When you have a young family with three active children, you are always busy. 1972 was one of these years. There are so many things that need to be attended to. I gave the boys their hair cuts and mowed the lawn. (My husband mowed it once and all the neighbors came out to see if I was all right.) Then there were the basics like cooking and cleaning.

After supper one evening, I was at the sink doing the dishes while my husband was sitting on the patio under the mulberry tree reading or working out something. He was a realtor and liked to figure out the best way to help buyers close on a property. The kids were playing in the tree house and on the swings. It was one of those days when everything seems to be going right.

The sky was somewhat clouded over but because it was evening, the sun was low enough to send rays under the clouds at a wonderful angle. The back yard looked like a paradise. Everything was glowing in the light of this almost sunset.

I remember looking out of the kitchen window, taking everything in. I was thinking how everything seemed so unusually beautiful. The flowers that I had lovingly planted and watered were all smiling in the sunshine. The privet hedge that Muriel had helped me put together around the property now formed a five-foot hedge and looked great. I had been trimming them and making a wonderful enclosure with them. The Cherry tree, while still only about 4 feet tall, was in blossom. The Plum tree near the swing set was also in blossom and even the Magnolia, as small as it still was, had one large white flower smiling at me. I had worked very hard to create this garden and it was just the way I wanted it. I found myself filled with love for everything that I saw. The feeling that I had was overwhelming. My cup runneth over.

In the next instant, I was about 8 feet behind me on the other side of the kitchen. I knew that I was looking at the back of me because there was my long blonde hair and I was wearing a white blouse with blue slacks. I felt so frightened in that moment that in the next instant, there I was looking down at my hands in the dishwater again.

Wow, what had just happened? Things like this just don’t happen in my world. I don’t think I have ever heard my friends mention anything like this. What had I done to create this affect? I must have been doing something to make this weird thing happen? (This turned out to be one of the first unordinary things to happen in my world and I wasn’t used to it yet.)

Let’s back track. What had I been doing? I had been loving our back yard with the same kind of love that one reserves for people. Can we love things that way? I had been loving the trees and the bushes and the patio and the flowers...everything because they looked so loveable. OK, so is that what Jesus meant when he said that there was only one kind of love? (I don’t know if he really said that or not but this is what I was telling myself at that time.) I remembered something from church about three kinds of love but I don’t believe that anymore. I can love a tree the same way I love my child. I can love a flower the same way that I love my husband. There is only one kind of love. This is big stuff! Unconditional Love?

I had to digest this for a while. A few days later I decided to see if I could create that situation again. Could I duplicate that intense love and pop me out of my body again? Why not try?

It took a lot to figure out just how to recreate that feeling, the intensity and the kind of love that I had witnessed. I kept adjusting the feeling and yes, I could leave my body and view things from a different perspective. I could watch me doing things like talking or cleaning or relating to other people or just listening to them. What I found out was that I had to bring this love from deep inside of me then send it out through my eyes. It has to be very intense, but it can be done.

Once, I wanted to see if a camera could pick this feeling up. As I worked on getting the intensity just right, the photographer asked me if something was wrong. I guess I do look strange but when that picture was developed, there were comments about it that weren’t usual. One person many years my junior, asked the owner of the picture if I was married. Could one really send this love in picture form? I guess the answer is "yes".

Many times after that I would leave my body and go to another part of the room, watching how I was relating to whomever my body was near. Sometimes I found myself near the ceiling but not all the time. I would study what was happening, what my body language was and what was the body language of the person I was interacting with. It was a very interesting study. It felt like flying and swimming at the same time only with thoughts instead of movements. After a while it didn’t seem to accomplish anything and it wasn’t as much fun so I decided to not do it anymore.

What did I learn? Unconditional Love is very powerful when used right. We haven’t even scratched the surface of learning about this. There are so many possibilities to explore. Look out world, here I come.

Phyllis Heitkamp
Writer & Herbalist
Thiensville, WI
oakwelherb@aol.com