Chapter One

Back

to Nature

"Go for long walks outdoors." I'd heard this sentence in my mind for days now, especially as I climbed on my treadmill to run four miles from the comfort of my bedroom. I'd watch the red LED lights counting down my 45-minute workout, and all I could hear was, "Go do this outside!"

    Little did I know that some very special angels--those assigned to nature--were trying to get my attention. Their persistent chant finally paid off, and one sunny Wednesday afternoon, I bypassed the treadmill in favor of the sidewalk.

    I walked along Selva Avenue in Dana Point, California, the seaside town located midway between Los Angeles and San Diego where I lived. Selva Avenue has long and hilly sidewalks leading to Salt Creek Beach. As the traffic on Golden Lantern Boulevard whizzed by, I wondered why I was called to walk outdoors. This seems stressful, compared to working out in the quiet setting of my own bedroom , I mused.

    So, the next day when the fairies urged me to go for an outdoor walk, took along my Sony Walkman, hoping that turning up the volume on my cassette tape of A Course in Miracles would drown out the traffic noise.

Co-writing with Spirit

    It was the spring of 1997. I had just finished writing The Lightworker's Way , a book that I wrote in complete isolation. I'd taken the phone off the hook for three and a half months and had told all my friends and associates that I would see them when the book was done. During the process of writing, the angels were very specific in their instructions. They told me to stay in a state of centered meditation, keep fresh stargazer and tuber roses nearby, use soft lighting, and listen to classical music. They also urged me to keep my mind off worldly affairs, and focus on the truth of peace and love.

    While the isolation was difficult, I saw immediate results from following the angels' advice. My office felt like an ashram, a sacred cave where the energy was high and pure. The Lightworker's Way seemed to reflect that high-frequency energy and intention, and to this day, it remains one of my favorite authored books.

    I was now in the midst of writing a new book called Angel Therapy . The whole project felt oddly "directed," as if the angels knew exactly what the book would be and do. Even the planned publication of Angel Therapy seemed surreal. In the past, my publisher had always requested that I submit a detailed book proposal. Yet in this case, I had simply e-mailed them three sentences, mentioning that I'd like to write a book called Angel Therapy , with a brief description. My publisher immediately said, "Yes!" and sent a book contract without questions about its format, length, or other details.

    The writing of the book was odd, too. I seemed to enter into a trance whenever I'd sit down to write. Completely unaware of what words were coming through my fingers onto the keyboard, I was practically afraid to read the text afterward. Part of me feared that it would be unintelligible and I'd have to start writing all over again. I was also aware that the process of trance-channeled writing triggered my "control issues." Surrendering and trusting completely wasn't natural for me--perhaps a product of my headstrong Taurean nature, or maybe a result of being a first-born child.

    Nevertheless, I was quite aware of the spirit world's instructions. I never doubted their validity; I only hesitated in following them. Ever since a carjacking incident on July 15, 1995, in which I'd ignored my angels' warning and narrowly escaped theft, and perhaps, death, I'd done my best to heed heaven's advice. Yet, despite my brush with near-disaster (which I'll explain more fully later on), my ego would still occasionally kick in and argue with my angels.

    While writing Angel Therapy , the angels acted like Olympic coaches, advising and motivating me toward optimum performance. They clearly wanted Angel Therapy written and released. So, I thought the urgings to go for outdoor walks were just part of the process. It turned out, though, that I was being prepared for work they foresaw me doing in the future: the book you are currently holding in your hands.

Connecting with Nature

    I walked briskly along Selva Avenue, listening to the pleasant male voice narrating A Course in Miracles through my headphones. Oblivious to anything but his words and my footsteps, I might have missed an extraordinary sight, but the intense color of some purple bougainvillea flowers in front of me stopped me in my tracks. I turned off the cassette to give the flowers my full attention. Never before had I seen a hue this vibrant. The bluish-purple was so dazzling that I couldn't get enough of it.

    I put my face as close as possible to the flowers, hoping to quench my eyes' thirst for the luscious color. Still, it wasn't enough; I felt as if I wanted to consume and merge with the glowing hues. I walked to the next bougainvillea tree along the sidewalk, and the next, and the next. Nearly an hour passed, while I stood transfixed amid the blossoms that looked like purple moths sitting atop green leaves.

    As I tore myself away from my new friends, I was amazed that I hadn't even noticed the traffic noise. My connection with nature had been so profound that time and sound ceased to exist. And that's when I simultaneously began my connection with the nature angels--the fairies and elementals--although I wouldn't realize it for quite some time.

    The next day, some inner sense compelled me to leave my cassette player at home. I knew that the angels were asking me to open my ears so I could hear them fully. My inner voice guided me to pack a blank notebook and a reliable pen, along with my house key and water bottle. I retrieved a green-and-pink hip pack from my closet that I'd been given as a guest on the Leeza show years earlier, and put my notebook in it (covered with a small plastic sandwich bag to waterproof it lest an errant ocean wave erase the messages I knew that I'd pen).

    The writing on Angel Therapy had gone especially well the previous evening. Usually I'd only been able to withstand channeling for 15 to 30 minutes without getting a headache, but last night I'd been able to channel for nearly two hours. Had my encounter with the bougainvillea helped?

    When I'd asked the angels why I got headaches during my channeling sessions--after all, I had never been prone to them before--they'd told me that my steady diet of chocolate was interfering with my energetic vibrational frequencies.

    In other words, my "antennae" couldn't connect with the high frequencies of the angelic realm, because chocolate was making me dense and slow. I had been aware that chocolate was a poor substitute for human love, and that we often craved it when we really wanted romantic love, but now the angels were explaining to me that chocolate cravings were really a desire for God's love--a yearning to connect with our Creator.

    When we eat chocolate, we fill in the neuron receptors that are designed for Divine love with the synthetic chemicals called "phenelethylamine," or P.E.A., for short--a fitting name, since "pea" is a small substitute for the grand love that can only be filled when our hearts are in love with our Creator and all of Creation.

    Yet, I was the quintessential chocoholic, and I mentally argued with the angels. After all, my third book, The Chocoholic's Dream Diet , was all about chocoholism! I craved and ate chocolate daily, even though I'd switched to "healthier" versions of the "drug," such as chocolate soy milk, chocolate rice "ice cream," and chocolate "health bars."

    If you want me to give up chocolate, you're going to have to remove my cravings! I practically yelled at my angels. I'd learned that our angels appreciate us being honest and authentic with them, and aren't offended when we express genuine emotions. So, during those moments of exasperation when I'd wondered how I could possibly follow Divine guidance--that is, giving up chocolate--my angels were accustomed to my indignant tone. Angels focus only on the love they see within us, and not on our fears, which trigger anger and distrust.

    My request that the angels heal my chocolate cravings was half rhetorical and half said in earnest. Could the angels really remove a lifelong addiction to a fattening stimulant? I had my answer the next day. As if the angels had worked on me throughout the night, by morning I was free of all chocolate cravings. I haven't wanted, and haven't eaten, chocolate since that day!

    This was no minor feat for the former "Queen of Chocolate," my self-imposed title. Many of my audience members, students, and readers, knowing of my story, have reported similar results after asking their angels for assistance with chocolate and other types of addictions.

    Almost immediately, I could channel passages of Angel Therapy for longer periods of time, free of headaches or other physical discomfort. As I thought about this during my walk, I heard the angels say, " All food affects you, long after it is digested ." I stopped and wrote this phrase in the little notebook in my hip pack. So, the angels are going to instruct me during my walks in nature! I thought. No wonder they don't want me distracted by listening to an audiotape! I am here to listen and take notes .

    That day as I sat on the foggy beach with pen in hand, the angels explained the effects of food on our spiritual psyche, information I've written about in my books Divine Prescriptions and Eating in the Light .

    I still had little awareness that a branch of the angelic kingdom known as "the elementals" was counseling me. These beings are the doctors, nurses, and counselors assigned to help and heal all Earthly beings (including humans). Fairies are one type of elemental, and you'll meet other members of the elemental kingdom throughout this book. To me, anyone who helps us is an "angel," and elementals definitely help us. In my own case, though, I had no idea to what extent the fairies and other elementals were assisting me, and how much they were a part of my life.

Nature's Angels

    I kept up my daily walks, taking notes and doing trance-channeled writing for Angel Therapy . For the second half of the book, the angels dictated material about the "nature angels," and they taught me--as well as my readers who were unfamiliar with them--about interacting with the fairies. I learned that animals' guardian angels are fairies, and that they also work closely with flowering plants.

    As I read the angels' words, I glanced at my Himalayan cat, Romeo, and noticed glowing lights around him. I gasped with delight and surprise, and quickly looked at the stargazer lily bouquet in my office. It had never before occurred to me to look for fairies! But there they were--little Tinkerbells flitting from flower to flower like beautiful fireflies. I half saw them in my mind's eye, and half with my physical sight, similar to how I see angels, deceased people, and auras. My spiritual and physical sight meld together to give me one unified vision of the spirit world, which I see with my physical eyes open.

    The angels--or was it the fairies, I now wondered--channeled more information for the "Nature Angels" chapter of Angel Therapy . They said that we humans should be cautious when walking on or mowing grass, and should offer mental warnings to the fairies so that they can scurry out of the way of feet and lawnmowers. They also warned against using pesticides, as poisons are as noxious to fairies as they are to insects.

    They explained that fairies have a type of physical body, so environmental pollutants and human carelessness affect them. All spiritual beings--whether human, animal, fairy, deceased person, or angel--have a body composed of energy and "light matter." This light matter has a form that gives it shape and mass. The consciousness, or thought pattern, of the being determines the density of a person's energy. Humans have the densest, most concrete, opaque bodies, because our thoughts are largely materially focused. We think heavy thoughts, and our bodies reflect this consciousness.

    The angels said that because we humans do things the hard way, such as silently enduring a job we can't stand instead of using the power of thought, prayer, and manifestation, we have dense bodies that are masses of hardened thoughts about materiality.

    The elemental kingdom, in contrast, regularly uses manifestation to attract or create their needs. This gives them lighter hearts and schedules, and thus, their bodies are lighter than ours. Nonetheless, the fairies' mind-sets are denser than angels, who are completely focused upon Spirit. To the angels, Jesus' words, "Seek ye first the kingdom of God, and all this shall be added unto you," are the guiding words that will lift us from density, suffering, and hardship.

    The angels then told me something that immediately rang true, yet which still surprised me: " Your human bodies are elementals. They have a life force and intelligence all their own, coming from the elemental kingdom ." The angels explained that our body has a natural intelligence, which regulates its systems, yet it also can have the impetuous personality of a two-year-old child.

    This child within the body--the being that demands and craves both the healthful and the unhealthful--is the elemental within all of us. The body is a separate individual being, with its own mind, life force, and life plan. We don't own the body, and it isn't an extension of us. It is essentially a roommate with whom we have a synergistic and mutually dependent relationship. We depend upon the body to house and transport "us," the soul; and the body depends on us to feed, shelter, and exercise it. The body's origin is of the spirit world, yet it is a dense being of the earth. Bodies are, therefore, part of the Earth kingdom of angels--the elemental realm, in other words. The body is our inner fairy, leprechaun, unicorn, mermaid, or one of the other members of the elemental kingdom.

    So, our bodies are elementals! I marveled at the realization. They are denser bodies than the wispy, etheric bodies of the fairies, but our bodies are definitely in the same family. No wonder the fairies are brilliant healers of human bodies--they are merely working on their relatives when they work on our bodies. Just being out in nature, and holding the intention to connect with the fairies, can have a physical healing effect.

Excerpted from HEALING with the Fairies by Doreen Virtue. Copyright © 2001 by Doreen Virtue. Excerpted by permission. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.