Katrina Cavanough - Wisdom for Your Life (Extract)

7/30/2019 Katrina Cavanough - Wisdom for Your Life (Extract)

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I n t r o d u c t i o n

Every day ofmy lie I talk to people who have died.However, I know that people dont truly die. Trustme; I talk to them. I am aware that I am mind, body, soul

and spirit. In my early years as a practitioner and intuitive I

used the word soul and spirit interchangeably, until I came

to understand that there are our layers to our being. Beyond

our mind and body is our soul. It is the soul that moves in

and out o each lietime, experiencing itsel through the

human body and personality. The spirit is a eld o energy


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w i s d o m f o r y o u r l i f e

that rests beyond the soul and comprises the same energy

that others reer to as God, the universe, Allah or Buddha.

We each have our own spirit with a unique energetic

vibration that deines us, like a ingerprint. Our spirit

is all-knowing, illed with pure wisdom and love.

My intuition draws on the part o me that is spiritenergy. My intuition thereore is pure in its intent and

connected to the wisdom o the universe. This knowledge

has changed my lie, and it has given me the greatest git o

allpeace o mind.

I am also a social worker. For ten years I worked with

people experiencing trauma and death in a hospital

emergency department. I supported the amily and

riends o patients who were dying and had died. While

some o the deaths were expected, and the transition was

easy, many deaths were tragic, unexpected and traumatic.

Until I began working at the hospital I would have

described my lie as having two paths that I lived

simultaneously: the path o my soul, ull o intuition,

connecting with spirit and spiritual development; and

the practical path, my career. Little did I know, when


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k a t r i n a c a v a n o u g h

I took up the position, that my hospital social work would

be aided and enriched by the spiritual realm, through the

souls o hundreds o people who came to the end o their

lives beore me. But so it transpired. And I began to see

that each time I assisted a patients soul to make sense

o their death I was taking part in something that held ameaning ar greater than mysel.

For ten years I was held in a unique tension: in my

career surrounded by death and those acutely touched by

it, and in my spirit able to communicate with the souls o

those people who were dying and had died. It was a path

with ethical considerations, and I was careul to keep the

spiritual aspects completely apart rom my proessional

work. My rst priority was always my proessional role

as a social worker and I never compromised that. But or

me personally the two paths were interwoven, creating

unique insight into the nature o lie, o death, and o the

mingling o the two.

I saw lie ater death, and I elt mysel change. Over

time I began to notice that I altered the way I lived my

lie. I noticed aresh the rich colours o the pansies in


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the garden, the eeling o the wind on my ace, and the

delight o my girls wrapping their arms around my neck.

I began to breathe in as many moments as I could. I now

live with an understanding that each moment I have is

the only moment I can rely on.

The result is that I live dierently rom other people.To begin with, I do not ear death; it is simply a passing,

not an end. I live in each moment, aware that it could be

my last in this lie and that how I live it aects everyone

around me.

I believe that the lessons I have learned can be o

benet to everyone, which is why I have written this book.

In it I describe my personal experiences with the aterlie,

mostly through stories o my spiritual encounters at the

hospital. The impressions I have received rom and the

conversations I have held with souls o the dead and with

my spiritual guardians have given me insight into what

happens at death, but also wisdom or how to live lie,

and I have aimed to pass this on in the stories that ollow.

In order to protect the identities o my clients, all

names in the stories have been changed, along with some


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o the peripheral details. I believe that the stories speak

or themselves, and thereore I have allowed them to do

so, giving them prominence throughout the text, while

also describing some o my roles practical considerations

that may be o interest to readers. It is my hope that

through sharing these stories I will pass on the insightsI have been given, so that you too may understand

more about death and, through this, reconsider how you

might live.


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A n u n u s u a lp e r s p e c t i v e


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I have an unusual view o lie and death. Many rontline

health-workers, emergency personnel and palliative-care

proessionals are the same. Working closely with human

tragedy changes the way you perceive human existence.

For me theres an added dimension: I talk to the souls

o people who have died. Some o those I met as a social

worker died in trac or workplace accidents, or through

suicide, heart attack or stroke; some died gently in their

sleep. All taught me a great deal.


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1F i n d i n g m y w a y

t o s p i r i t

Ilay in bed. The house was quiet except or the distanthum o the ridge. Suddenly, a howling wind startedup outside, prompting my heart to a aster beat. I pulled the

covers up close beneath my chin. To my eight-year-old ears

the wind sounded like a monster trying to blow our house

down. My ather appeared in the doorway, and he used

what were by now amiliar words to try, or the hundredth

time, to soothe away my night-time terrors. Rabbit, its the

sound o the wind. Theres no need to be araid.


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Later, as I lay wide awake in the darkness, I elt the

hairs across the back o my shoulder blades and neck

stand erect. My pulse beat loudly in my ears, and ear

raced down my arms, nearly exploding out through my

ngertips. I could eel it again. It was there.

I rolled over slowly to ace the doorway. In it therestood a ghostly apparition. I closed my eyes. But the

gure was still there, even clearer in my minds eye: a man,

tall, with a beard, and wearing blue overalls. He stood

motionless at my door. Just there. I had oten sensed

he was there, but until that night I had never actually

seen him.

I leaped out o bed and raced through the darkness

towards my sisters room. Ruth! Can I sleep with you?

As always my sister obliged and with a sleepy

Yes moved over, allowing me to climb in next to her.

Wrapped in the rhythm o her breathing and her warm

presence, I elt sae once more. My heart nally returned

to its usual beat, and I slipped into sleep.

The next morning, as I ate my breakast with my dad,

I described what had happened. He listened to me with


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an unusual expression on his ace. He was calm, quite

matter o act, as he explained that I had seen a ghost,

possibly the ghost o the man who had once been married

to a lady my dad was currently dating.

I smiled. In the saety o the morning light I elt

happy that I could perceive ghosts, lucky to be able to seethe unseeable. Dad told me that it was a special git that

others in our amily also had. I was excited. I elt magical.

On the way to school I told Ruth what Dad had said.

Wow, you can see ghosts? Thats cool!

Later on I heard her telling her best riend that

Katrina can see ghosts. For the rest o the day I walked

with a spring in my step. I was happy. My mind delighted

in my newound understanding o my world.

But that evening, as I was getting ready or bed,

I was struck by the reality o the long night ahead. The

enchantment o my newound ability dissolved. As the

light waned my wonder and excitement were replaced

by ear. I knew that with the darkness came the ghosts.

Most people believe that the souls o dead people are in

heaven, but I knew they were down here with us, and


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I didnt like it. I said a prayer begging God to take them

up to heaven with him.

When my ather tucked me into bed I pleaded with

him to leave the light on. He tried to talk me through my

ear, but his words made no dierence. The terror that

grabbed my chest and clutched at my back could not betalked away.

As the years passed this became the rhythm o my

lie: happy with my intuition by day, ull o ear by night.

And so my extraordinary adventures began.

g

By the time I was teen years old my lie had changed

dramatically. My ather had remarried, and my home

lie had become unbearable. Home was no longer a

happy place to be. Ruth and I moved out. Ruth went to

live with our beloved grandmother, while I was taken

in by our kind Aunty June. In the school holidays

I would travel to the country to stay with another aunt,

my Aunty Gwen, who is a psychic and clairvoyant.


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Aunty Gwen introduced me to a wondrous world.

My years o learning with her gave birth to a lielong

journey o discovery that I continue to live today. We

immersed ourselves in a daily practice o reading the

cards, meditation, and crystals. She taught me many

dierent ways to connect with spirit on the other side.She also taught me how to control my metaphysical

experiences. I learned how to make contact with

spirit only when I wanted to: I could decide when,

where and how I experienced my intuition. Ater

those years o rightening night-time encounters

with spirit, I ound learning to control the way

I experienced my sixth sense liberating. At times I

was still scared at night, yet in Aunty Gwens presence

I always elt comortable.

Having amily members who were supportive o

my intuition was a great git. Not all children have this

support; some are told that what they are seeing, eeling

and hearing is not real. I eel or those childrenit

creates unnecessary conusion. For me, those years

represent a time o returning to the amiliar.


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Aunty Gwen was involved in a new age group

people who were psychic or simply interested in the

paranormalthat gathered in the village regularly.

When I was visiting her on holidays she would take

me along with her. The group members were everyday

people: i youd passed one o them in the street youwouldnt have guessed that only the night beore they

might have been sharing time with the supernatural.

I loved every moment o attending that group. It was

exciting to sit in a room ull o people whose lie was ull

o spiritual phenomena and intuitive practices.

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With maturity and experience I have grown to under-

stand my intuition and use it powerully in my lie.

My intuition helps with everyday living as well as

tackling broader issues, in areas ranging rom whether

I will be able to get an emergency appointment with my

hairdresser today to whether a patient in the emergency

department will survive.


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Sometimes I am asked how I communicate with spirit

and experience my intuitive impressions. Its diicult

to describe succinctly, because I receive them in many

dierent ways. Sometimes they come to me in the orm

o words, images or an overwhelming emotional eeling,

which I call impressions. At other times I am given a wholeconcept. Depending on their subject, messages generate

a range o eelings. I I receive a strong impression that

I am going to get a job I am applying or, then o course

that eels good, but i an impression comes to me that

there is confict in a relationship, this eels unpleasant. An

impression concerning a uture event will remain with me

until the event has transpired. I rarely nd ault with my

impressions, though at times I havent liked them.

Occasionally I eel the presence o an impending

death; in act, I am able to know that I am going to

experience a tragedy well beore it happens. This

is something that I can turn on and o at will. I have

control over whether I eel it or not; impressions come

only i I ask the question. I am ortunate in this, as it is

not the same or everyone: some people are continually


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fooded by intuitive messages and eelings as they go

about their everyday lives. For these people it can happen

any timethey might be walking down the street and

as they pass another person they will suddenly know

something about them. Some people might describe this

as their gut instinct; I describe it as powerul intuition.Our society is not yet at a stage where knowledge o

the aterlie is considered a normal part o everyday lie.

But everyone is intuitive; everyone has the capacity to

connect with the spiritual world. When we discover that

there is no veil, no separation between the physical and

the non-physical world, our ear and grie are sotened

a little. I hope the ollowing chapters will help you to

understand and connect with the spiritual realm, leading

you to a uller lie as a result.

Katrina Cavanough - Wisdom for Your Life (Extract)

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Transcript of Katrina Cavanough - Wisdom for Your Life (Extract)