Welcome to The Course in Healing. This is what I call my back story. Pun intended.
In 2014, I was diagnosed with a rare disorder called syringomyelia. An MRI revealed fluid-filled cysts inside my spinal cord, running from the base of my brain stem to my tenth thoracic vertebrae. These cysts balloon out in my neck and behind my heart, taking up half the space of my spinal cord. I spent the first year obsessed with my diagnosis – researching treatments, looking for specialists and other people with the same disease. I studied medical journals to determine my exact prognosis and probability of becoming paralyzed.
In 2015, I was accepted into a syringomyelia study at the National Institutes of Health. I truly believed they would cure me. I met Dr. Heiss and Dr. Cantor, two brilliant men who have devoted their careers to studying rare neurological disorders. Despite all their knowledge and attention, it became clear after my second visit that there was no cure for me. They could only offer a recommendation for painkillers and a promise to intervene with surgery if my syrinx expanded.
I spent the next several months in a deep depression. The pain intensified and the numbness spread from my left arm to include both feet. I stopped working because long hours at my desk made the pain worse. I withdrew from life, believing that my disease was my only reality. I began to wonder if we would have to sell our two-story house as I struggled to walk up and down the stairs without falling. Would there be a day when I couldn't walk at all? I worried that my three daughters would only remember me as sick and weak.
During this time, I reflected back on all my beliefs and all my decisions that led me to this point. I remembered a profound event that I had not shared with anyone. It happened more than two years before I became sick.
In 2011, my good friend experienced the incredible heartbreak of losing her 12-year-old daughter. I agreed to design a memorial for her child's school, working late at night because my girls were very young and it was the only time I could work. My friend was always awake late, communicating with me, despite needing to wake up early for work. She shared with me her difficulties in sleeping. One night we worked and chatted until well after midnight. I tiptoed to bed, trying not to wake my husband. I sat on the edge of the bed, feeling the full weight of her grief. I have always been able to feel what other people feel, but I was never fully aware of this ability back then. I just felt this downward spiral of sadness as if it were my own. While still sitting up, I closed my eyes and asked God to give me all of her pain so she could sleep peacefully that night and wake up fully rested. Intuitively, I think I knew that we were connected and the transfer of her pain to me was possible. The pain of that moment was overwhelming.
In the next instant, I was suddenly somewhere else. I was no longer aware of my body or my bedroom. I saw orbs of light, similar to seeing stars like in the photos of a galaxy. The balls of light were everywhere, clearly connected to each other by a string of lightness. Everything in that vision happened in a flash, but the information and understanding I received unfolded over time as I let myself remember it. The two light beings closest to me identified themselves as Jesus and Buddha/Siddhartha. These are the two spiritual masters I knew the most about. But there were so many others, all connected and floating around in a circle. The threads of light that connected them rose upward to the largest ball of light that I knew was God or Source. This lightness was farther away from me and much larger than all the others, too brilliant for me to really look at. I was viewing all this from outside their circle, but still connected to all of them. I felt the most intense feeling of peace and love.
I fell asleep afterwards, sleeping soundly. When I awoke, the image was still vivid in my memory but I didn’t know what to do with it. I assumed it was just a dream, even though I had been wide awake when it happened. I didn’t want to believe that I had a mystical experience because I never thought myself worthy of God’s presence.
It was easy for me to pass the incident off as a dream or my imagination, but what I couldn’t deny was the overwhelming urge to serve God. I knew my life had to be about something bigger. In March 2012, I found a blank journal in my bedroom. When I picked it up, a story sort of spilled out about my youth. I began writing, and realized I could tell the story about my spiritual experience by writing it as a work of fiction but closely related to my own life. I wrote for several months, until eventually I lost confidence in myself. I accepted a job with my church the next year, thinking it would be a better way to serve God. That job was a disaster, and my physical health declined rapidly while I was there.
During my illness and path to healing, I finished that book and have two more books outlined to finish out as a trilogy. I’m not yet ready to share them with the world, but writing them has helped me to heal. It also helped me realize the gifts I was given as a child but was afraid to explore. I have seen and felt the spiritual world all my life. I used to draw spiritual beings, not angels but spirits that would come to me in sleep and while daydreaming. I now understand what it means to be a spiritual medium, and am so grateful for this gift of connection.
From that realization, everything in me shifted. I decided to take control of my future. I didn’t know how, but I believed that healing was possible. I hope this is where you are right now, ready to embrace a new reality, one that you create. My healing happened gradually as I forged my own path. It’s now been three years since I decided to heal and I no longer have pain, numbness or depression. I’m no longer fearful about my future. I’m strong, happy and filled with a renewed purpose.
I created The Course in Healing in 2020 to share the lessons I learned on my path to healing. The lessons are true for any diagnosis, any dis-ease. The reason I spell dis-ease with a hyphen traces back to one of my first teachers, Louis Hay. Louis wrote Heal Your Body in 1976, and healed herself from cancer later in life. I learned a lot about affirmations and forgiveness from Louis, and went on to consume healing information and strategies from many different sources. My healing came about – and continues – as I return to a state of wholeness.
I am not a doctor. I don’t diagnose or prescribe anything. I don’t offer any guarantees to you except one: what you get out of this course is directly equal to what you put into it.
Don’t just read the words. Feel the lessons. Raise your awareness. Step outside your comfort zone to learn and experience a new reality.
In the weeks leading up to the launch of this course, spiritual teacher and author Ram Dass left the physical world. My thoughts keep drifting to one of his most famous quotes, “We are all just walking each other home.” It is my hope that we can walk together on your path to healing.
In peace, Sharron Wright
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