Book Review: The Lightworker’s Way

Guest post by Kat Tepelyan

I walked into my favorite Barnes & Noble on a crisp December day several years ago, heading for the art magazine section to get some visual inspiration for a website I was designing. I picked a periodical I liked and flipped to a random page. A giant wing – the logo for a show called “Angels in America” – stared back at me from the oversized magazine.

The energy markedly shifted, I gently placed the magazine back, as if not to startle *something*, and followed my feet up the escalator, through the rows of books until I approached a far-back wall of the store I’d never been to.

The small name plate before me read: “Angels” in clear, Barnes & Noble serif.

I should tell you that I had moved back to New York from Australia the previous winter after dismantling a life I was building there with someone I thought I’d be with for good. It was still – a year after my return – difficult to motivate, see the joy in things and remember that “this too, shall pass.” I remember I was really embarrassed at how difficult the healing process was turning out to be, and I wanted nothing but to move on.

I hadn’t yet met Belinda (although I later discovered that I’d been to her town on my travels), and I was doing everything I could do to heal, trying out different guided meditations from self hipnosis to Theta, with the latest being an angel meditation gifted to me by a friend. I should also mention that I was starting to see wings all over the place now. So this wing’s appearance and the shelf I stood in front of were not entirely surprising even as they were quite startling.

So what do you do in those situations? You close your eyes and reach for a book.

I did, and feeling a paperback in my hands, I opened my eyes to see Doreen Virtue’s face smiling at me from The Light Worker’s Way, Awakening Your Spiritual Power to Know and Heal.

From Woo Woo To Healing

Doreen – for those of you who haven’t heard of her – is a psychic, medical intuitive and more; she’s become a major writer on the topic of Angels, healing and lots of other things, bordering, what I thought, some major woo woo territory I wasn’t altogether comfortable navigating yet.

My prior experience with spiritual teachers was very grounded, involved physical practices, mountains and very Buddhist methods of accessing NO MIND, so while I knew the magic of *sight* existed, I’d never experienced it myself and was, to be honest, a little disappointed at the Universe’s choice of book for me.

But I accepted what came, bought it and began to read.

Working With The Chakras

I started from the back, diving right into the application section, reading everything about connecting to Source and trying out the meditations. They worked! I began to feel the chakras within me rather than just intellectualizing the chakra concept as I’d had all the years prior. My meditations suddenly became enjoyable! I couldn’t wait to sit, all prior guilt around not doing “that super long Buddhist chant I don’t understand… again!” gone, and  I just found myself immersing into the practices and enjoying myself in the peace that would quickly wash over me. I began to feel better.

It became clear that I needed to begin taking care of myself energetically, the world beginning to give me loud nudges in the right direction.

Coming To Terms With It All

I met Belinda within the week and began working with the White Light and her chakra practice as I now turned to read the book from the beginning – Doreen’s rather wild autobiography. It was full of twists and turns, full of dismay and loss, followed, ultimately, by amazing joy.

I began to accept that the crazy roads life took us on were never wrong.

Something clicked for me through her stories as I watched her press on despite the challenges, seeing that my own life circumstances were maybe just necessary to help me get me to where I was and to where I am now, writing this.

The (often heart-breaking) things we go through are our training gyms, our unique paths through the world of the physical so that we can become learned beings capable of relating and being helpful to others. This became clear. In my body. I was exactly where I needed to be.

Healing

Using Belinda’s practices and reading this book I began to experience the NOW. Or rather, the lack of persistent suffering I had been living in for some time, which leads to the ability to experience the NOW. [Eckhart Tolle speaks about that in great detail in The Power of Now, Belinda’s staple go to, and he refers to this as dropping the pain body. Which – without  having the words for it then – was beginning to happen spontaneously, as I persisted with my chakra practice.]

There was suddenly nothing present but the desire to connect to myself, to the universe and to those around me in a deeper, more profound way. I felt the tension of constant self defense begin to peel away.

There was nothing to defend. I was fine.

Doreen’s peaceful approach to her own human drama, her ability to accept all that had happened to her, began to help me to accept all that had happened to me, and I suspect that besides being genuinely surprised by what this woman has been through – and witnessing what she’s become in the popularized world – you will begin to find positive shifts in the acceptance of your own story as well, no matter where you are on the path.

Maybe that was the whole point.

Divine Simplicity

I keep Doreen’s book close to me for the times when acceptance is challenging, for the times when I need a reminder that “all roads lead to Rome”, and for the times when I need trust in the beautiful, often strange and painful mystery that life is. Those times are rare now. My practice has paid off, and I am grateful, but I still look at that book spine on my shelf and smile to myself, remembering how I didn’t originally want it.

We have so many friends! People we know and people we don’t, people who write books that help us heal and understand. We may never meet them, but they are ours forever…

And as far as literary eloquence goes, this book is simple. But that is often the point: other people’s simplicity can yank us out of our own complexities, out of our stubborn analyses, and Doreen is transparent in that sense. Neither pompous nor dramatic, she has nothing to hide, nothing to be ashamed of, and she invites you into that space, a space so absolutely beautiful to share with another human being.

It’s clear to me that this book was divinely inspired so that those of us who happened upon it could learn useful methods of getting started on this journey, while learning to believe that healing, growth and connection really is possible.

All we have to do is listen to the call within and learn to accept ourselves for everything we are and everything we’ve allowed to happen to us.