Very soon it is morning and time for my appointment with spirit – a spiritual surgery! The Casa volunteers usher all those having a surgery into a small inviting room with pews, a little like a chapel, with paintings of saints and catholic icons. However, here there are also paintings of the spirits who work at the Casa. A calming, sweet Brazilian lady instructs us to close our eyes and to relax and meditate. I'm nervous, but I don’t know why because nothing is going to physically happen to me. I try to calm myself. “I am not doing the physical surgery, nobody is going to cut me up or do anything,” I continually reassure myself. I don’t understand why I'm so nervous, but I am. The beautiful Brazilian guide is speaking softly and calmly, praising God and the spirits and talking us through a little meditation in a mixture of Portuguese and English. Gently, I feel the soft touch of spirits and a warm current of loving energy.
My eyes are tightly closed but I am dying to take a peek. I physically feel the spirits stroking my face, lightly pressing on my shoulders, and just kind of calming me, telling me that I’ll be okay. They are very close now and they feel almost as real as the people sitting on either side of me. There are several spirits around, not just one but a whole team. I couldn’t open my eyes even if I’d wanted to. I feel like I’ve been hypnotized into creating heavy eyelids that refused to open. Then with our eyes still closed, there is a sudden shift of energy in the room as if a major draft blew through, but it was not a temperature change. We feel the presence of John of God in Entity come in the room. It’s as if a golden aura of love precedes this beautiful being. John of God says a few words in Portuguese that resemble a prayer. There is an enlightened feeling of love throughout the room. Then the translator says to us that if we want to have a physical surgery to raise our hand, but to keep our eyes closed. My hand is glued to my knee. There is no way I'm putting my hand up! I'm nervous enough about having an invisible surgery.
John of God continues his prayers. His voice has the melody of a thousand angels, soothing, comforting, and healing. I know there are many special energies in the room now. Medium or no medium, everyone has to be feeling this change, I am convinced. I ask nervously, “Who is here, who is doing my surgery, who is working on me?” The face of Jesus slowly materializes in a kaleidoscope of colors, close to my face, just to my left, smiling and loving. The vision is strong and clear and the energy that accompanies this vision is heavenly, calming, and beautiful. Now, I'm not religious and Jesus is not somebody that I would normally have thought about, which makes it all the more believable to me. I feel very honored and eternally grateful.
The energy is broken with the translator’s announcement: “You can now open your eyes. Your surgery is complete.” I open my eyes and look around the room. The whole process felt like maybe five or ten minutes, so I am utterly amazed at what I see. I don’t know what happened to time because as I scan the room, there are all these people that have had physical surgeries laid out on stretchers around the room. “How could this be?” I wonder. I didn’t hear anything and this wasn’t possible in the little time that passed. Yet there were six or seven people lying on gurneys who look like they had been wheeled directly from an operating room. I felt overwhelmed at the incredible power of this beautiful soul, John of God. “Did this person, this man, have a direct connection to God?” I thought.
I stand to leave, a little in awe of what had just taken place in those few minutes. Did I just completely lose time? I stumble out of the room into the warm Brazilian sunshine feeling like I’m floating, not quite walking. Feeling great but a little spacey.
We are instructed to write down our name and the pousada where we are staying so that the spirits could continue to work on us in our hotel room and, on the seventh night from now, remove any psychic stitches. “Strange,” I thought. “Surely these miraculous beings would know where to find me,” but dizzily I write down my details.
We are informed that the spirits would continue to work on us for the next seven days. For the next twenty-four hours we are instructed to remain in our room and not to come out. Not for food, not for anything. We are not to talk to anybody, not be on our computer, not even read a book. Just to lie as quietly as possible, meditate and sleep. Wow! Am I going to go stir crazy? I’m thinking some of this doesn’t apply to me as I'm here by myself and who’s going to feed me?
Even with these instructions, some people think maybe they don’t really need to stay in their room for the full twenty-four hours and they’ll just go back to the Casa and enjoy the energy. We are told in no uncertain terms not to come back to the Casa for at least twenty-four hours. After spiritual surgery, your Crown Chakra is blown wide open and it may be difficult to tolerate the strong energy at the Casa, and it could give you a headache.
Other instructions are no spicy food, no pepper, no pork, no alcohol, and no sex for forty days!!! Whoops, rewind, had I heard this correctly? Perhaps I should have checked the fine print beforehand. There is a lot of talk at our pousada about if everyone could go without any pepper for forty days! (joking!). I asked one of the volunteers if sex by yourself counted, and he rolled his eyes with the unfortunate message as to the extent of my celibacy. Something to do with your energy and how stimulating energy in your body could offset the energy work of the spirits. Okay, I could understand, I suppose, and would try my best to comply. My husband might not be quite as understanding. I pondered why no spicy food, and if spicy food and sex had the same level of energy stimulation for some people!
If the post-surgery instructions seemed rather strange, the whole process was about to get a whole lot stranger.