A true short story:
The first time I heard the name Wayne Dyer was during a very important phone conversation I had back in January of 2005. I say “very important” because on that call, I would be given an opportunity to change the course that my life and marriage was about to take. And, Wayne Dyer would factor into that decision. I hope you’ll bear with me as I explain.
All of my trouble at that time began a year earlier when a mystical experience left me with unequivocal understanding that there was a book within me that needed to be written. However, try as I might, my writing kept stalling out, and leaving me feeling confused.
Consequently, an entire year passed with no coherent writing to show for it. And, one day, something shifted, and the words started to flow. And, a month later, the words were still flowing when I received a compelling job offer. By that time, I had been unemployed for seven months, my credit cards were maxed, my wife and I had recently decided to list our house for sale (because of the financial hardship), and yet, as counter-intuitive as it was, I felt completely certain that turning down the job was the right decision; the decision that my Higher Self wanted me to make.
Adding to my conviction, my guardian angel and spirit guide had been telling me for years to follow my heart and my passion. And, well, this seemed like a perfect opportunity to show them that I knew how to do that (though, I would later come to realize that I had misunderstood their guidance). Unfortunately, however, I had also woken up several days earlier (the day before the job offer) remembering a dream that had only served to embolden my errant decision.
In the dream, I was driving a bus up a steep hill and was just about to crest the hill when all of a sudden the bus lost power and began to roll backwards. Naturally, I applied the brakes, but the brakes failed, as did the steering. Moments later, all I could do was hope for the best as the bus sped backwards down the hill, careened around a corner, and slammed into a tree. Waking up, I remembered the dream, and intuitively knew it was precognitive. I also experienced overwhelming feelings of disappointment for having gotten so close to the crest of the hill without having had a chance to see what lay on the other side.
The next day, faced with a sudden decision regarding the job, I remembered that dream. And, just like that, what should have been a simple decision to accept became a defining moment in my life — as if the job was the very thing that my dream had been warning me about. So, I turned down the job. And, immediately, my wife was incensed and infuriated.
Three days later, on a Monday morning, I received a phone call from a woman named Diane. Diane was an executive on the job I had just turned down who had spent a week working with me several months earlier before our project was cancelled due to insurmountable labor problems. Now, months later, the project was up and running again, and Diane was on the phone, disappointed with my decision to turn down the job, urging me to please reconsider, or at least, explain my reasoning.
Now, I must say, that phone call caught me completely off guard. So, perhaps that’s why I was so transparent with my answer. Or, perhaps I was surprised by the genuine disappointment that Diane was conveying. Either way, I felt compelled to tell her the truth. And, the truth was, I just couldn’t wrap my mind around abandoning my book for the term of the job (8 months) just for the sake of money. So, I explained all of this as best I could while Diane listened keenly. When it was clear that I had said what i needed to say, Diane began by listing all of the redeeming qualities about the job that I was passing up. It was a great pitch, but I held firm to my decision.
Diane was unrelenting. She too was on a spiritual journey, she said. “And, if you take the job,” she continued, “we’ll help each other on our respective journeys.”
When I began to protest, she interrupted. “Your book will wait for you, Mathew. If it’s meant to be, it will still be there for you when you finish the job.”
I don’t know what I was expecting in response to the information I had shared, but I was genuinely surprised by Diane’s response. And, I wanted to know about her journey. I no longer remember exactly what I asked, but I do recall that she responded by telling me about “an amazing book” she had recently read called The Power of Intention by Wayne Dyer. Had I heard of it? When I told her I hadn’t, she insisted I get it right away.
“It will change your life,” she said. And strangely, I knew she was right.
Was it the conviction in her voice? Or, maybe, that I intuitively recognized a predefined moment on my life path? Whatever it was, I absolutely knew that The Power of Intention was going to change my life. I didn’t tell her this, of course, because I was still doing my best to hold to my decision. But, for the first time, I was suddenly feeling conflicted, and I know Diane sensed she had found the kink in my armor.
I ended my part of the conversation by offering to reconsider my decision and call her back. We then said our goodbyes, but not before Diane lightheartedly offered to buy me a copy of the book if I agreed to take the job.
As it turned out, after consulting with my overjoyed wife, I called Diane back and accepted the job. Immediately after, literally, the moment I hung up the phone, I experienced an unexpected flood of tears and relief as I immediately knew I had finally made the decision that aligned with the highest good. Not only was my wife instantly relieved (my poor decision had created a lot of tension between us), but I suddenly knew the direction my life was going to take for the next eight months. And, there was relief in the certainty and security of the work, whereas, there was only stress and uncertainty in the writing of the book. And, well, as much as I had been learning about faith, for the past seven months, faith had not been paying the bills.
One month later, immersed in the job, I had long forgotten about The Power of Intention when it showed up on my desk one day — Diane had fulfilled her promise. Of course, the moment I saw it, I couldn’t help but recall her memorable words:
It will change your life.
Thus, in spite of the heavy work load at the time, I eagerly plowed through the book in less than a week. Funny, if Diane hadn’t told me that the book was going to change my life, I would have been thrilled with the numerous validations I experienced while reading it. However, I had been so intent on experiencing nothing short of a life-changing epiphany — when that epiphany didn’t come, I felt momentarily disappointed. However, because I was so up to my neck with the stress and challenges of my job, I soon forgot all about the promise that it would change my life.
My story now leaps forward an entire year to March of 2006.
The job with Diane finished seven months earlier, and I was now unemployed (again!), spending a dull evening alone, mindlessly channel surfing when I happened across a PBS special where a man was speaking to a studio audience on the theme of “inspiration.” At once captivated, I found myself particularly interested in a story the man told about how he regularly woke up in the middle of the night, without conscious intention, and always at the stroke of 3:13. He then went on to say how he responded by getting out of bed and writing, and how some of his most inspiring moments came at that unusual hour of the night.
Hearing this story was an amazing moment of validation for me.
A few years earlier, I, too, had gone through an intense period where regardless of the time I went to sleep at night, I kept waking up and looking at the clock at exactly 3:30 am. Like the man, I, too, had felt compelled to get out of bed to write (and to pray and meditate). Mind you, when these unusual wake-up calls first began for me, I didn’t get up. But, after three occasions in four nights, I knew something magical was going on – especially when on the fourth night my wife and I awoke to the sound of a loud CRASH in the rooom.
Switching on my bedside light, my heart pounding from the interruption to my sleep, and my wife equally confused and agitated, I noticed our heavy reproduction antique telephone lying on the floor beside my side of the bed. “It’s just the phone,” I said to my wife. “I must have somehow knocked it off the table in my sleep.” I then picked the phone up off the floor and set it back in its usual spot beside the clock. And, that’s when I saw the time — 3:30! And, that’s when I experienced goosebumps, and suddenly understood that the Universe was trying to get me up!
As it happened, over the course of the next two years, I was awoken many nights at 3:30. And, I wrote and channeled a lot of interesting material ion those small hours of the night. Thankfully, my wife and I were never again woken with a loud bang. However, like the man on the television special, it became my routine to get out of bed in the middle of the night. And, hearing him speak, I realized for the first time that I hadn’t been the only one experiencing those strange wake-up calls.
The morning after I watched the PBS special, I woke up with the name Wayne Dyer stuck in my head. Although I had heard his name mentioned while I watched the show, and I had been captivated by his stories, I had no idea why his name was so familiar, or why I awoke with it playing over and over in my ears. I had been so stressed a year earlier when I had read his book, I hadn’t yet made the connection that the man on the PBS special and the author of The Power of Intention were one in the same.
A couple of clicks on the internet later, the connection was made. And, I couldn’t help but wonder, had Wayne Dyer crossed my path again because I had missed something the first time around. Well, that’s exactly what I was thinking when I next clicked on his website and found a long list of his upcoming appearances — the first one being in my home city of Toronto only four days away! As soon I saw that, it was goosebumps again; I knew I was going to that event and that I was going to see him speak in person.
The convention was called “I Can Do It” and it was sponsored by Hay House Publishers. I had never attended a convention on personal well-being before. And, well, to say it was a positive experience is an understatement.
As a sensitive, I could literally feel the positive energy buzzing around that convention center. In fact, the energy was so palpable and powerful, over the course of the three day event, I only managed to sleep about two hours a night! And yet, I felt great! And, I continued to feel great (and buzz too) for the three week period that followed!
Remarkably, I had been through many unusual spiritual experiences over the course of the preceding 20 years — I conversed regularly with a guardian angel and a spirit guide, I helped confused earthbound spirits cross over to the light, I had many lucid and precognitive dreams, I even had an experience when I was 23 where Jesus fully materialized in a room with me the first time I ever prayed (I had considered myself agnostic prior to that moment) — and yet, although I knew in a spiritual sense that I was never alone, I felt extremely isolated. I had never met anyone who had gone through the type of experiences I had gone through. And, other than my wife, I had no one I could talk to who accepted, let alone understood my experiences.
But, just like that, a few incredible moments of synchronicity occurred, and I found myself surrounded by at least one thousand awakening souls, including several respected authors who spoke freely about the kinds of experiences I had lived through.
As it happened, I participated in several amazing workshops, and attended many interesting lectures, including the one that Wayne gave. I also had a brief conversation with Hay House’s one and only, Louise Hay!
Thus, for the first time in my life, I realized I had never been alone, and that feelings of isolation were just false perceptions that needed to come to light. Not only that, but now that they had, I felt like I was suddenly free to begin a new chapter — a chapter where I could reach out and make connections with all kinds of interesting awakened and awakening people.
So, you see, in the end, Wayne Dyer and The Power of Intention did change my life — just not in the way I thought that it would!
As for that precognitive dream (the one where I rolled backwards down the hill), two years after the completion of the job with Diane, I just have one thing to say about that:
My life unfolded just as the dream foretold in spite of my decision to accept the job. Because, no sooner did I finish the job, the emotional tones and beats of that precognitive dream played out in my life. In fact, as I sit here today, I am still looking forward to the day when my bus will finally have the power and opportunity to climb back up to the crest of that hill (and not roll backwards again).
Of course, I realize that ironically speaking, cresting that hill might offer a most beautiful and enchanting view of the very next hill that awaits me — or not! Either way, for the time being, my life lessons seem to be all about patience and faith. And, well, rolling backwards and crashing into trees seems to be an essential part of that lesson (for now!).
As for my book, I have no doubt that I will write it one day, and that it will find its way into the world when the time is right. My job, as I understand it, is to align my intentions with Love, to follow my heart and my passions — when and as I reasonably can — and allow everything else to unfold as it does. There are no accidents and no coincidences after all. As Louise Hay is known to say (and my guides too), “All is well.”
And, so it is. 🙂
***UPDATE: AUGUST 29, 2015 — R.I.P. Dr. Wayne Dyer. Thank you for being you, and for the many gifts you brought to the world.***
