anchoring me. I imagined the top of my head open and energy from Spirit flowing through me. I began my prayer: I know there is one divine force at work in the universe. I waited until that truth resonated through me. I am part of that force, part of spirit manifesting in this body and this experience. I aligned myself with that truth and felt it deep inside. I am grateful for boarding the next commuter plane and arriving at my destination. I felt what it was like to hear my name being called to board the plane. I felt myself pick up my bags and hurry up to the line. I heard the ticket agent say, “You got on the plane!” I imagined the wind hit my face as I walked across the tarmac to board and climbing the steps up into the small plane. I imagined sitting down and facing my seatbelt. I imagined the take of, the flight and the landing. I imagined my friends greeting me at my destination and what that would feel like to receive their hugs. I moved into this experience until it was so real I could smell the smells and be totally in the experience.
I now give thanks for this experience and release it as in completion and done. I continued to repeat this process until the moment came that the plane was boarding. My name was called. I stood up and grabbed my bags just as I had envisioned. The ticket agent said, “I don’t know how this happened, but you are on this flight.”
Knowing there is one force in the universe, connecting to that force, stating my positive affirmation, giving thanks and letting go.
Spiritual Transformation
I am really good at huge events that create transformation in my life. Because I have chosen huge 100-mph in-your-face experiences to "get it" I now choose to get my life lessons without a big bonk.
When I fly I always do a quick check of everyone's energy before boarding. I had the idea that if with my psychic eye if something was wrong I would not get on the plane and somehow save myself from doom.
As I sat down in my seat with the in focus intensity of something very out of the ordinary. I centered myself and went within to ask what was happening. I thought emergency landing and I knew I was part of whatever was about to unfold and did not even consider getting off the plane.
A very old couple boarded and sat next to me. She was too confused to engage in a conversation. Morning coffee was passed out and the immediately picked back up because of the turbulence we were experiencing. No one was moving around the cabin; the flight attendants were all safely buckled in.
The elderly man next to me asked to get out and went down to the bathroom. As I turned towards his wife she said, "He has had a heart attack before and I think he is
going to die this time." I pushed my assistance button and an attendant met me. "There is a man in the bathroom having a heart attack', I said. The attendants went to assist
the man. I went back to my seat and began to talk to his wife. Again she could not answer. I realized that it was highly unlikely that she had spoken to me about her
out loud. I had heard her inner plea to help her husband.
Moments later I was asked to exchange seats with a paramedic that was going to assist. The plane wa bouncing along and with everyone else safely in their seatbelts as the entire plane focused on getting me safely to that seat. Each person held my arms as I passed them. I looked down the isle at the beautiful faces of these strangers who had been for that instant connected in a higher purpose.
There is a wonderful exercise call the Angel Walk. The two
lines face each other and one at a time walki with our eyes closed down the middle. People gently touch and support you on your journey. We sing, "How could anyone every tell you, you were anything less that beautiful, how could anyone every tell you, you were less than whole…"
Down the isle of the plane I walked. Surrounded by my “Angels”. As I walked I said to myself, "I am supported by the Universe. My path is made easy by the support of those who surround me." The words of the song came flooding back, "How deeply we are connected in our souls."
We made an emergency landing and the couple disembarked to receive medical care. The moment ended, people fell back into their own agendas. Complaints of missing connecting flights and grumbling replaced the precious moments that had just proceeded. I however hold the memory and speak to you with the knowledge that youdon't have to huge experience happen to you to be in the presence of Angels. Even a walk down the isle of a plane can change your life.
When I fly I always do a quick check of everyone's energy before boarding. I had the idea that if with my psychic eye if something was wrong I would not get on the plane and somehow save myself from doom.
As I sat down in my seat with the in focus intensity of something very out of the ordinary. I centered myself and went within to ask what was happening. I thought emergency landing and I knew I was part of whatever was about to unfold and did not even consider getting off the plane.
A very old couple boarded and sat next to me. She was too confused to engage in a conversation. Morning coffee was passed out and the immediately picked back up because of the turbulence we were experiencing. No one was moving around the cabin; the flight attendants were all safely buckled in.
The elderly man next to me asked to get out and went down to the bathroom. As I turned towards his wife she said, "He has had a heart attack before and I think he is
going to die this time." I pushed my assistance button and an attendant met me. "There is a man in the bathroom having a heart attack', I said. The attendants went to assist
the man. I went back to my seat and began to talk to his wife. Again she could not answer. I realized that it was highly unlikely that she had spoken to me about her
out loud. I had heard her inner plea to help her husband.
Moments later I was asked to exchange seats with a paramedic that was going to assist. The plane wa bouncing along and with everyone else safely in their seatbelts as the entire plane focused on getting me safely to that seat. Each person held my arms as I passed them. I looked down the isle at the beautiful faces of these strangers who had been for that instant connected in a higher purpose.
There is a wonderful exercise call the Angel Walk. The two
lines face each other and one at a time walki with our eyes closed down the middle. People gently touch and support you on your journey. We sing, "How could anyone every tell you, you were anything less that beautiful, how could anyone every tell you, you were less than whole…"
Down the isle of the plane I walked. Surrounded by my “Angels”. As I walked I said to myself, "I am supported by the Universe. My path is made easy by the support of those who surround me." The words of the song came flooding back, "How deeply we are connected in our souls."
We made an emergency landing and the couple disembarked to receive medical care. The moment ended, people fell back into their own agendas. Complaints of missing connecting flights and grumbling replaced the precious moments that had just proceeded. I however hold the memory and speak to you with the knowledge that youdon't have to huge experience happen to you to be in the presence of Angels. Even a walk down the isle of a plane can change your life.
More about Night School
Night School
Since 1988 I have been attending a series of special classes in my dreams. I have graduated from 4 separate “Night Universities” and today continue with taking special classes, but primarily I teach and do healing work in my dreams.
The dreams began shortly after my spiritual awakening in 1988. I had a near death experience after my family was involved in a car crash. Because of internal injuries I had emergency surgery that left an incision from pelvic bone to sternum. I woke in the hospital with several light beings around my bed. They had long delicate fingers that seemed to weave the air above my stomach. Explaining to me that the surgeon had done all he could to repair the damage, they began the delicate work of repairing the field above my body. I thought they were playing the piano. “We will show you this technique later,” they said. And they kept their promise. The first healing technique I was taught in night school was how to extend my fingers into long beams of light that could knit together what appears to me as a multi-layered grid surrounding the body.
The night school time has always occurred between 12:00 a.m. and 4:45 a.m. “Night School” dreaming begins after a short period of regular dreams that often intertwines the day’s events or situations. School often begins with an experience of traveling. When my night studies began in 1988 every dream began in the same way. I would be propelled through a tunnel of light. As time went on I became very curious and wanted to learn more about the tunnel. I learned to slow down and actually look at the tunnel. It was math formulas and geometric shapes. I have always thought it was humorous that this piece of information would be revealed to me since I have always had such trouble with numbers. The secret of the “tunnel formula” is definitely safe with me.
On the other end of the tunnel was always a park-like setting with a carved stone bench and a water fountain. A teacher would come towards me and we would walk or sit together and discuss what the class was to be about. My first classes were the longest, sometimes lasting several months on one concept. Other times a lesson would happen in one night. As I learned about one subject I would be offered opportunities in waking state following the teaching to test out the level of my new understanding.
I had been going to the temple courtyard in my dreams for over a year when I attended a slide presentation of sacred sites. One of the slides showed my bench. I got so excited I made the woman giving the presentation back the slide until I could really look at the picture. I explained the temple building to the side of the bench, the fountain and the hills that surrounded them. “It is exactly as you are saying. So you have been to Malta?” she asked. “Yes”, I answered, “last night in my dream I was there in class”. In my dream my Malta classroom is a thriving present time reality. The fountain bubbles and it is lush and green.
My first two years in night school was just like waking state. There was always a physical setting, like the Malta temple, and human beings. As time went on school became much more complicated. I began to experience myself and the other participants in different forms, such as dolphin-like beings, feline looking “lion persons”. The form that I take most frequently now is as a very tall light being. I realized that if my teachers would have started with these images it would have been too much for my sleepy humanness to take in. I am always grateful to my teachers for the gentle way they allowed me to grow. I strive to offer my students, both in day school and night school, the same gift.
Now my experience in night school varies depending on what I am doing. Sometimes the dreams begin with a meeting with other beings. Sometimes I go directly to a place and begin to work with someone. When I first began to receive teachings I thought all the teachers I worked with were angels or guides. As my work has grown to include doing teaching and healing in dreams, I now appear as that same kind of teacher I believed to be Angels.
Often my night school travels take me to a real earth location. I belong to a group of beings that work regularly on a specific tall narrow pyramid in Guatemala. From the top of this location I work with energies that are connected around the planet between this pyramid and other sacred sites. This next spring I will be traveling in waking state to visit this site.
Sometimes the people I work with in dreamtime find me. A woman came into my office for an appointment. She began to cry as she came in. She said she had a very difficult period the month before and had prayed for an Angel to help her. I had appeared in her dream comforting her and told her to “go see Cathy Pfeil”. I even spelled my name out for her explaining it was a difficult spelling. She was very surprised to find her special Angel was a regular person! I asked her what I was wearing in the dream and she described a new dress I had recently purchased. In her dream I appeared exactly as I am in waking life.
In dream state I created myself the same, no beautiful long legged body, no thick wavy hair, just me. I asked my night school teachers why I would do that if I could create myself anyway I wanted in dreams. “You can create yourself anyway you want in dream state, but you can in your waking life too”. He said, “You are completely your manifestation.”
Without fail as soon as night school ends I wake up. Waking up seems to be a method I use to help me remember my lessons. I then fall back to sleep and spend from 4:45 to the time I wake up in the morning taking specific questions into dream and receiving answers. I wake and sleep in cycles that allow me to maintain a lucid interactive state. I ask questions about the teachings I am receiving and about things happening in my personal life. I also spend time in active prayer and healing for people who have asked me to do long distance work with them.
I remember my dreams as if they are waking state. To me everything that happens in my dreams are as real as what happens in my waking life. One of the impacts this has had on my life is the realization that waking state is as richly symbolic as dream state. In my dream state I am involved in a moving tapestry of images and teachings in which I interact. I now live in my waking life in a tapestry of images that I interact with at the same level of lucidity and conscious creation.
If I have trouble interpreting what just happened or it seems too complicated, I ask for the teaching again in a simpler form. I know the next dream will be the simpler version. If I still don’t understand I keep asking for simpler dreams until it is clear. Then the dreams reverse and become more complicated until I am back at the original dream.
I keep a journal of my dreams and reread them frequently. As I continue to grow and change the level at which I understand the dreams increases. I have found dream interpretation books of little help in understanding my own dreams. Exploring my own dreams and what the symbols mean for me has been the best dream interpretation tool.
Moving from one “Night University” into another often includes a completion dream. I enjoy playing in my life, and my dream life is no different. A good completion dream for me needs all the trimmings receiving a grade, a gold crown, a party and the final ah-ha:
I had gone to participate a workshop. I was late getting there because I was teaching a class. I arrived just as the group was getting ready to walk down to another location near the water to continue their work. The woman and man who were leading the group handed me a small pouch with what I thought were Tarot cards, but I did not look.
I put the pouch down by my luggage and began to talk to the man and woman about what the class had been doing. They told me each group was setting their own criteria for the class and everyone already had partners except two. There was a woman who was working on issues concerning women and babies, and a man working on understanding Kundalini energy. I told them I would work with the man because I had already completed my studies on women and children.
I went to pick up my pouch and join the group when I saw it was missing. The instructors would not let me join the class without my bag and they all went on without me.
I began to search for my pouch. I was then in my own house and searched everywhere. There were great piles of art supplies and ritual objects under beds, in closets, everywhere. I looked in every place there was to look but could not find the pouch. I could hear the group drumming and singing and could see them when I looked out the window. I felt angry and frustrated.
Finally I decided that I was going anyway. As I was leaving the house I heard a piano playing very softly “Heart and Soul”. I went back into the house and there was a little spirit girl with dark hair and eyes at the piano. I went up to her and sat down on the bench. “It was so pretty”, she said. “I wanted it for myself so I took it” She pointed to the pouch on the top of the piano.
“How about if I make you another just like it?’ I asked, “I will begin working on it tonight and complete it a bit at a time until it is done, and you give me the bag so I can join the class?”
Two older spirit children appeared. An older brother and sister. “That is a great idea”, they said. I took the bag and for the first time opened it. Inside was a set of Tarot cards, but they were all blank.
I took the cards in the pouch and joined the class just as they were finishing. I was still thinking about the girl and the cards and wanted to share what had happened. I told the male instructor the story of the little spirit girl. He asked, “do you know what goes on the cards now?” I said “yes, half would be in-breaths and half would be out-breaths. The in-breath cards would all have adventures and events that have happened to me that have created on my path. The out-breath cards would be resting times and times when it appeared I was off track in my life. The cards were about me.” He took the stack of cards and wrote “A+” on the top one. “You passed the class Cathy. Looking through all of your important things from the past was part of it. Making the commitment to Spirit to create and see your life as both the in and out breath was the last part, you have graduated.”
We all went out and there was a big party going on. Everyone was in exotic costumes. I found a huge gold crown and put it on. It had two small statues of Kyan Yin on the top. Several other people had crowns on too. We talked about how much fun it was to play with the crowns.
I invite you to consider enrolling in this special night college. The curriculum is exciting and challenging. Don’t wait for a big crash in your life to begin on your spiritual path. Say yes to Spirit, yes to understanding your dreams and yes to the in-breaths and out-breaths of your life. It is the heart and soul in the circle of life. See you in class.
Since 1988 I have been attending a series of special classes in my dreams. I have graduated from 4 separate “Night Universities” and today continue with taking special classes, but primarily I teach and do healing work in my dreams.
The dreams began shortly after my spiritual awakening in 1988. I had a near death experience after my family was involved in a car crash. Because of internal injuries I had emergency surgery that left an incision from pelvic bone to sternum. I woke in the hospital with several light beings around my bed. They had long delicate fingers that seemed to weave the air above my stomach. Explaining to me that the surgeon had done all he could to repair the damage, they began the delicate work of repairing the field above my body. I thought they were playing the piano. “We will show you this technique later,” they said. And they kept their promise. The first healing technique I was taught in night school was how to extend my fingers into long beams of light that could knit together what appears to me as a multi-layered grid surrounding the body.
The night school time has always occurred between 12:00 a.m. and 4:45 a.m. “Night School” dreaming begins after a short period of regular dreams that often intertwines the day’s events or situations. School often begins with an experience of traveling. When my night studies began in 1988 every dream began in the same way. I would be propelled through a tunnel of light. As time went on I became very curious and wanted to learn more about the tunnel. I learned to slow down and actually look at the tunnel. It was math formulas and geometric shapes. I have always thought it was humorous that this piece of information would be revealed to me since I have always had such trouble with numbers. The secret of the “tunnel formula” is definitely safe with me.
On the other end of the tunnel was always a park-like setting with a carved stone bench and a water fountain. A teacher would come towards me and we would walk or sit together and discuss what the class was to be about. My first classes were the longest, sometimes lasting several months on one concept. Other times a lesson would happen in one night. As I learned about one subject I would be offered opportunities in waking state following the teaching to test out the level of my new understanding.
I had been going to the temple courtyard in my dreams for over a year when I attended a slide presentation of sacred sites. One of the slides showed my bench. I got so excited I made the woman giving the presentation back the slide until I could really look at the picture. I explained the temple building to the side of the bench, the fountain and the hills that surrounded them. “It is exactly as you are saying. So you have been to Malta?” she asked. “Yes”, I answered, “last night in my dream I was there in class”. In my dream my Malta classroom is a thriving present time reality. The fountain bubbles and it is lush and green.
My first two years in night school was just like waking state. There was always a physical setting, like the Malta temple, and human beings. As time went on school became much more complicated. I began to experience myself and the other participants in different forms, such as dolphin-like beings, feline looking “lion persons”. The form that I take most frequently now is as a very tall light being. I realized that if my teachers would have started with these images it would have been too much for my sleepy humanness to take in. I am always grateful to my teachers for the gentle way they allowed me to grow. I strive to offer my students, both in day school and night school, the same gift.
Now my experience in night school varies depending on what I am doing. Sometimes the dreams begin with a meeting with other beings. Sometimes I go directly to a place and begin to work with someone. When I first began to receive teachings I thought all the teachers I worked with were angels or guides. As my work has grown to include doing teaching and healing in dreams, I now appear as that same kind of teacher I believed to be Angels.
Often my night school travels take me to a real earth location. I belong to a group of beings that work regularly on a specific tall narrow pyramid in Guatemala. From the top of this location I work with energies that are connected around the planet between this pyramid and other sacred sites. This next spring I will be traveling in waking state to visit this site.
Sometimes the people I work with in dreamtime find me. A woman came into my office for an appointment. She began to cry as she came in. She said she had a very difficult period the month before and had prayed for an Angel to help her. I had appeared in her dream comforting her and told her to “go see Cathy Pfeil”. I even spelled my name out for her explaining it was a difficult spelling. She was very surprised to find her special Angel was a regular person! I asked her what I was wearing in the dream and she described a new dress I had recently purchased. In her dream I appeared exactly as I am in waking life.
In dream state I created myself the same, no beautiful long legged body, no thick wavy hair, just me. I asked my night school teachers why I would do that if I could create myself anyway I wanted in dreams. “You can create yourself anyway you want in dream state, but you can in your waking life too”. He said, “You are completely your manifestation.”
Without fail as soon as night school ends I wake up. Waking up seems to be a method I use to help me remember my lessons. I then fall back to sleep and spend from 4:45 to the time I wake up in the morning taking specific questions into dream and receiving answers. I wake and sleep in cycles that allow me to maintain a lucid interactive state. I ask questions about the teachings I am receiving and about things happening in my personal life. I also spend time in active prayer and healing for people who have asked me to do long distance work with them.
I remember my dreams as if they are waking state. To me everything that happens in my dreams are as real as what happens in my waking life. One of the impacts this has had on my life is the realization that waking state is as richly symbolic as dream state. In my dream state I am involved in a moving tapestry of images and teachings in which I interact. I now live in my waking life in a tapestry of images that I interact with at the same level of lucidity and conscious creation.
If I have trouble interpreting what just happened or it seems too complicated, I ask for the teaching again in a simpler form. I know the next dream will be the simpler version. If I still don’t understand I keep asking for simpler dreams until it is clear. Then the dreams reverse and become more complicated until I am back at the original dream.
I keep a journal of my dreams and reread them frequently. As I continue to grow and change the level at which I understand the dreams increases. I have found dream interpretation books of little help in understanding my own dreams. Exploring my own dreams and what the symbols mean for me has been the best dream interpretation tool.
Moving from one “Night University” into another often includes a completion dream. I enjoy playing in my life, and my dream life is no different. A good completion dream for me needs all the trimmings receiving a grade, a gold crown, a party and the final ah-ha:
I had gone to participate a workshop. I was late getting there because I was teaching a class. I arrived just as the group was getting ready to walk down to another location near the water to continue their work. The woman and man who were leading the group handed me a small pouch with what I thought were Tarot cards, but I did not look.
I put the pouch down by my luggage and began to talk to the man and woman about what the class had been doing. They told me each group was setting their own criteria for the class and everyone already had partners except two. There was a woman who was working on issues concerning women and babies, and a man working on understanding Kundalini energy. I told them I would work with the man because I had already completed my studies on women and children.
I went to pick up my pouch and join the group when I saw it was missing. The instructors would not let me join the class without my bag and they all went on without me.
I began to search for my pouch. I was then in my own house and searched everywhere. There were great piles of art supplies and ritual objects under beds, in closets, everywhere. I looked in every place there was to look but could not find the pouch. I could hear the group drumming and singing and could see them when I looked out the window. I felt angry and frustrated.
Finally I decided that I was going anyway. As I was leaving the house I heard a piano playing very softly “Heart and Soul”. I went back into the house and there was a little spirit girl with dark hair and eyes at the piano. I went up to her and sat down on the bench. “It was so pretty”, she said. “I wanted it for myself so I took it” She pointed to the pouch on the top of the piano.
“How about if I make you another just like it?’ I asked, “I will begin working on it tonight and complete it a bit at a time until it is done, and you give me the bag so I can join the class?”
Two older spirit children appeared. An older brother and sister. “That is a great idea”, they said. I took the bag and for the first time opened it. Inside was a set of Tarot cards, but they were all blank.
I took the cards in the pouch and joined the class just as they were finishing. I was still thinking about the girl and the cards and wanted to share what had happened. I told the male instructor the story of the little spirit girl. He asked, “do you know what goes on the cards now?” I said “yes, half would be in-breaths and half would be out-breaths. The in-breath cards would all have adventures and events that have happened to me that have created on my path. The out-breath cards would be resting times and times when it appeared I was off track in my life. The cards were about me.” He took the stack of cards and wrote “A+” on the top one. “You passed the class Cathy. Looking through all of your important things from the past was part of it. Making the commitment to Spirit to create and see your life as both the in and out breath was the last part, you have graduated.”
We all went out and there was a big party going on. Everyone was in exotic costumes. I found a huge gold crown and put it on. It had two small statues of Kyan Yin on the top. Several other people had crowns on too. We talked about how much fun it was to play with the crowns.
I invite you to consider enrolling in this special night college. The curriculum is exciting and challenging. Don’t wait for a big crash in your life to begin on your spiritual path. Say yes to Spirit, yes to understanding your dreams and yes to the in-breaths and out-breaths of your life. It is the heart and soul in the circle of life. See you in class.
More about me
I was raised in a household were all the women where psychic. They did not call it that; they called it “the women’s thing”. As a child I saw energy and sensed things about people. Growing up in the funeral business I saw ghosts and felt the grief of family’s who where experiencing loss.
In 1988 when I was 35 I had a series of near death experiences that where the result of a car crash. It was like tuning in a radio signal. I immediately began to focus in on the spiritual realm, and began my spiritual journey both in body and out of body. I began attending “night school” in my dreams and my inner teachers began the process that has continued through the present.
Being a curious I began taking classes that I thought would help explain how to manage the experience I was having. I did all the classes through the Washington Psychic Institute (Church of the Divine Man) and a year of the ministerial program there. I actually was kicked out for explaining an alternate idea given to me by my “night school teachers” for something we had learned in the class.
I became interested in Reiki and eventually became a Reiki Master and taught Reiki. I studied with Ken Page through the Third Eye of Horus Mystery School and learned Multidimensional Cellular Healing, then became a staff member, helped Ken write a book and became a teacher there.
I have studied with Starr Fuentes, who is a Curandrea and has a program called Divine Intervention. I became a teacher of D.I. and taught this healing technique.
I also had a center in Olympia where I taught classes in intuition and different healing techniques. I had a private practice during that time, seeing clients in Olympia and traveling around the Northwest, then down into California and other parts of the U.S. doing talks, workshops and private sessions.
I have taken many classes with Carolyn Myss and Dr. Norman Shealy, and eventually joined the Medical Intuition program they were offering. I did 3 years of that program then became very ill and needed to stop everything for a while.
I am a long time student of the Science of Mind and began taking classes 4 years ago with the local church in Olympia (which I also helped start). I am a Practitioner of the Science of Mind.
I continue to be a student and a teacher in my “Night School”. I am well, and I have begun seeing clients writing and teaching again.
In 1988 when I was 35 I had a series of near death experiences that where the result of a car crash. It was like tuning in a radio signal. I immediately began to focus in on the spiritual realm, and began my spiritual journey both in body and out of body. I began attending “night school” in my dreams and my inner teachers began the process that has continued through the present.
Being a curious I began taking classes that I thought would help explain how to manage the experience I was having. I did all the classes through the Washington Psychic Institute (Church of the Divine Man) and a year of the ministerial program there. I actually was kicked out for explaining an alternate idea given to me by my “night school teachers” for something we had learned in the class.
I became interested in Reiki and eventually became a Reiki Master and taught Reiki. I studied with Ken Page through the Third Eye of Horus Mystery School and learned Multidimensional Cellular Healing, then became a staff member, helped Ken write a book and became a teacher there.
I have studied with Starr Fuentes, who is a Curandrea and has a program called Divine Intervention. I became a teacher of D.I. and taught this healing technique.
I also had a center in Olympia where I taught classes in intuition and different healing techniques. I had a private practice during that time, seeing clients in Olympia and traveling around the Northwest, then down into California and other parts of the U.S. doing talks, workshops and private sessions.
I have taken many classes with Carolyn Myss and Dr. Norman Shealy, and eventually joined the Medical Intuition program they were offering. I did 3 years of that program then became very ill and needed to stop everything for a while.
I am a long time student of the Science of Mind and began taking classes 4 years ago with the local church in Olympia (which I also helped start). I am a Practitioner of the Science of Mind.
I continue to be a student and a teacher in my “Night School”. I am well, and I have begun seeing clients writing and teaching again.
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