My dad was uneducated and could not keep a job. Not because he was a direlect, it was just how it seemed to work out for him. He struggled a lot through his life as an uneducated man. Did his thoughts create his troubles?
In his late 30's early 40's he went back to school, after the bursitis in his elbow caused him to have to quit his job as a shoe die maker. He went back to school and got his GED.
I was 9 when my dad went back to school. My dad taught me the importance of education through his example. We did our homework together at the table, one of my favorite things to do with my dad. He'd also write a vocabulary word on Marty's toy chalk board, every morning, with the definition. My dad, he encouraged us to try and use the word in as many sentences as we could. It was his way of helping to build our vocabulary and on a grander scale, my dad taught me to love education.
He went on to college after earning his high school diploma equivalent. Dad loved psychology and all things paranormal. My dad believed in UFO's and would sit in the back yard at night with me, we'd look up at the sky and watch for aliens flying by. Once, I remember thinking I saw one and my dad went along with my fantasy. My dad loved to feed my wild imagination and often told me that I would achieve great things in life. I believed him.
Dad, he taught all of us how to see auras. I remember he lined us up against a big white wall of cabinets in our dinning room. He would have some of us against the wall and the other kids, he'd have standing next to him. He showed us how to see the outline of the energy field around the human body. He told us to squint our eyes a little until it focused in, "look at the top of the head" he coached, "look at the outer edge of the body." My dad was excited to teach us about auras.
The joy I had when I saw my first aura, it was Ed's aura that I had seen. Once we saw the aura around Ed, Dad instructed Ed to move his energy body with his mind. "Eddie, visualize in your mind where you want to go. See yourself moving, but don't move... OK... move!" Dad exlaimed.
We all watched and sure enough, I remember seeing Ed's aura move. It was an energy field, it looked like it was made of a hazy white matter, but I could see through it. I learned that we are energy and our thoughts are real, my thoughts can take me places, places that I later discovered is where I go for peace and sollace.
Dad also taught us about our vision and it's connection with the brain. How the brain sees things that aren't there. I remember looking at a picture of a flag in one of his text books. Dad had us look at the picture and focus on it. Then he had us look up at the white wall. The flag, it was the American Flag, in all it's glory, red, white and blue... floating on the wall. Through this lesson, I learned that nothing is as it seems, we should question things that we "see."
Most importantly, Dad taught me the importance of family and that we need to stick together. This last lesson that I had learned from my dad, is the most daunting for me. Why? Because it's up to my individual siblings to feel the same way about family in order for it to work the way my dad had taught.
I love my dad. He died at 49 but I feel fortunate to have had a chance to know him and learn. My dad, he was my first real spiritual teacher. He taught me to strive to be a leader. He provided me the courage to beat the odds and break the chain of poverty. Dad saw my potential and encouraged me, he helped me to believe that I can do anything that I set my mind toward achieving. I am grateful for my dad, he was the most influential person in my life.
Often I wonder what would have become of my family and me if he didn't die so young. Cancer taking his life, leaving my mom at 50 with 5 kids, most of us grown but Marty, he was only 14, too young to lose his dad.
I'll never know if things would have been better or worse if my dad lived. I do know that we all have lives to live and it's how we chose to live that determines how well we get to live.
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