I have often been asked how I started on this ascension journey, and what makes ascension different to other spiritual traditions of the past. So I will give you a little insight into how I came to be on the ascension path and hopefully inspire you on your own journey.

My spiritual background started as a blank canvas, and this was really a blessing as I didn't have old programming that needed undoing. My parents were atheists - and so I was too. As a child I asked my father 'What happens when we die?' He said you get buried in the ground and the worms eat you! Not a good image. I said 'But what about thinking?' He said you just stop thinking. To me this was unacceptable. You couldn't just cease to 'be' - what's the point in that? That was more scary to me than being eaten by worms.

So my spiritual life progressed unhindered by religion. Over 20 or so years, I explored ghosts, spiritualism, paranormal activity, ouija boards, tarot, wicca, theosophy, Linda Goodman, channelings, divining, spiritual churhces, crystals, UFOs, etc., and when the internet came along and I found lots of channelings and new information. Looking back I can see when certain information came my way that took me into a new level of understanding. Linda Goodman's Star Signs book introduced me to the idea of agelessness as a concept (although she did not achieve it herself). Also the writings of Madame Blavatsky (the Secret Doctrine) and the Theosophical Society I found very interesting as it seemed to be the most in-depth esoteric information available at the time. However, I also saw the limitations of falling into dogma and politics in any interest or belief so I didn't get overly involved, join groups or follow anyone in any particular tradition or limit myself on the right or wrong way to think about something according to the traditions that have developed around them. By standing back it was also easier to see the common threads running through many spiritual and new age traditions and interests.

I first read about Ascension on the internet through channelings by several writers and then purchased some books on the subject. Although something in me was triggered to know more the road to actually ascend yourself via these authors was fairly vague. Some required doing a particlar workshop and moving up in various levels like reiki, others gave personal accounts although the road they took to their own awakening was no longer available to others.

When I first started reading Mila's early material (aka Karen Danrich from the Spiritual School of Ascension), she was one of many channels I read and sourced articles from for my old web site. This web site became a huge library of resources of new age writers and channelers for several years (before it grew out of control and I dismantled it). However, there was something about Mila's material that seemed different from all the other channeled messages from 'Ascended Masters' and extraterrestrials.

I got permission to put the articles on my site and started getting engrosed in the material over the next two years. Mila had workshops and Masters Conclaves organised in different places around the world but overseas travel was out of the question for me. So I wrote to Mila and asked if she would be coming to Australia to do an Ascension Workshop she immediately said - 'yes, you organise it and we'll be there'. I had previously helped advertise other visiting channels and workshop facilitators in exchange for free attendance and thought this would be a similar situation.

We advertised the workshop and as it grew time for her to come, only 7 people had expressed an interest and only one had actually paid. I wrote back to her and said 'Look, I don't think you're going to make any money here - you won't even break even, it will cost you to come'. Mila said 'Don't worry, we have to come anyway as we have work there to do'. And so Mila and Oa went ahead and booked plane fares and hotels and I organised the venue for the workshop. By the time they arrived, 20 people had booked for the workshop - even coming from London and Singapore and across the country, and all had also booked personal readings. All the costs were covered. From this group came the first ascension mapmakers from Australia.

Other changes started happening for me personally. Up until this workshop I had got myself into a spiral of work that I couldn't get out of. I had been at my day job for 7 years and previous to that working for myself (until I went broke through giving too much away). I also ran my own huge web site as well as designing them for others. Previous to that I had sung professionally in bands up to 5 nights a week. I worked out that the last time I had even a weekend off work was 14 years before when I had a week's holiday. I went to work in the morning and was in front of a computer all day, then got home from work and turned on the home computer and worked until midnight - every day and every night. Weekends were for catching up with e-mail. I did a lot of free stuff for people and the more I gave, the more they wanted. My web site was costing a fortune to run and making no income as it was just hosting free information for everybody. I was essentially working my day job to cover the free web site and had no money left for household expenses, bills or groceries. I felt that I couldn't stop or it would overtake me.

Nobody else at work could do my job so I hadn't taken any holidays the whole 7 years I'd been there. Nobody else could do the web site so I just kept doing it as long as I could stay awake. Trying to find time for my own meditation and spiritual development was nearly impossible. I always felt I should be working. I had honestly got to the stage in my life that I thought the only way I'm ever going to be able to have a rest is to die. There was no light at the end of my tunnel. No way I could ever see myself having a holiday and attending a Masters Conclave in Hawaii was beyond the question.

By the time I helped organise Mila & Oa's visit, it was just something else to squeeze in to the jobs I had to do. However, the workshop ran over four days. We'd also offered to pick them up from the airport and show them around. This meant taking time off work. For me this was a big deal as I had never taken time off. So having no choice I organised my workload to allow time off while Mila & Oa were here.

From past meetings with American channels I had been expecting somebody with big hair and lots of tapes and books to sell:) However Mila was nothing like this. It became apparent that this was not a commercial tour - it was the energetic work was what she was here for and was being guided by something bigger than all of us. The energy coming through her at the workshop was in turn triggering and awakening and release in many of the participants. There was lots going on beneath the surface that became more apparent afterwards. There was some powerful guidance working with Mila that I had not felt with anybody else. The whole vibration of the room and ourselves was lifted. For some participants this triggered karmic releases of memories and a release of emotion. For all of us ancestral records were released that were gathered to help form part of the early map for ascension. Mila and Oa also used the trip to gather records from the land and to work with Earth, as Australia is part of ancient Lemuria.

For myself, the full impact of the workshop became more apparent in the months afterwards. At the time I worried that I couldn't burst into tears and release anything. Was there something wrong with me? However, I had done a lot of release work on myself over the years so perhaps this is why I did not have any emotional release at this time. It turned out my release was more of a mental one and the workshop a catalyst. Firstly, I had been forced to take time off work and in doing so was able to feel something profound stirring. People always say there is more to life than work, but actually feeling it awakened something in me.

Secondly I learned about abundance - energy out, energy in - manifesting what you need without hoarding or poverty. Until then I undercharged for any work I did for people, and if it involved anything 'spiritual' I felt I had no right to charge anything. Most people offering spiritual services seem to polarise into either overcharging huge amounts or giving it away for free because they feel they have no right to charge for a gift. Somewhere between the two lies the truth.

When I organised the workshop and booked readings for Mila and Oa I didn't expect anything for it. I was just hoping to be able to attend for free (as I couldn't afford to go otherwise). After the workshop finished and we did a bit of sightseeing and shopping, Oa muscle tested and peeled off what I think was several hundred dollars (to me a small fortune) and handed it to me. He didn't count it - he just handed it over as guided. I didn't count it either, I was just stunned and tried to refuse it. I said 'It's OK, I didn't want payment, I just enjoyed coming to the workshop'. And he said 'You don't understand, we need to give you this money for the energy you expended, otherwise there is a karmic imbalance between us.'

They explained that if people over-charge or under-charge they create a karmic imbalance that has to be balanced in another way. You don't do yourself any favours by undercharging as you have a whole lot of people to collect karma from later. The same as if you overcharge you create a karmic imbalance where you owe karma to those people through other means. This made sense to me, and when I thought about it, all energy expended had a value whether you were doing a spiritual healing, making a website or working in a shop - you are still expending creative, intuitive, emotional or mental energy for somebody. From then on I asked my guidance what to charge for my services and although my prices increased nobody complained as I was still cheaper than most others doing the same thing.

The third thing that awoke in me was really learning to follow my own truth and guidance - connecting within rather than just reading lots of other peoples work from an intellectual standpoint. I was not naturally clairvoyant, so I made more effort to use techniques and tools that would tune in to my intuition and body level knowing like muscle testing, pendulum and tarot. This in turn exercised and strengthened my intuition and I later learned to look into nature for signs, listen to my inner voice and develop divination tools for myself and others.

After that first workshop in February 2000, I went back to work, but something had changed in me. I also understood from my reading with Mila and Oa that I had already started ascending without knowing it. I had really wanted to go to the Conclave in Hawaii the year before, but had thought it was an impossible dream until then. I started thinking 'If I was able to take a week off without any major dramas, maybe I can take more time off'. Ted and I were getting married in May and so we decided to only take a few days off at that time and have the honeymoon in Hawaii and go to Conclave at the same time in September.

I had a light at the end of my tunnel at last. I had broken the work spiral. I had so much holiday time and pay accumulated that we had the time and money to go and have a wonderful honeymoon and then attend Masters Conclave which was a magical experience with lots of other people who were also awakening.

After that first workshop I joined the school to work on 'mapmaking' the ascension path for humanity. This was an extremely busy and rewarding time, although it's not something everybody is guided to do so I won't go into detail in this article, suffice to say it accelerated my spiritual development in the process. Most ascending people in the West will be following this map so I'll discuss that further in another article.

During my time with SSOA I attended several more workshops and another Conclave during two years of mapmaking. When I finished my mapmaking with SSOA and left the school, I dissolved my old web site and it was reborn to just reflect my own truth which includes my own articles and some of Milas too. I started offering my own workshops and healing and helped others on their ascension journey.

In 2003 I finished releasing all karma with the region that I lived (Sydney) my old job, and my old web site, so in July 2003 we sold the house, left the job, dissolved the old web site, sold and threw away excess household goods and moved to the country with a caravan and put what we had left into storage. We have started building a house and this is what we will be doing this year. We make a small income selling crystals and when we have premises again we will offer more workshops and healing. We have planted fruit trees and are preparing to put in vegetable gardens and aim towards a more self-sufficient lifestyle, which in turn can hopefully inspire others.

I have followed my guidance in all these things and although at times I worry whether we have made the right choices, in right divine time everything has a reason. I am guided to assist those just awakening to ascension with my classes, products and articles, thereby forming a bridge to SSOA's more complex information as Mila's vibration has moved beyond the levels that many newcomers can understand due to the language vibration behind the writing. I try to write from the standpoint of bringing ascension into the everyday life that you are living now and giving examples of what you can do to make a difference and continue ascending.

You may see that my own journey is not so very different from your own. It has been my rising vibration (ascension) that has allowed me to release the old ties and karma and move on to a new phase in my life. This phase too is in transit and in the coming year things will change again when we are able to move on to the land we were guided to as we build our house and gardens. Your own rising vibration will prompt changes in your life too, so go with the flow as your higher self sees much more than you do, and knows best where you should be and what you should be doing to ascend further.

Above all, remember that ascension has no limits. Up until recently things could be predicted to a point but now everything is free flowing - including your own future. The information coming through changes constantly as new records are released and integrated and problems uncovered and worked through. You now have the ability to begin to manifest your own future dream in the physical, literally becoming 'the dreamer and the dream'. So what is the future you will manifest for yourself? Intend to ascend and it will all start happening.

Namaste,
Linda

For practical information on ascending and mapfollowing see article: So, How Do I Ascend?

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Copyright 2005 - Linda Johnson - www.newage.com.au