Main Dish

This is the third of three articles featuring highlights of my recent interview with Anita Moorjani, best-selling author of Dying To Be Me: My Journey from Cancer to Near Death to True Healing. Anita was healed of stage 4 terminal cancer through a consciousness-expanding near death experience that opened her to the realization of who she is, and who we all are: magnificent beings whose very essence is love. Not only did that profound realization heal the cancer, it awakened her to a deep knowing of the joy-filled purpose of our lives, which is to express our unique magnificence. In this article I’ll share more of her insights – and an amazing story that isn’t in the book! Enjoy…

Soon after my inspiring interview with Anita Moorjani, whose clarion call to us is to remember our magnificence, I realized we had covered so much ground that I had the material for at least three articles, though I had planned to write only one. Talk about an abundant universe! Reviewing my notes, I made little symbols beside the main points to indicate topics I felt went well together and could form the basis of an article. I drew stars next to the notes I’d taken when she talked about self-love – there was the first article! – and hearts next to the comments related to manifesting our desires – there was the second article! 

Happy arrows pointed to the comments I planned to include in this third article – yet they didn’t necessarily gel into a consistent theme. They were just things she said that I really liked. In the little legend I created so I could decipher the symbols I used in my notes, I wrote “misc” beside the arrow. Pretty helpful, huh? So this is an article about the miscellaneous musings of the wonderful and wise Anita Moorjani. (And a few of my own.) Let’s dive in.

I had intentionally focused much of our interview on how her experience and insights could inform our own lives, right here and now in the physical world, but I couldn’t resist asking her several questions about her experiences in what she refers to as the other realm. In particular, I was curious about her ability to sense other people – her father and her best friend, both of whom had died – even though they were not in physical bodies.

I had gleaned from what she’d written in her book that there was an aspect of oneness or connectedness with everyone and everything, yet at the same time she had retained a sense of her own unique essence. She was still “Anita,” and she could clearly discern distinct essences of her father and best friend even as she could merge with them. In our interview she confirmed my understanding was correct, difficult as it is to put something like that into words.

I feel a need to simply pause here and let this sink in. We are One…and at the same time we are unique and distinct. It is the great paradox of Life, that two seemingly opposite conditions can co-exist. And what a glorious paradox! We have the opportunity to experience and enjoy life through the unique talents and passions that define who we are as individuals, all the while being supported by the magnificence of an all-loving One Presence that connects and uplifts us all. 
I am reminded of a clear, powerful yet startling thought that showed up during a quiet moment of meditation some time ago. I had been worrying about something and sat down to let my mind settle and clear. As I breathed into the spaciousness of the moment, the thought came in: “I cannot fall and I cannot fail.” I had a real sense of being held, of being part of an endless web that supported me at all times. There was nowhere – and no way – to fall. I could also sense the eternal nature of this web, and in that moment the notion of failure simply had no meaning. We were all points of light in this life-giving matrix, exploring in countless ways the various experiences of being and doing; everything counted, everything mattered. There was no way to fail.

I’m not sure if that even resembles Anita’s experience, but it’s what our conversation inspired me to recall. And I think that’s the way of it: wisdom shared stimulates wisdom remembered. And as we each remember what we deeply know about who we are and why we’re here, we open ourselves to ever-deeper levels of joy and fulfillment.

So it goes.

Of course, Anita shared other aspects of her experience that went far beyond my meditative insight! My notes about one of these in particular had several big arrows next to them. Here is what she told me:

Toward the end of her illness, as her cancer worsened and she became sicker and weaker, Anita stopped eating. Naturally her husband and mother were deeply concerned and tried tempting her with her favorite foods, yet at some level she had given up and just couldn’t eat. Then out of the blue, she began craving a particular Chinese dish that had been the favorite of her best friend (the one who had died). That is all she would eat – and she did eat, at least for a while.

Later, when she was in the other realm during her near death experience (NDE), she realized that during that time her friend – the essence of her friend - had actually merged with her to instill in her a desire to eat. Okay, I don’t know about you, but…I think that is amazing and very, very cool. The merging of essences! Yet aside from all the mind-blowing implications of what our ability to merge with each other might be – most of which I have yet to fathom – thinking about her experience later opened me to this deepened insight:
What we love is, in a real sense, who we are. And in being who we are – in honoring and celebrating what we love – we help others in profound ways. Her friend’s great love for Anita, expressed through her pure delight in a Chinese meal, literally kept her alive for a period of time. She helped Anita by being herself. Let’s pause again and let that one sink in.

She helped Anita by being herself. Just imagine all the ways you are helping and inspiring others by simply being yourself. Know that you are.
Now back to Anita and something else that intrigued me about her experience. When she was in the other realm she had a choice to make: she could stay in that realm or return to life in a physical body. I wondered, do all of us have that choice? The friend of a dear friend of mine had just lost her beloved daughter to suicide, and my friend wanted very much to comfort her. She hoped Anita might be able to provide a perspective that could help, so I promised to ask Anita about that during the interview.

Anita’s sense was that not everyone has the experience of a choice – often it is simply our time, and there is no further decision to be made. And she seemed clear about two things. First, if someone does have a choice and decides to stay in the other realm, it is a very blessed choice. The other realm is so magnificent and all-loving that coming back is actually a more difficult choice. So if you’ve lost someone, know that they are in a place of great love. She also said that those who choose to stay in the other realm may be more needed in that realm. I love pondering that; apparently we continue to serve a loving purpose regardless of which realm we are in!

The other point she made, in response to my direct question about it, is that it really isn’t possible to “go before your time.” We can assume that when anyone dies, it is their time. My sense of what she was saying is, this Universe is so loving that every choice we make is ultimately a right choice; again, we cannot fall and we cannot fail. We are eternally held in Oneness.

Of course, knowing or believing that may not alleviate the heartache and perhaps even the guilt we feel when we lose a loved one “too soon.” We wonder if we did or said enough, or enough of the “right things.” Anita was very firm in her conviction that guilt serves no purpose. She said a much better emotion to cultivate is compassion – especially compassion for everything you think you’ve done wrong. Guilt diminishes us. Compassion expands us. Only love can bring us back to remembering the love that we are.
Which is, of course, Anita’s central message:

We are magnificent beings whose very essence is love. Our forgetting of that truth gives rise to all that we would consider unwanted in our lives and in our world; our remembering of it restores us to wholeness and joy.

At the close of our interview I asked Anita what she most wanted people to take away from our conversation. She said, simply and clearly, “Don’t take life seriously. Don’t take yourself seriously. Find your joy. The more you find joy, the closer you are to your authentic self. Listen to your emotions and do what makes you happy.”

I am blessed to have had the opportunity to speak directly with Anita. It is my wish that these articles have in some way blessed you.