The book encouraged the choosing of one focus for meditation and I chose "I will love with no expectations".  I meditated every day and when life became challenging, I would repeat "I will love with no expectations" as a sutra. One afternoon the school called and asked if I would come and pick up my daughter after school, she was afraid to walk home because the grasshoppers jumped on her. I went to the school and as I pushed open the front door, I heard a voice say, "Do you think Susan can love with no expectations?" Another very different voice said, "We'll just have to wait and see". I stopped going through the school door and came back outside and looked around to see who could possibly know my sutra. No one was on the front walk. I even looked up to the edge of the roof because I imagined two people sitting there watching me enter the school. No one was there. I went into the school and the world disappeared. An amazing light filled everything including myself. My thoughts were overwhelmed with the beauty and perfection of everything, although there was nothing but light. Then a voice said, "This is love, it always has been and always will be". I don't know how long it lasted, but then a teacher was holding my hand and asking me if I was all right. I responded, "More than all right I hope".

I was afraid to meditate for a long time, as I feared I might be driving the kids and the world would disappear. During this time I did grow, as the teacher who had held my hand quietly pushed me back into my career. Many coincidences let me know this was what I was meant to do.

Fifteen years later, my mom came out to live with us after she had a stroke. I ran to the mall during my lunch break to get a soothing music CD to help mom relax as she was getting very anxious. The clerk was taking forever with the one patron in front of me and I was torn between throwing the CD back into the rack or waiting. I didn't want to be late for work. Finally I bought the music CD and rushed out. As I ran down the mall, the teacher who had been such a good teacher to me came around the corner. We hadn't seen each other in years. I couldn't stop and as I said "hi" in passing, I was filled with total joy and bliss. When I got to the car, I couldn't help but look up at the sky and give thanks for the clerk being slow, and for this wonderful gift. I realized later that was goodbye.

The years have passed and at that goodbye, I moved from Achiever to Giver and now I am struggling as a Seeker. I have been motivated to get back to meditation after reading The Spontaneous Fulfillment of Desire, by Deepak Chopra. Not only the meditation, but the book itself helped me move forward as I kept running (literally and figuratively) into the same person each day as I read the book while going to see my mom in the hospital. Now this person is my doctor, helping me fight cancer. She is so familiar to me it is as if we have known each other forever. I am very grateful for all the coincidental events and people who have helped with the alchemy of me.