Suzanne Falter's Blog

I woke up with a dream this morning. In it the house I was living in was being rebuilt—or at least a corner of it was. Long ago a huge tree had taken out an entire corner of the place.

And now I watched as builders methodically reconstructed it.

Clearly, I’m healing. My ‘house’ is literally being rebuilt by the wonderful process of writing my father’s biography. Since March I’ve been methodically combing through old newspaper articles, personal letters, sketches, paintings, home movies and even his journals, kept religiously for more than 40 years.

Turns out all those boxes in the basement had solid gold in them. And now, thanks to copious help from the Nebraska State Historical Society where they are housed, I have dug in.

And may I just say that I adored my father. He was funny, generous, and deeply loving to me and my three half-siblings whose mother he had married. We all called him ‘Johno’, the nickname one of his friends had given him.

Here’s what John wrote in his ordinarily terse, businesslike journal on the day I was born.

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What have I learned about my father, whose career included 128 covers on The Saturday Evening Post and his self-portrait on the cover of Newsweek?

John Falter was a much bigger deal than I ever realized.He worked with true, unbridled and relentless passion… and always with the confidence that only comes from knowing and owning your geniusJohn was genuinely liked, loved or appreciated by a lot of people, everyone from his realtor to Jimmy Cagney and former US President Herbert Hoover. They all became good friends who wrote letters for years.He was incredibly good at research and had a knack for getting the story no one else could. He saw himself as creating “stage sets where people could come in in and wander around for a while.” An example here is from his later work, a depiction of the secretive Hopi Snake Dance, which the tribe invited him to photograph and paint.

And yeah, John Falter was a great dad–a REALLY great dad. He would sit down and play Barbies with me after a long day in the studio. And then get me interested in making Barbie clothes…or even an entire Barbie world.

Jay, Sarah and Lisa and I would play an after-dinner game with Johno, as twilight was setting over the old 18th century farmhouse we lived in. This involved walking tentatively into a room we knew he was hiding in.

In giggling voices we’d call out ‘Oh JOHN-o”. And we never knew where we’d see him.

Sooner or later, he’d appear and scare us out of wits. Once he got himself up on a ladder inside the closet, and peered at us through the old glass panes above the door. He’d put a flashlight under his face just to really add to the effect.

We loved it!

So much good stirring of the pot. Just to sign off for now, here’s one of my favorite Saturday Evening Post covers. That’s a portrait of Crow Hill Farm where I grew up, and my sister Lisa, a passionate horsewoman, is the blonde rider in the foreground. My other sister Sarah appears here with red hair.

We regularly modeled for his painting, but that’s a story for a future issue.

But so many more stories to tell… stay tuned and see you here again soon!

With love,

 

 

 

 

The post Reading My Father’s Journal… appeared first on Suzanne Falter.

Those who’ve been reading my ezine know I’ve now officially begun the transition from talking about self-care to a new topic — the incredible but true story of my father, John Falter. He was one of the most famous artists in America in the 1940’s and 50’s, right up until a few years after I was born.

And really? I had no idea. He just didn’t talk about it that much.

I have read with amazement the national news accounts of his life, including even my grandmother’s death in her small town of Falls City, Nebraska. (There it was, remarkably, in The New York Times.)

I’ve researched his story, finding his self-portrait on the cover on Newsweek (“Falter by Falter; How Good Can You Get?”) and his appearance on The Arthur Godfrey Show. I’ve uncovered his letters to and from three different US Presidents, plus all manner of movers, shakers, and movie stars. Even his forty-year correspondence with his best friend, actor James Cagney.

And then there were the 129 Saturday Evening Post covers he painted, which include intimate details about real people, real places, and most importantly, real heart.

John Falter was all love all the time. For this he was loved by not only us, his family, and his many, many friends. He was also loved by millions of Americans—and now I get to tell the full amazing story of this small town boy who really did live the American dream.

To me, of course, he was just my dad. A wildly creative person who could paint inches of British soldiers in a Revolutionary skirmish in the morning, then make Barbie clothes with me in the afternoon.

We all weathered the demise of the Saturday Evening Post when I was four years old, when the magazine could not successfully transition from illustration to photography. We watched him flail for some years, and then beautifully settle on the ultimate work of his career–telling the story of the American migration West, which he did with not only historically accurate detail but a full feeling for the hardship and the pathos of those times.

My father died 41 years ago, when I was 22. And only now can I truly see who he was, and what an impact he had on his era. Even Norman Rockwell went through what he called his ‘Falter Period.’

There has never been a book written about his career–though there is a museum dedicated to his work, The John Philip Falter Museum in his hometown of Falls City Nebraska. And they publish a wonderful collection of his Saturday Evening Post covers.

Yet now, in a time when America is sorely, severely divided, perhaps there is a chance we can find some common ground just by touching back to our shared humanity. John Falter loved our inventiveness. Our resourcefulness. Our humor. And he loved the magic in life.

So now it is time to tell the whole story behind John Falter’s work–even the secrets he buried in his Post covers, and the actual people he portrayed.

The National Museum of American Illustration is collaborating with me on this project. It will include 150+ beautiful images of his work, many from their own incredible collection. More details to come on when it will publish, and where to find it.

Rather than go on and on here, let me close by sharing a few Falter Post covers. Better than anything, they convey the unique humor and insight into the human condition that marked his work. And they are beautiful.

PS. We all posed for his Saturday Evening Post covers. That is my sister, Sarah, listening to the conch shell when she was four. If this work looks familiar, she was on Antiques Roadshow with the painting a few years back. Take note also of the folded Sunday comics on the deck. They feature Peanuts, a new cartoon strip at the time by my father’s friend and fellow artist, Charles Schulz.

 

The post My Surprising Father and Why I’m Telling His Story Now appeared first on Suzanne Falter.

When I was in fourth grade, my teacher, Miss Brown, sent home a report card that said, “Suzanne seems excessively worried.” In fact, I’ve been worrying more or less ever since.

Why, I cannot tell you, for we all know that worry generates nothing but bad mental mojo and stress in our bodies. For me, that has shown up as tooth grinding, jaw clenching (requiring years of orthodontics), tense shoulders and even gut trouble at times. I’ve only learned to control it through regular meditation, journaling, a little prayer, supportive others and yoga.

But can I truly give up worrying? Well, not entirely most likely. Because I realize now, it’s a state of being… one I freely chose for most of my life. I’ve swum in an endless sea of worry like a fish in a slightly cloudy tank, unaware of my mental gunk.

Strangely, worrying has made me feel safe. As if thinking ahead in anticipation of dire events will somehow protect me from such moments, should they ever occur.

For instance, I KNOW without question what I’ll do the minute a major earthquake strikes my home in the Bay Area. And I know what I’ll do if other bad things, like financial loss, major illness or wildfires beset me. But really… such exercises are academic.

For when the bottom truly drops out, like it did when my daughter Teal suddenly died in 2012, all the worry in the world couldn’t protect me from the fallout.

This is the illusion of worry—that thinking ahead keeps us safe and immune to pain.

I’ve come to realize that life actually is pain, in part. And perhaps that is the point.

I never worried about losing my daughter because it never crossed my mind it could happen. That was just too heinous. Too wrong. What I know now is that her death was the fulcrum point on which my life rests. For it seems only since then have I truly evolved.

When Teal died, I suddenly saw my life starkly. I realized I’d completely lost track of my values. I’d been living without key things like integrity and compassion for far too long. In short, I woke up.

So I devoted myself to honoring Teal’s legacy through service… through my blog posts, my books, my podcast, in which I gently speak to my listeners, spreading love and healing where I can.

I do my best to live up to an invitation from Teal herself, which I received in a letter from her six months before her death. She said we were meant to be “leaders in light” together in this lifetime, and she offered me her full support. Little did I know that we would indeed do just that. Or that I’d walk this path alone—yet fully in sync with her disembodied spirit.

As I’ve traveled this path of light leadership day by day, I’ve noticed something extraordinary. When I trust it—and even when I don’t—the path has taken care of me. Completely. In spite of my tendency to worry.

A regular income writing fiction showed up unbidden when I had no idea how I would earn money after Teal’s death. This year another offer came unbidden from a prominent museum, to write the comprehensive biography of my father, the artist John Falter.

This is joyful work for which I’m uniquely qualified as not only his daughter, but a writer with a degree in art history. Who knew this would materialize? And yet it did.

As for my podcast, listeners have continued to pour in even though I’ve done little to court them. What I’ve mainly focussed on in all of these projects is heading for the joy–the light, which is just ahead. I’ve done this largely by refusing to buy into my worries. And yeah, dialing back on the worry-laden media that surrounds us helps. Of course, they’re still there, buzzing in the background, but I simply don’t listen as closely.

Recently, I released a podcast about filling your head with positive affirmations with an expert who has built her own highly successful podcast doing just this. Who knew our thoughts were actually so powerful? Ah, but they are.

So if you have a lifelong habit of worry, may I suggest you gently remind yourself each time a worry presents itself that you are at choice here.

You can go with the worry… or you can head for the light. It’s a habit, a muscle that builds over time.

May you enjoy some worry-free peace of mind… for this is where the sweet beating heart of life is. In total and complete joy.

Embrace it, my friend.

 

 

 

The post Please Stop Worrying… the Light is Just Ahead appeared first on Suzanne Falter.

I know. Life is intense. You feel pulled in every direction, and long ago you lost sight of what really matters most.

Instead, you’re in survival mode as you rush from dropping off kids to hitting that first meeting, all the while worrying about your kid’ recent ADHD diagnosis, not to mention that annoying twenty-something guy who appears to be horning in on your job.

But you will get through this. Mainly because you always do.

You will drag yourself home to your so-called sanctuary and order the pizza that no one else (i.e. your partner) seems to have the time to do. You will even make a salad and enforce the ‘Drink Your Milk First’ rule, as well as lovingly play with Legos, read a bedtime story, administer baths, sign report cards, and even … maybe … pour yourself a glass of wine when the dust settles.

Someone has to keep this whole wagon train moving forward, so it might as well be you, right?

Well, no actually. It doesn’t.

We are our mother’s daughters in so many ways. Especially if our mothers loudly sighed, and trudged off to do the laundry muttering about why no one else around here seems to be able to start a load. We, too have inherited the Mantle of Martyrdom.

The Pew Research Center has found that mothers were far more likely to significantly interrupt their work time to attend to children’s needs than fathers. And even though women in the U.S. represent a full 50% of the workforce, they still devote more time than men to housework and child care.

So no, you’re not alone if you feel like you are giving all the time. In fact, you’re in good company. Which is why it may be time for a change.

As an advocate for your self-care, I invite you to stop and take five minutes to answer a few simple questions.

1. Do you find yourself running – literally running – to the bathroom because otherwise you can’t finish your work? Or your mummying … or …?
2. Do you find it hard to actually ask for help … even though you know you need it?
3. Does the concept of self-care seem to apply to everyone else beside you?

If you answered yes to any of these questions, I urge you to consider something important. It could be your own behavior enables those around you to turn into big time slackers, leaving you to carry their weight.

What would happen if you were to give a polite but firm ‘No’ and set a few limits? What if you were to simply explain to your spouse that you’re not available to do the laundry or buy the groceries anymore?

You don’t have to explain why. As Ann LaMott has been quoted as saying, “No is a complete sentence.” And so those who traditionally ‘don’t cook’ or haven’t ever actually done the laundry, or fulfilled X, Y, or Z task at work get a new opportunity to excel.

Just remind them of that with a smile.

Or, if you’re a single mom, it could be that you need to find some support. Who else is in the same situation and might be willing to swap child care hours so you could, say, make it to the gym … or to that extension class you’ve been wanting to take? What teenager in the neighborhood would like to get a little babysitting time in?

Do yourself a favor. Remember that you are only a human being … and that you have a just as much right as anyone else to take your time, to rest and renew and to walk, not run, to the bathroom.

Not only that, you have an obligation to set the necessary limits and boundaries so you can really give your work, your family, and yourself the very best. A bedraggled employee or mom rarely rocks the house. Instead, she may devolve to the point of meltdown, and that brings everybody down right along with her.

Therefore, ask for help. Set a limit. Be creative if necessary. It really is part of your job to do so.
Then take that bubble bath, that walk in the woods, or that journaling time at your favorite café. Or that vacation. Or that meditation class. Or find a job in a place that truly supports its employees.

Invest some time in you, and you will discover something extraordinary. You’ll find out that you really are a powerful woman, and that the world is far more supportive than you knew.

May you enjoy the journey!

The post For Every Woman Who is Truly Ready to Scream (Some Reassuring Words) appeared first on Suzanne Falter.

For a good deal of my life, I attracted some seriously controlling people. The tendency began with Mom (it always begins at home) and charged along in my life until my early fifties, when I’d finally had enough. 

Controlling people don’t always have bad intentions. Many of my controllers, like my mother, thought they were somehow serving me. Mom was an insecure, anxious woman who was easily intimidated by life. So when she gave birth to me, a zealous, exuberant bundle of energy from the earliest moments of my life– the kid who talked too loudly, who ran and never walked, who was simply “too much”– she did her best to control me. For my own sake.

Or so she thought.

Right up until age 16, I was told what to wear, who to play with, how to behave, where to go and what to do. But I’d already broken free long before that, diving headlong into a dozens of projects with gusto. I can still remember my mother standing at our front door, calling after my retreating back as I darted towards the main street in our village, “Susie, slow down! You’re doing too much!”

God bless my poor mother, who believed it was her job to keep me safe by keeping me ‘under control’. I paid enough attention to mollify her somewhat, and so the pattern continued. It kept right on through most of my love relationships, as I attracted those who dictated choices such as what we ate, where we vacationed, how we spent our time, and even “our” politics. I didn’t always agree. But I remained quiet by then, realizing things would go better if I just put up and shut up. And ultimately, each of these relationships quietly died.

The last one was with a particularly spiteful woman who needed to put me down as a means of controlling me. If I came home with a piece of jewelry or a treasure I’d discovered, I’d be met with a sneer. She considered my wardrobe her domain, right along with who I spent time with, what I ate (again) and even what type of exercise I did. This was controlling on steroids, and I bought right into it.

After all, I was new to California, freshly divorced and vulnerable. And this was strangely comforting behavior I recognized from long ago, and so I complied. Never mind that I had far more resources and professional success, and we were living in my home. Twice I tried to leave, and twice I came crawling back.

I was triggered enough to actually believe I needed this controlling abuse.

I was finally rid of this controller when she dumped me. Yet, I immediately found two more controllers in the form of housemates who tried to bully me into submission, one in California and one in Europe. But by now, I’d finally begun to wise up. I was no longer pliable, willing, or eager to please. Instead, I began to speak up, to set limits. And I moved out of both situations, leaving behind the old me who blindly chose such set-ups.

Did I need to seriously get out of my comfort zone to make this happen? Yes. Did I need support from good friends who I could talk over things with? Yes. Did I feel freaking triumphant when I set my limit with each of those housemates and was able to peaceably move on? You bet I did.

Each time I was greeting with disbelief, anger, even suspicion. I wasn’t “acting like Suzanne.” Oh, but I most certainly was–for Adult Suzanne had finally shown up. And because I was able to keep my cool for the most part, I felt truly proud of myself.

It took another year of healing before I found the woman I am now married to, with whom I’m neither controlled nor controlling. I have learned that healthy relationships demand we we make requests, we disagree, and we dance to the beat of our own drum sometimes.

But most of all, good relationships demand that we love ourselves enough to keep our eyes open, be honest, and avoid those who might take instead of give. May this help you today with whatever relationship challenges you are facing.

Want to hear more ideas and inspirations about how to let go? Check out my book, The Joy of Letting Go.

The post Breaking Free of Controlling Relationships appeared first on Suzanne Falter.

I don’t know about you, but my mind has often been a tizzy about my To-Do’s. It’s that feeling that MORE should be getting done all the time, not less. Yet thankfully, in recent years I’ve reformed.

What happened was that I woke up. Then I began to pay attention to the flow of tasks through my day. After my daughter Teal’s death and my slow return through a solid routine of self-care, my values shifted. I became resolved to stay grounded and calm in my work.

Things went quite well for several years. But then, inevitably, that old overwork started creeping in once again. Turns out consciousness is a practice

So I found myself emptying out every pocket of time I had to try to make something happen. Not surprisingly, this tired old habit became unsustainable.

I knew I was in trouble one night at 3AM when I turned on my light and actually reached for my computer to get some work done. That would be work binging. Somehow I stopped myself just in the nick of time. Perhaps you relate?

In the U.S. we live in a culture that rewards overwork. But when you live inside that little pressure cooker for too long, you tend to swing to the opposite extreme. i.e. Wandering around the nearest Target for hours without nothing particular needed, or losing yourself in four consecutive episodes of Netflix’s latest.

This would be time debting. And it feels really, really good after over-pressuring yourself for days, or years, on end. Yet, this is not the solution to the basic lack of balance.

For a long time I swung between the two extremes … hence, I labeled myself a ‘time binger.’ That’s the same part of my psyche that could  devour endless scrolls of disaster news for hours. It’s not a good look. And finally, I became done with it.

So how did I actually move ahead?

I discovered a work flow that is grounded in a more spiritual reality — what author Leslie Keenan calls ‘spiritual time’ in her book It’s About Time. This is as opposed to linear time, which is where all of us over workers, time debtors and time bingers hang out.

Her excellent book seriously helped me in my long, meandering path back to myself. I needed to balance out my use of time so I neither lost myself in it, nor felt I had to master and control it like some steely dominatrix. Instead, I learned to strike a fluidity.

When you’re fluid with time, you are able to let go of a bunch of To Do’s every day without guilt. You’re aware that life is full of choices, and you really can choose not to do it all.

To get there, you have to ask yourself what kind of life you want. Then you set about creating it.

Is it one that allows for a visit with a friend who drops in, even in the middle of work, so you decide to step away? It is one that gives you the leeway to take an entire day off and just go to the beach when you need to?

Because these are the moments that ultimately count in our lives. And they are actually more important than the rigidly performed work To-Do’s, though many of those do need to get done.

When we deprive ourselves of the space to be flexible, we play with self-deprivation.

For me, I do this by making too many commitments to myself (i.e. I will plan a new program, promote my book, write a chapter in my new book … all this afternoon.) That’s just nuts and nobody can accomplish a list like that. Not even me!

Or … I get overwhelmed and flee to the comfort of Facebook, or I surf the Web and bury myself in interesting (and justifiable) news stories.

You get the idea. Bottom line is an invitation to give yourself the time, the space and the choice to create a day to day life that is truly balanced and healthy. A little work, a little family or friends, a little love, a little exercise. And then good doses of fun, and perspective.

“Don’t submit to mind chatter. Make choices by being present to what you want,
to your body, your soul, your heart.”
— from Teal’s journal, September 28, 2011

The post Are You Caught in an Over-Doing Habit? appeared first on Suzanne Falter.

Finding love—or ‘a proper love’ as an English psychic put it to me in 2014—was the last thing I thought I’d get from Teal’s death. But I did. This very psychic predicted I was soon to meet someone named Deborah. “She’s a lawyer… or maybe in transportation?” she said with certainty.

I was skeptical. But I shouldn’t have been, for this is exactly what happened about two months later.

What follows is an excerpt of my new book that captures the many …well… mystical things that happened after I began connecting with Teal’s spirit in the Afterlife.

The Korean baths were nearly empty that Saturday night, and I enjoyed the luxury of sitting alone in the steaming whirlpool. I’d driven into San Francisco to attend a party in the neighborhood. But first, I stopped by the baths for some intensive self-care.

On the other side of the large tiled room, an Asian woman who worked there quietly went about her business, picking up towels. The silence in the spa was deep and complete. I closed my eyes and sank a little more deeply into the hot, swirling water. I felt my whole body give way and relax, and as I did, I could feel Teal make her entrance.

“Hello, love,” I ventured.

Hi Mom.

“Whatcha doing?” I asked.

A small laugh bubbled through me. It was the usual Teal-laughter for no reason other than the joy of being. On the other side of the room, the attendant looked up. She gave me a smile and I beamed back at her.

I’m preparing you, Teal continued.

Preparing me for what? I asked.

You’ll see.

This time, instead of disappearing, she lingered for a while. Her presence soothed me as she suffused the whirlpool with her energy.

Sinking back into the pool, I surrendered all of my tension, my worries, and my sadness. Allowing it to swirl out of my body into the water, I let go. I breathed in the fizz of Teal’s essence, the possibility, the joy and the pure love that she was now, my disembodied sparkle of a daughter.

Thank you, I murmured sometime later. She just glowed as a laugh pushed through me once more. Then she was gone.

Twenty minutes later, I walked up Filmore street to The Girl Party. This massive, roaming party of lesbians happened every few months in some generous Bay Area person’s private home. This time it was in San Francisco. I walked up to the doorway of the old Victorian and saw a friend just inside.

“Thank God you made it,” she said. “This place is packed! The doors are just about to close.”

I pushed into the house as lesbians of every description chatted, drank and partied all around me. Tatted, pierced girls in their twenties danced while middle-aged women gossiped and older women sat together in the back on lawn chairs, watching and sipping wine.

I put my pot luck offering down on a table in the backyard and looked around. One empty seat beckoned to me; a bench across from a few chatting women. One of the women looked up at me as I neared.

She was a beautiful and silver-haired, and her face glowed with the zest of a life well lived. “Join us,” she said. We smiled at each other as I sat down across from her.

“We were just talking about a recent overnight we made to the hostel at Point Reyes. Are you a hiker?” she asked.

“I am,” I replied.

We began to talk. Within a few more moments this mysterious silver haired woman was sitting next to me, and our conversation had deepened. She began telling me about her adventures cycling twice across the country, solo hiking sections of the Pacific Crest Trail and backpacking deep into the wilderness of the Sierras.

“Why backpack?” I asked. “Why not just car camp?”

She cocked her head and looked at me. “Have you ever backpacked?” she asked.

I replied that I never had.

“When you backpack, you can finally find the silence,” she explained, her voice filled with rapture. “Imagine being in a place in nature where you are totally alone for days on end, where you can see every last star in the sky and there’s no one else around for miles. I know places off the trail where nobody goes. Nobody at all,” she assured me. I didn’t doubt it.

I looked at her and something shifted inside of me.

Who was this woman? I studied her, trying to understand what was happening as I became more and more enraptured with each purring, lilting word she spoke.

“Why are you telling me this?” I finally asked.

She looked at me levelly. “I’m looking for some activities we might do together,” she explained calmly. Something in my groin stirred.

This was it, I thought to myself.

“What ‘s your name?” I asked.

“Deborah,” she replied.

Deborah! My mind sputtered and reeled, and I felt like I was waking up from a very long nap.

“I’m Suzanne,” I said. A moment of silence ticked by as we looked at each other, recognizing something. I thought back to my last reading with Joanne.

There was once last acid test. My true love was supposed to be in law—or possibly transportation.

“And what do you do for a living, Deborah?” I asked.

She smiled and looked down. “Oh, I’m a lawyer, but I’m retiring,” she said. Then she glanced up brightly. “In my heart of hearts, I want to be a conductor on Amtrak,” she added with a laugh.

A shot of electricity poured through my body in confirmation. Yes, this really was it.

My love had arrived.

Excerpted from my new memoir, Free Spirited; How My Daughter Healed Me From the Afterlife

The post On Finding the Love of My Life appeared first on Suzanne Falter.

Sometimes clarity comes when you least expect it. In my case, it happened slowly at first. Then more urgently. And now it seems to be here, in sync with the launching of my new memoir, Free Spirited: How My Daughter Healed Me from the Afterlife.

I’ve been talking in many interviews about the book, yes. But also, more and more, I find myself chatting about the latest step in my Teal-Healing journey, which is actually giving what I like to call healing readings. They’re like a cross between a Tarot reading and gentle life purpose coaching.

I always knew this day was coming.

Early on after her death, Teal told me so in no uncertain terms from the Afterlife. On a particularly gloomy day, her ethereal whisper directed me to a letter buried in my inbox, one written before she died. In it was clarity: Our job was to be ‘Leaders in Light together’, she wrote.

Now ten years later, the full manifestation of that work has arrived. I’m no longer able to hide behind the written page and recorded podcast. Instead, I am out and fully engaged.

So I sit on Zoom with clients, feel into their energy, pull Tarot cards and bring forth whatever lessons, ideas, insights or ‘aha!’ moments I receive, intuit or discover.

All of this has come about quite naturally and easily. It began with a Tarot deck with a mermaid theme.

One day, three years ago, I came home with this mermaid-themed deck, though I wasn’t exactly sure why.  Since then, I have found myself watching endless YouTube videos of Tarot readers, taking several classes as I learned what the cards mean to me and how to read them. And then reading for various people to learn what I was doing.

As often happens with me, the arrival of this interesting new work was marked by the departure of the old, specifically writing fiction for an investor. One day it was here… then the next it was gone.

For a few months I sat in the unknown, not sure what to do next. But then a whole new vision of how I wanted to serve started to shape up. Because that’s what we get from the unknown, which is such a rich and fertile place. We get to embrace what is actually waiting, right in front of us.

What occurred was a series of dreams that let me know that this mysterious ‘new work’ had arrived… and that, yes, it was what I needed to focus on next.

This is not the first time I’ve done healing work. For an entire year in my twenties, I found myself trance channeling and giving energetic healings with my hands. Once I’d identified that I could do this, clients simply began showing up at my door.

I made my living this way for more than a year. But then I was directed towards writing books.The gift had simply moved on. I knew that someday it would be back, though that was more than thirty years ago.

This time, there is no laying on of hands. Nor can I channel spirits of the deceased from the beyond. For I’m not a medium, so much as a listener. A guide. An advisor about what is troubling you most. Perhaps ultimately, I’m a letting go coach.

What I’ve learned is that such work is not taught, really, but rather formed by the rough crenellations of life.

Just as it is brought in by meditation and slowing down. Now, at age 64, I can safely say I’ve seen enough of life to deliver this healing fully.

So that’s what’s cooking in my world now. Onward, to an ever-surprising life! [image error]If you’re curious, you can read about my healing readings here.

The post My Newest Healing Work Has Arrived appeared first on Suzanne Falter.

Lately people have been asking me a recurring question. What does it take to actually connect with a loved one in the Afterlife? Or even our Higher Power, or Spirit, or Guides… or even the Universe?

Is it true what people say—that ‘anyone can do it?’

From my experience, I’d say it is. And by no means am I an expert in all of this. But here is what I get.

The long and the short of it is … surrender.

Yes, surrender. That’s how I became able to receive Teal’s otherworldly energy after her death. She came to me again and again and again after her death. First it was in little whispers, then a tingly energy that would whoosh through my body, and ultimately there she was, in my dreams and even in waking visions.

What it took was surrender, as in lovingly detaching from the circumstances of my life for a while. Which wasn’t hard when she first appeared, because I was so disabled by grief all I could do WAS surrender.

What I learned was invaluable.

In this state of beingness, we naturally empty ourselves out. We forget about our To Do’s… or better yet, we just don’t do them. For today, at least.

And most of all, we quit worrying. And we let go of all expectations of… well, anything, really.

It doesn’t work to ‘try to still my mind so Uncle Bob will come rushing in’. We can’t have an agenda. Instead, we practice something Teal wrote about repeatedly in her journals: we practice Being. ‘Be and you know,” she wrote.

To do this, you must still your mind and let it go blank. Allow yourself to return to a state of nothingness…to a resolute calm that simply is. Chances are this is how you woke up today—before coffee, your phone, headlines, deadlines and the pull of your text messages and social media got on board.

This alpha state that lingers between sleep and wakefulness is often where we find our clearest spiritual guidance. It doesn’t last long, but it is real. And the messages can be remarkably cogent.

In Free Spirited, my new memoir about tapping into this vast well spring of inspiration, I write about one particular waking vision that was life changing.

When I had this vision, Teal had been dead for almost two years. Throughout that entire period I hadn’t worked. Instead, I lived very simply and frugally on my savings. And I was beginning to wonder how and if I’d ever get back to earning a living.

Financially, the time had come… but was my heart healed enough to jump back into things? I wasn’t sure.

In the vision, Teal spoke to me from behind the locked door of the bathroom just up the hallway. Brilliant white light seeped out around the edges of the doorway, and I knew she was in there. And that she had a message for me.

“Is that you?” I asked and she told me it was.

“Why won’t you let me see you?” I asked her.

“I don’t want you to get distracted,” she replied.

Then I asked her what her message was for me, and this is what she said. “You are whole and complete and ready to go back to work.”

In my heart, I knew she was right. Not surprisingly, paid work writing fiction showed up less than a month later, unbidden. Here was the next right thing for me to do.

If you’re confused about something, or feeling like you need some guidance, ask for it as you begin to go to sleep. Ask your guides, your deceased loved ones, or God, or whoever you think might be listening for the clarity you seek.

Then don’t be surprised if it shows up when you least expect it. Perhaps it won’t appear the next morning, but maybe it will in the next week. Again, detachment and being in flow is the key.

Expect nothing but embrace all that comes. You can ask for direct guidance. You can ask for clues along the way. This gift is yours to embrace.

Enjoy it, my friend. For it is, indeed, magic.

The post How Do You Connect to the Other Side? appeared first on Suzanne Falter.

 Free Spirited; How My Daughter Healed Me from the Afterlife, the memoir I spent the last eight years writing, is finally, blessedly here. It contains a tiny capsule of the vast, healing magic that I experienced after Teal’s death. Cosmic adventures, one after another, showed up in a way that now seems truly incredible. And yet…all of it is true. 

I learned how very thin the veil is, and how incredible our access is to the vast, light-filled, yet  unknowable Other Side. Here is a taste from the middle of the book to show you what I mean. This scene happened about a year and a half after Teal’s death in 2012.

I walked up the stairs of feeling elated. It was close to 10 PM and I had just successfully booked travel for something I’d dreamed of doing for at least thirty years: spending two months in Paris.

Things felt right in my heart—even though I had no idea where I would stay in Paris, nor did I know how it would be to work there. Would I feel comfortable and grounded enough to write?

And did it even matter if I did? It had been nearly a year since I’d actually earned a living.

My mother would have wanted me to do this, I reasoned, for Paris was a place we’d traveled to once when I was younger. It was a place we’d both loved. In her will, she’d left me just enough money to go, if I spent it very carefully.

My soul was singing and happy as I settled under the covers. As it happened, I was back in Teal’s old childhood bedroom, where I’d joined my son Luke and former husband Larry on the first anniversary of her death.

I opened up Facebook for an end-of-day scan and saw a message from Kate, a fellow writer whom I’d recently heard about from a friend. Kate said she’d just had an unexpected seizure while visiting friends who lived on a street called Teal Lane. She was hoping we could talk.

Naturally I was interested. I clicked on Kate’s page and began to read her post about the benign brain tumor that had caused her seizure. Suddenly a message box popped up, and I saw that Kate was messaging me.

Can you talk now? she asked.

Within a few moments we were on the phone. An otherworldly calm descended the moment our conversation began.

As Kate told me about her seizure, something shifted for me. My listening became soft and gentle, and I melted into the phone. Spirit, or perhaps TEFKAT (‘The Energy Formerly Known as Teal’ as she now referred to herself)  had overtaken me.

“It all began with the death of my spiritual mentor,” Kate began. She talked of listening to this mentor in a dream just as her seizure began. Her mentor said to her: “The veil to the other side is thinner than you think.”

Involuntarily, the TEFKAT laughter I’d been experiencing rippled through my body as she said this. Light, angelic, surreal. It laughed again as Kate described the intense, yet fully awake experience of her seizure.

At that moment, a shroud of fast, high energy whooshed through me, a tingling bed of flames that began in my heart and spread through my body. I surrendered just a bit more to the feeling.

Now I began to talk in a radically softened voice that flowed through me. It didn’t seem to be me that was speaking, but some other energy that had borrowed my mouth.

“You and I are receptors, Kate,” I heard myself say. “We have been brought together to inspire each other.”

In that instant, I could see everything. The reason for Teal’s death. The purpose of the path I was on. Even why I needed to go to Paris. Both Kate and I were being prepared for expansion beyond our wildest dreams.

And we were being brought together now in some kind of shared reckoning.

I felt completely connected to Kate. Our souls were touching as deeply as if we had fallen in love, or given birth to one another, or witnessed each other’s deaths.

And yet there was a lightness, here, too—a detachment. So, if Kate and I never spoke again that would be fine, too. Understanding flooded my body and I could see the tender link between being Teal’s mother and mothering the planet in just the way I am meant to do.

Suddenly, in this conversation with a relative stranger, I understood that for the remainder of my life I would travel to and fro between worlds, like a mystic. Like a shaman.

Like a receptor.

In biochemistry, this is the molecule that convey signals within a cell from the exterior—the other side, so to speak. Now I understood why Teal looked at me the way she did that last night in the restaurant, the night of her collapse, as we listened to a speaker explain how shamans traveled between two worlds.

Her eyes were so full of wonder then, lit with an understanding I couldn’t grasp. Her expression said, Pay attention, Mom. You’ll be needing this. And now her message was clear.

That night at dinner, Teal was already on her path to the other side, and she was inviting me to come along. To be a shaman…her shaman. To bring forth divine energy, as well as her energy, just as it was needed.

Now it all made perfect sense.

Moments later, I hung up, awash with gratitude and forever changed.

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Read Free Spirited; How My Daughter Healed Me from the Afterlife

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The post Tapping into the Other Side–My Gift from Teal appeared first on Suzanne Falter.