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The purpose of this journey is to travel to the Spirit realm and request the spirits give guidance around a topic that I read about recently, which is whether we think about the world as sad but beautiful, or, beautiful but sad.

I thought this was a very interesting consideration to take to the spirit world for their guidance.

So I start at the mountain ledge from which I travel up alongside my energy beam toward the upper world.

I’m not really climbing up the beam, although I do give a little push with my hands and feet, which helps propel me upwards.

I travel higher and higher until I see white marble steps, similar to the steps that I saw on a recent Journey to the Upper World.

There are columns and pillars and on a previous journey this place was described to me as the Temple of Insight.

I go inside, and interestingly, unlike the previous occasion when I was inside the temple, this time the interior has a very Buddhist appearance.

It’s very similar to a Buddhist temple that I saw recently on a TV program.

I feel it’s appropriate to bow, and prostrate myself on the floor, out of respect and recognizing the intensity of the sacred space.

Interestingly, at the same time as I hear the drums playing, in the background I hear a long drawn out sound, similar to a Buddhist chant or sacred sound.

I get told, that in a certain way, it’s a false consideration to have to decide whether we think life is beautiful but sad, or sad but beautiful.

The spirits say that one way of looking at it is to simply say, what one’s own personal experience is – not an overarching description that borders on a definition, but just to simply say, that most of the time, my experience, or one’s experience of living is….. and then one can put in, sad but beautiful or beautiful but sad.

So we should bring it down, not to almost a definition, but just to ask that overall, what is ones own personal experience? Because that will change by the day.

There is an analogy to the weather, that different weather rolls in at different times, different weeks, different months.

It can be stormy, it can be rainy, it can be sunny, it can be mild. Depending on where one lives, one might be able to say eg. that most of the time its rainy, or the majority of the time its sunny.

But while the weather is objective, ones own personal experience is subjective and personal.

Beautiful or sad is influenced by subjectivity.

The Spirits say it would make for a very interesting after-dinner discussion amongst friends. It’s a very good way of getting to know people and empathizing with people and feeling a community of shared experiences.

Another way of putting it, would be to say for oneself, the majority of my life experiences have been sad, or the majority of my life experiences have been beautiful.

The spirits say that the more useful consideration is: are we able to influence how we experience things?

And to move into less of an emotional reaction of sadness, and more into an emotional reaction of beauty.

They show me a dinner table, and a whole lot of food items being put out to taste, to eat. And there is the understanding that when you are given food to eat, you are not given poison, however some of the food may be delicious and enjoyable, and some of it might be not to your liking.

It’s like we are eating at the table of life, and some of the plates we get are going to be unpleasant. but none of it is poisonous.

The spirits say that there is no real point in making a decision about is life beautiful but sad, or sad but beautiful.

I am still in this Buddhist like temple. And there is a very golden color all around me.

I see some robed figures ahead, further down this long temple that I am in. Almost purple, deep red scarlet purple robes.

And I put out a question of guidance around how do we manage very difficult situations and sadness? I’m told that this is one of the most profound questions for everyday living that one can ask.

The Spirits say that there is the notion of “this too shall pass “. And that refers to both our feelings around a very difficult or sad situation which can change, and that there is also our lives on this earth as well. That “this too shall pass “.

My Spirits say that it is very useful to be constantly, daily, reminding ourselves of our mortality and what the implications of our guaranteed ending of this incarnation are.
What the implications are for how we live, and how we think and feel about living, and for dying and what if anything, follows death.

I ask the Spirits what helpful guidance can they give us?

Its quite funny, that at this very second of asking this,

a peculiar sonic interference came in on the drumming track that I’m listening to (which is not usually there), about 5 seconds of almost a little rattling sound which then went away. When this happens on a Journey, it can mean “pay attention!”.
The spirits say that it more a question of how do we handle sadness, and how do we handle joy for that matter?

Those two extremes of whether we are having an experience of sadness or having an experience of beauty.

Managing our emotions is really what they are talking about. And I say “yes”, everybody listening would be so glad to have guidance about how do we manage our emotions.

How do we manage our emotions? How can we manage our emotions?

They give me an image of a pendulum with a very wide swing, On the one end of the swing is deep sadness, and on the other end is joy or pleasure.

They say that if we can moderate the swing of the pendulum, following this analogy, so that we don’t go so far into the sad swing, and also, that we don’t go so far into the joy swing. They say that many people would think of this as counter-intuitive, to not have a very big joy swing. They say that there is a Buddhist notion of moderation, and that is something we could find out more about. They say there is an unfortunate cultural tendency to want to experience extreme joy, extreme excitement, extreme pleasure.

They say we are not good at feeling content, (in fact they tell me right now, that the idea of contentment is not “popular” that we are groomed in our culture to always want more).

The monks have come back towards me, and they are rolling this large silvery ball, its like a round pearl, but its very large, about shoulder height, and its not something I understand.

At this point the drums changed to call me back from the Upper World, to ordinary, every day reality.

I tell the monks I will return to follow up on this experience. I thank them. They did say that it could be called “the pearl of wisdom”, but I’m not sure what I’m supposed to do. I had a feeling that I’m supposed to go into that sphere, and that’s quite exciting to look forward to, in the future.

I return to the beam that takes me back to the Middle World of every-day reality.