Jenny Murphy's Story...

I began my spiritual journey after a failed love affair. Actually I think the love affair was in my head, but I certainly felt the pain of it's ending. I often think that the search for something else is generated by pain, trauma or by feeling that there is a missing piece of ourselves that we have not yet found. In my case, it was yet another disaster in my love life! But before I go there and tell you that story, may I just share with you a bit about my early life and experiences that may explain my need to search for happiness in the first place.

I had a very privileged childhood in Australia, with comfort, a great education and the opportunity to pretty much do whatever I wanted. I had an amazingly loving father who was a beautiful soul, but a very difficult mother with whom I had a pretty disastrous relationship. Without revealing all the family secrets, I can tell you that my mother was not well, both physically and emotionally.

By the time I was about 8 or 9, my mother did not want to be a mother any more. So I grew up not having someone to help me through the growing pains of a young girl. It is a very long story, but suffice to say, it left me with a feeling of worthlessness and a need to prove myself to everyone. I do not blame my mother for this. In fact, now understanding a little bit more about the ways of the universe, I can thank her, bless her and love her for creating the environment where I would search for myself, search for meaning and search for happiness. Of all of the teachers I have had, she has perhaps been my greatest teacher, with incredible patience at a soul level.

As I reached young adulthood I was a mighty rebellious young girl who got suspended from school, left university before completing anything of value and got sacked from my first three jobs! I was very unhappy and unsettled. Through a couple of career changes I ended up in recruitment and doing very well at it too. But I was still unhappy and unsettled.

I had not experienced any really good relationships with men. In fact many of my relationships had been with married men. A very good excuse not to commit. And then my father died. And I was shattered. I left my job and started conventional therapy with a psychiatrist to try to work through the grief and anger and lack of self worth.

I went to live in England for a while in the hope that I would find happiness, but that didn't work either. I came back to Australia no wiser and no better off and started a business in HR to try to find a life. No – this didn't do it for me either. I was a perfectionist whose standards and goals were so high – for both myself and others – that no-one – least of all me – had any hope of ever meeting them.

I started more therapy and didn't really find an answer. So when not working 12 hours a day, 7 days a week, I would travel. I travelled to find happiness and joy and to escape me and my demons.

On one of these trips I started yet another love affair, though this one was the one that I think I imagined. He wasn't interested, but I pursued him until I actually got the message that a relationship was not going to happen.

At the time of this disaster, I was staying in England, with a close friend, who was involved with the Spiritualist Church. She was going to a meeting that night and asked me whether I would prefer to sit at home crying, or to come with her. The choice seemed obvious - anything to get out of my own way. So I went.

Here we were in this church hall, being told to meditate. What the hell was that?? We were asked to talk about what we had "got" in the meditation. What on earth did that mean? I really had no idea what was going on. The group then proceeded to give each other messages and I was completely lost.

I had been a bit distracted, unsure and even a bit bored with the whole thing until I looked up at the pulpit, only to see a cat. Now I am a bit of a cat fan, as my friends will tell you. I was watching this lovely tortoiseshell and white moggie and thinking how lovely it was. Then it completely disappeared! And I mean faded out, gone. I felt very shocked, but kept my mouth firmly shut. I was then looking around the room and saw, to my amazement, a big bunch of brightly coloured balloons floating up behind one of the people in the group. This was VERY weird.

Not saying too much in the car on the way back home, I felt that I wanted to talk to the group leader at some point, just to find out what on earth was going on. Later that week I was able to get an appointment for a tarot reading with Gwen, the group leader. I spent most of the tarot reading asking a million questions. It turned out that the moggie belonged to a friend of Gwen's and had recently DIED. Well, this was very peculiar.

To cut a very long story short, Gwen told me that she had seen my guide (what was this?) coming in behind me at the church hall, very pleased with himself because I was finally "on the path", whatever that meant. She told me that eventually I would be teaching and doing readings for others and that she couldn't wait to see what happened to me. Well I could wait. This was all very interesting, but just a bit scary really and I didn't want much to do with it. That was, until I got home to Melbourne, Australia.

The next step in all of this was the 'activity' that began to happen in my lovely, quiet and normally normal home. Suddenly I had the sounds of footsteps going up and down my hallway, things moving and seeing lights out of the corner of my eyes. Not very relaxing, I can tell you. I had a VERY HEAVY cast iron fire place with a VERY HEAVY cast iron cover, which continually used to open itself. This kind of thing was not for me. But one thing it did do was start me on the search to find out what was going on.

I began to haunt (word used advisedly) esoteric bookshops and anywhere where I thought I could get information. I went for readings to people who usually ran courses on this stuff, only to find that they were not doing so at this time. I rang people and I asked questions. Finally I discovered a course about energy work and protection. This sounded just like what I needed.

The minute I joined the course, all activity in my house ceased! I think that spirit may have needed to get my attention in a big way and I commend them for their success!

The long and short of it then, was that I have not stopped learning. I went on and learned a vast range of different modalities and techniques for healing and divination. And all the time I was learning, I was beginning to understand what was going on. The search for knowledge was, in fact, the search for myself.

I have worked with some great healers and some great teachers and all the time I was learning to understand myself. My gifts, my challenges, my life path, my journey. I discovered that THIS is what it is all about. Not the clairvoyance or the healing that comes with the learning. Not the wonderful meditations and states of euphoria. It is about understanding ME and understanding how I can give to others.

That has been the greatest gift of all. I still have a whole heap of human stuff to deal with and I imagine I will spend all of this life and a whole heap of other lives in trying to work on myself, but that's ok. Spirit loves me as I am. It is me that is learning to do the same.

I understand now, that this is about love, understanding, compassion and developing some kind of wisdom in the process. I hope, as a result of what I have learned that I have changed - those who work with me certainly think so!! I am calmer and more accepting. I am less judgmental (sometimes) and certainly more able to compromise and to choose the hill to die on. I have a hugely long way to go, but I thank spirit and the spiritual journey for making me happier and ultimately, for teaching me that we are beautiful beings of light ourselves, who are here to learn. That makes living here very worthwhile and a whole lot easier.

Finally, I sold my corporate business – the HR consultancy - in 2003, so I can devote my time fully to spiritual development and teaching. I feel like, for the first time in my life, I know where I am headed and what is important to me. All the years of conventional therapy to "fix" myself and make myself happier, was nothing compared to all the recent years of discovery and healing that was precipitated by spirit and that first experience in the church hall all those years ago.

Since this was written in 2002, I have continued to learn and grow. I met my wonderful husband in 2005 and we were living in Boston until February 2010. This was an incredible challenge for me. I was isolated from my work, my friends and all things familiar. It caused me to become extremely ill with fibromyalgia and early onset arthritis. While I went into myself for all that time, I failed to keep up with any spiritual practice. I KNOW that meditation and self healing helps and yet I let it go. What a challenge and lesson for me.

It is now February 2010 and it was only in early Feb/late January that I have managed to turn things around. I realised that all of the drugs (prescription) that I allowed myself to be on - not that I am against Western Medicine at all - had further isolated me from my own strength, personality and, in fact, life! Once I decided to come off them all, I have found my old self. I have learned tremendously from this experience and hope that I can coach, heal and help others who are experiencing debilatating disease, great pain and personal isolation. There is so much to share, but I believe that everything happens to teach us and help us grow. I hope in experiencing the last four years, I will be able to share what I have learned and to help to coach others in their own healing processes

love and light

Jenny Murphy