My article for Echo World

Friends have said they find it difficult to read the article on the site (http://www.theechoworld.com/Magazine/magazine.html)

So here it is from my original.

Easier done than said – only, it won’t do itself!

By Frank DeMarco

Accessing guidance isn’t rocket science. Everybody has access, and, in fact, everybody already uses that access, perhaps mostly without knowing it. Yes, everybody, including you!

Teaching people how to access guidance consciously is mostly a matter of clearing away people’s wrong assumptions. Once that’s done, the rest is easy. I have taught people how to do it in as short a time as a three-hour afternoon workshop. Let’s see if we can’t do it in a 2,000-word article.

We don’t start out as experts

Everything I have learned about contacting guidance, I learned through 25 years of making mistakes. I never knew what I was doing. Even when I did something that worked, I didn’t necessarily understand why it worked. I didn’t have a teacher, so I was on my own, swinging in the dark. But when you have an aim, but you don’t know the possibilities or the constrictions, all you can do is follow your hunches, and take whatever opportunities arise, whether those opportunities are books or classes or someone’s example, or dreams, or whatever. That’s listening to guidance!

When we are just starting out on something new, anything we do is likely to be misguided, or badly interpreted, or just flat wrong. We don’t start out as experts. How could we? We’re going to make mistakes, and thank God for it, because mistakes are lessons that leave us sure-footed.

Accessing guidance doesn’t require a special posture, or aptitude, or an absence of distractions. We all have the ability to contact guidance, only in different degrees. It’s as much a matter of practice and concentration as anything else. If it’s important to you, you will get it. It’s just a part of life, and like the rest of life, it happens while other things are happening around it. But we must stop getting in our own way.

Access to guidance is not only possible, it’s unavoidable

And speaking of things that get in our way, the first in line is the illusion that there is distance between us and the sources of guidance. We talk about “our higher self” or “the other side,” or even “the guys upstairs.” That’s just the nature of language. It gives the impression we have somewhere to go, distance to bridge. But there is no distance to overcome.

The 3D world we live in is really both 3D and non-3D. The 3D world we are familiar with day by day: an ever-moving moment of “present time,” separation by time and space; limited but intense focus. The non-3D world we experience more usually in dreams, where we are not stuck in time or separated by space, where we experience wide interconnections but not as brightly lit as daylight consciousness.

We know the three-spatial dimensions from sensory experience. The others we know only dimly, and by way of science (which, however, is not agreed upon just how many there are). But no matter how many dimensions make up the world – six, 12, whatever – clearly everybody is in all of them. We have to be! (How could you be in length and width, say, and not in height?) Therefore it follows that we are partly in 3D, partly in non-3D, know it or not. Thus a part of us lives among the sources of guidance.

Our ideas about communication

One of the first things the guys upstairs told Rita Warren and me, years ago, was that the chief difference between us and them is not the difference between our nature and theirs, but the difference in the terrain we lived in. (3D versus non-3D). We are not lowly 3D worms. They are not exalted all-knowing spirits. Do you see why that’s important? A worm dealing with exalted beings does not have the same kind of relationship that you will if you feel equal and at home with them.

I suggest that you approach the other side in the same way you might approach someone on the internet. Basically friendly and open, trusting your instincts, letting the relationship develop as it wants to. Do as you think best, but keep in mind that your own attitude toward communication is going to flavor what and who you connect to. Depending on who you think you’re talking to, you are going to be different.

How to proceed

Realize, going into the process, you don’t necessarily know what you’re going to receive, or what it will look like. Guidance may come as voices, visuals, words, knowings, inexplicable urgings, hunches, coincidences – even, sometimes, from other people’s words or actions. What you get may be cloudy. It may not seem to make sense, and often it can’t immediately be understood or interpreted.

Forget about stage fright or worrying whether you can do it. You don’t have to be sure, and the input doesn’t have to make sense right away. Guidance comes in different forms. Don’t judge relevance, just receive. You must perceive first, then interpret. You can alternate, even very quickly, but you can’t do both at the same time.

Don’t get caught up in the useless questions (see below). Don’t criticize yourself or your performance or your non-performance. Just, don’t. There’s no advantage to it. Instead, intend to receive a helpful message from guidance, and see what happens. Guidance knows what you’re doing; it’ll help from its end.

What you get may feel too familiar, too mundane, to be anything but you making it up. DON’T JUDGE! Get it down first, criticize later. Don’t compare yourself to others or to how you imagine I would do, or to Jane Roberts or to God. It isn’t a competition and nobody is capable of judging.

The useless questions

Distinguish between the questions that don’t help and the ones that do. Among the unhelpful questions:

“Who or what is the source of the information?” (What is the source of your dreams, hunches, thoughts, ideas?)

“How do I know the source can be trusted?” (You don’t. First you perceive and then you analyze.)

“How do I know that what I got is true?” (Just as in the rest of your life, you feel and provisionally believe.)

“How do I know I’m not just making it up?” (Maybe you are. Why this rather than something else?)

The questions are useless because they can’t be answered, and they get you nowhere.

The only helpful questions that I know are, Does it resonate? and, What can I do with it?

“Does it resonate?” You may not know whether what you receive will prove to be true or even useful, but you can know that for whatever reason, at least at the moment, it does resonate. Follow it. If later it ceases to resonate, or proves false, then you can and should change course. (Bear in mind, even mistakes have a logic to them, and lead somewhere. Something that resonates as true and later ceases to do so may nonetheless have important clues for you. A detour need not necessarily be a loss.)

“What can I do with it?” The whole purpose of getting into better touch with guidance is – to obtain guidance! In other words, to better know how to live, in general and in specifics. Beware high-flying information that is of no particular use.

Bad habits

Here are some habits pretty much guaranteed to hinder you in getting into conscious touch with your sources of guidance.

Ego, either too large or too small. (Everybody is special, including you. It isn’t just a joke.)

Keeping score. (Don’t try to measure yourself against others. We never have the data.)

Discouragement. (What didn’t work today, may, tomorrow. Try, try again.)

Fear of what you might encounter. (Your intention will protect you.)

Fear that you can’t do it. (No harm in trying.)

Excess skepticism. (You may receive valuable input without being sure of the source.)

Censoring. It doesn’t have to make sense right away.

In a nutshell: Don’t judge. (Analysis is the antithesis of perception, which must come first.) Don’t guess. (Guessing pulls in the logical side of the mind, and is a form of analysis.) Don’t use logic. (In this context, logic is a form of guessing.)

Good habits

Once you eliminate these obstacles, you see that the flow of information is already there. Some suggestions on obtaining greater clarity:

First, explore with confidence. Assume it can be done and you can do it. Your non-3D component knows where you are and knows how to reach you. Just express your willingness to cooperate and deepen the awareness. What you get may at first look inadequate or even silly. Just notice what comes. Look for the glass half full. You want to be open to the unknown, not prejudging what is important or how it will come.

Second, don’t try too hard. Don’t try to make it happen; allow it to happen. Set your intent and observe. An active, driving attitude will actually get in the way. Try approaching it like a daydream, drifting, staying in that twilight state between waking and sleep. Playful curiosity, not grim determination. If it feels like you are making it up, allow that, and see what happens.

Third, Give it time! Wait for the answer! Don’t press. Just observe and report. Remember, input may come in many forms. If you get something but can’t make sense of it, remember, it doesn’t have to make sense to you right away, and isn’t likely to seem clear and complete.

Fourth, disregard the useless questions. Be aware of whatever happens, in whatever form it takes, and make note of whatever thoughts resonate.

Fifth, make notes, and don’t confine your notes to the few things you understand. The more puzzled you are, the more important to make notes. Often, things make sense only in retrospect. Particularly note down what seem like pointless thoughts and fantasies.

Sixth, feel free to change your mind. There’s no point in being consistently wrong. And, again, mistakes have a logic to them, and that logic might lead you somewhere.

Seventh, experiment, find what works for you, and then stick to that until you get the feeling it’s time to change. There is no cosmic rulebook, and no cosmic drill sergeant. Suit yourself.

Intuitive Linked Communication (ILC)

Writing in my journal has worked very well for me, but won’t work equally well for everybody. The only way to learn if it will work for you is to try.

Set your intent to connect with guidance and receive relevant information and then, forget about trying. Take access to guidance for granted.

Go into this, not all tensed up, but in that daydreamy hypnogogic state, or as close to it as seems comfortable, then wait to see what comes. Maybe you will get visuals you wish to sketch. Maybe your guidance will come in the form of cartoons. Don’t worry about it. Set your intent and see what happens.

If you have a specific question, great. If not, you might do what I do sometimes, and say, “What would I be asking about if I had enough sense to know what to ask about?” Or you may wish to say, in effect, “I’m open for business. Does anybody want to talk to me?” You can always ask, “What is the most helpful thing you can give me at the moment?”

Maybe you won’t get anything. But, if the idea appeals to you, give it a chance.

In sum

Your non-3D component has a wider view of your life than your 3D component does, and it is always available. It’s there for the asking, so ask!

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Frank DeMarco lives in Charlottesville. He is the author of many books on communication with those in the Non-3D world. His website is www.ofmyownknowledge.com. On Facebook, frank.demarco.10