In Tibet a delok, usually a woman, undergoes a temporary death, or Near Death Experience, and ventures into the astral realm where she receives messages for the living from the non-corporeal spirits that inhabit that realm. One such delok from the 16th Century reported how she met her master in the astral realm while he simultaneously protected her “dead” body and spoke to her. As he prayed for her, she merged with him in a state of cosmic oneness. From that place of oneness, she was moved and guided by his prayers to explore the afterlife. Upon return from her Near Death Experience she brought back what she had learned. From that state of cosmic oneness, accessible to all of us, we can experience the intent of another.

When we pray for someone, we send them an energetic invitation to, in a state of oneness, merge with that intent. In so doing, that person is invited to expand themselves beyond their current fixation into a whole new possibility.

Perhaps we know someone deeply encumbered by an addiction, with the limiting belief that things can’t change. From a place of compassion, we might seek to be helpful.

First we must accept that all beings are challenged to take responsibility for their own choices in life. To make a choice for another person cannot relieve them of their karmic debt to solve the dilemma they are faced with in this life. If we are successful in relieving another of their own choice making, it assures a return of the dilemma, either later in life or in another life to come. Thus, we cannot solve the challenges that others face, but we can send positive prompts through our prayers, offering them support by envisioning a different possibility for them.

Can we imagine this person transformed beyond their addiction? Can we hold that possibility fully within ourselves? From there, in a prayer, we can send that positive intent to that person.

Our prayer will energetically solicit the attention of that other person and they will be offered the energetic impact of it, perhaps in a fleeting thought, a feeling, or a sensation that invites them to expand themselves beyond where they are caught.

For a moment in time they are afforded the chance to play dress-up with another possibility. That pause affords an interruption in the incessant continuity of the addict sense of self. That pause offers a moment to merge with a different self, and it might indeed be a life-changing moment.

American psychic Edgar Cayce spoke of a kind of therapeutic intent whereby the consciousness of one person can affect another. He believed that we all have the ability to channel health and healing for others. It is the purity of the intent, without ulterior motive, that will bring about the possibility of change.

And so, we are cautioned to examine the purity of our prayers. If the intention of our prayer is to change another person to meet our own needs, then our intent is overshadowed by our own merchant mentality. Indeed, the other person will be energetically impacted by our prayer even though our prayer is not freely given. In fact, the true message of such a prayer might be translated as, “please change to take care of me!”

That prayer, even if listened to, sows the seeds of its own demise. The actual invitation in that prayer is to help me not to grow, to stay fixated where I am through your support. This is not an evolutionary offering. True prayer is selfless. True prayer is non-conditional. True prayer is compassionate. True prayer is evolutionary. True prayer does not ask for anything in return. It does not ask another to change to benefit me but only the person it is directed to. True prayer offers visions of true possibility for another, inviting that other person to throw their own intent into manifesting change for themselves.

I, as the giver, must fully accept that you, the receiver, might not be ready for the vision of the prayer and I accept your right to refusal. Nonetheless, I might incessantly offer my good prayers on your behalf, without attachment to the outcome, that you might be surrounded with reminders of what is possible, because, as Cayce also said, “Thoughts are things, and they have their effect upon individuals…” And if I can imagine you as a profoundly changed being, perhaps someday you’ll find your way to envision that same possibility for yourself, and merge your own intent with it.

I will continue to pray, but also continue to fully take responsibility for my own evolutionary choices, as we all must.

Chuck