Here’s an email I got today:

I’ve enjoyed reading your sites. But I am curious if your husband supports your efforts of channeling? I am interested in doing the same, but I think my wife would think I’m nuts or something. I’ve been reading and reading about the subject but have not really shared my interest with my wife. She is more religious than I am and I’m afraid that I would offend her all the while feeling like she would think I’m nuts or something. Just curious of your view point?

Here’s my answer: By all means tell your wife what you want to do and why. Try to include her in what you are doing. And, you do want her support.

The road to channeling of reading and meditation and thoughtful introspective thinking can help everyone whether they actually channel or not. It’s the idea of getting more in tune with your inner self, having more confidence in what you do and in what you think that are the benefits that come from the path to channeling. Also, there is the desire to be more on your own path of spiritual development.

And, then there are the nuts.

What also happens is that people have expectations of what channeling is and that’s where the nutty ideas come in. I can certainly see how a spouse, especially one who is religious would be alarmed at what her husband was doing.

If you think that the channeling will not take away from anybody’s, yours or your spouse’s faith and can convince her of it too then I would think things would be okay.

It’s in the early days of channeling where the odd things happen. That’s when I advise people to sort of keep their mouths shut and try real hard to keep one foot on the curb of rational thought. That’s when God comes to you to say there is a fantastic sale down at the local hardware store and if you jump in the car RIGHT THEN you will be able to have the buy of the century. Those are just the early warped days of channeling. It’s not true. It is your guide speaking to you, but it is also you with a whole boat load of preconceived expectations and ideas of what the channeling process SHOULD be. It’s once you get accustomed to the new energies, to the new talking, address your own psychological growth issues (and everybody, absolutely everybody has them) then, things begin to settle down.

But, it’s not just a simple thing of, “This week I’m going to learn how to channel”. It’s a life changing experience. And, you could alienate your wife in the process. You do not want that to happen. Once you make contact with Spirit there is no going back and unmaking contact with your guide.

There’s also a stage (and I went through this too) of where you get all sorts of helpful advice from the guides for everybody and you feel you must share. Folks tend to not like that. You’ll learn caution and when to keep your mouth shut. This cautionary note would hold for anybody whether they are married or not. Can you imagine going to your boss to say, “You know, my guides said if you were to stop dragging your dog around the lake with you every time you go out to jog the dog would be a lot happier.” Right. See what I mean?

I wouldn’t say the various religions are so keen on having parishioners going about channeling. That’s what the priests, ministers and rabbis are there for: to interpret God’s laws. Not you. They just don’t seem to like it. There is a place for it, but I haven’t tried real hard to find it. (One of the guides just said that’s when you go make your own church.) I did know a priest once who I told about my channeling experience. As he and I talked over time I remember once he said to me that I sounded like his spiritual advisor. That’s as close as I’ve come to any sort of acceptance by a member of the clergy. It was brief and now I’ve lost touch with that priest. I’ve never sought out another one. But, that brief interchange did much to give my confidence a boost.

My husband is supportive of my efforts now. He was a little anxious in the beginning. There was a real tense moment once early on when he said I had to chose between him or my guide. I stood my ground and said I was going to have them both. Even then I realized that there was no way I could unmake the connection to Spirit and there was no way I could live the rest of my married life under a cover of silence from Spirit.

So, I learned a little discretionary caution. Everybody is going to have a different experience. It’s been 15 years that I’ve been channeling. Even though it was strange trying to find a place for the new me in my married life I did. And, I’m glad for it. I’m more outgoing now. I’m a little bolder. I’ve had to do my own psychological work, which, by the way does not stop. You work on it a little…a year or so goes by and then you work on it some more. This is an absolute must for anybody doing channeling. You don’t want to end up like some nut mowing down innocent civilians in a misguided effort to save the world. So, your own psychological health is an area of constant observation. My relationship with my husband is solid. It weathered my journey into channeling. It wasn’t always easy, but we came out the other end of it even happier together, more accepting of each other than before.

What you could do, if after all that I’ve told you if you decide the upheaval in your marriage isn’t worth the trouble of learning how to channel move into the introspective writing mode where you begin to meditate a bit, where you pray, where you balance your life with useful and healthy activities (jogging, gardening, exercise, yoga maybe, stuff like that), where you begin keeping a journal for writing whatever you want to write about and where you do a self evaluation to see if there is anything along the lines of psychological healthy making things you can do to help yourself, including your wife in these activities too. Check out Byron Katie at her website The Work of Byron Katie.  “Loving What Is” is a terrific book she wrote. Absolutely terrific. It’s not channeling. It’s supporting spiritual and healthy life for yourself and your wife. I hope this helps.