August 28
Impossible
To My Wonderful TMI Family!
I just wanted to let you know that my journey since taking the GATEWAY VOYAGE program has been a very interesting and amazing one.
Ever since I can remember there has been a huge list of things that I had convinced myself that I was not capable of doing. Since Gateway, things on my 'Can't Do List' have been slowly removed and been added to the 'Can Do List'. One of the things I had clearly convinced myself about was that I was not good at writing, but this year that perception has totally changed. Earlier this year on a whim, I submitted my 'Dream Story' to Chicken Soup for the Soul Publication Company who were looking for dream stories and the effect they had had on the person. So I wrote down what happened to me on the first night I had gotten home from Gateway and how it had totally changed and revolutionized my entire life over the last few years. I was totally shocked when I had received a letter from the publisher saying that my story had made it into the final round from the thousands of stories that had been submitted for consideration to being published into their dream book! I was totally floored. A few weeks later I received another letter saying that my story did not make it into the book, but I realized that even getting as far as I did was something that I would have said was impossible only a few years ago. This amazing experience has sparked within me a huge desire to get my story out even more as I now know that my story is worth telling and worthy of being published. Following is my story.
Creating My Own Personal Renaissance After Experiencing the Dream that Totally Changed my Life in March 2012:
It was my first night home after getting back from Vancouver Island where I had spent a week participating in a program called the Gateway Voyage. Little did I know that while I was in the program, things were changing deep within myself. As I had driven out to Vancouver Island from Winnipeg and back, I knew from some of the strange things happening driving back that things seemed a little different, but I had no idea of how radically things in my life were about to change until I went to sleep and had the craziest dream of my life that changed everything ...
I was standing in front of a crowd of 400 plus people, including my immediate and extended family. I was trying to do a presentation to the crowd but everyone was talking, being noisy and I was unable to get anyone to pay attention and listen to me. I was getting extremely frustrated and upset and so I said I'd had enough and that I was quitting and walked out of the room. Once I was in the hallway trying to calm myself down, this woman appears out of nowhere in front of me and asked me why I was upset. I told her that no one would listen and that I was incapable of doing a presentation or lecture like this. She looked at me straight into my eyes and told me that I can do the speech and that I had what it took to make all those people listen to what I had to say, while the whole time she never stopped looking deep into my eyes. As she kept reassuring me - never averting her gaze - it was like something instantly struck me that I knew this woman and waves of confidence, empowerment, and courage flooded into the depths of my being, and I knew that beyond a shadow of a doubt that I did have the ability to say what I needed to say and that people would listen! She told me to go back into the room and not give up, and so with all of these positive feelings surging through me, I returned to the room. As I opened the door and walked back into the room, the person who was sitting closest to the door moved backwards as I walked past ‘him’ and said "Wow! The energy in the room feels different." As I started to walk back up to the front, the crowd started to quiet without me having to say or do anything, and by the time I was at the front, the room was so quiet you could have heard a pin drop, and I had over 400 pairs of eyes looking at me! I immediately started the presentation with confidence. After a few minutes of talking, I woke up at around 2:00 AM. I remember waking up so suddenly that I almost jumped out of bed! I was breathing so hard and my heart was pounding as if I'd just run a marathon. I ended up going for a walk to try and process everything since this was the most vivid and strangest dream I'd ever experienced.
Prior to the dream - since I was very young - I've been battling depression, suicidal thoughts, addiction, low self-esteem, relationships of poor quality (including emotional, mental, physical, and sexual abuse), low marks in school, loneliness, anger, hatred of myself and others, etc.
I grew up poor, never feeling that I fit in anywhere. It seemed that no matter if I was at school, church, or any other social event, I was always getting picked on, teased, or misunderstood whenever I tried to be myself. So over the years, I turned off the emotional side of me and started building walls around my heart. It seemed like no matter who I let in close to me I always got hurt, so the walls just kept getting thicker and my view of myself and the world kept getting more and more negative. I became a very quiet person that got easily nervous and uncomfortable in social situations. It didn't matter if the group was 5, 10, or 20. I just felt so unsure of myself that I found it hard to talk to people because I was always second-guessing myself as to whether or not "I should have said that, or maybe I should have said something else instead, and what do they think of me, I sound like such an idiot, maybe I shouldn't have said anything at all ..." The list was never-ending. I had come to the conclusion that my life and everything else was nothing but a waste of time and meaningless.
After the dream, however, I knew from the very depths of my being that I was supposed to be a teacher/facilitator and help people. There was no question about the ‘knowing’ I had burning inside me of what the direction of my life was going to be. I even tried to talk myself out of it many times but synchronistic events kept happening that kept showing me confirmation. It was as if I had instantly woken up in an alternate universe or reality after the dream. All the pieces of the puzzle started falling into place and within 2 months of the dream, I was standing in front of a group of 15 people sharing my experience. This was an event that I had organized and these people came out just to hear what I had to share! Up until this point, I never thought I could organize anything, let alone an event where people would come out to listen to me. Within 6 months of my dream, I organized an event for a friend of mine who has had multiple Near Death Experiences to come into town to share his story, and over 100 attended, including my soul mate/twin flame, whom I met at the event! By the time it was March 2013 I had completed the training to become a Certified Outreach Facilitator/Trainer with the Monroe Institute®, and I am now giving lectures, presentations, workshops, and classes for people. My partner is a Certified Master Reiki Practitioner and she teaches classes and workshops alongside me and on her own as well. The relationship that we have is the most special and amazing I have ever experienced in my life. It was as if the universe knew all my innermost desires and brought the perfect woman to me through synchronicities and confirmation as soon as I started doing what I was meant to do. As of the time of writing this, I'm now a certified ESL (English as a Second Language) teacher as well. My life over the last few years since the dream has been the most wonderful and enriching time because I have not stopped my journey of self-discovery and have allowed myself to develop more and more every day to become the person I was born to be - teacher, facilitator, healing practitioner, and mentor.
I know from the very depths of my being that it is 100% possible that you too can create your very own ‘personal renaissance.’
I have set my intention to get my story out to the mass public by writing a whole book. I see this book as a way of Paying it Forward to the TMI Scholarship Fund because I want a good percentage from the sale of the books to go into the fund so that other people can go to Gateway and have a life-changing experience too. I still don't know how this whole thing will happen as this is completely new and uncharted territory for me but I believe that somehow it will eventually happen.
I can't thank everyone at TMI enough for being part of this wonderful experience and journey I have been on over the last few years.
Many Blessings,
Jason Cragg