How It All Began with Carruch -- Part I

 (The first two pages of this history were originally written in 2004 by Carol, prior to integration.)

I was born in a tiny town in Kansas, (population way below 1,000, not counting the cows).  My family moved to a booming Kansas metropolis (population around 2000) when I was six, and that’s where I spent the bulk of my childhood until High School.

After finishing my bachelor’s degree in a really HUGE Kansas town (population around 10,000), I adventured my way to Portland, Oregon at 22 – to give you an idea what a leap this was for me, I had never seen the ocean before this time.  I resided in Portland for the next 22 years, and had a pretty “normal” life (at least as normal as can be expected for a lesbian in America).  In my late twenties/early thirties I worked as a social worker/program manager for the Housing Authority of Portland for most of a decade, and later became self-employed, originally as a consultant and grant-writer for small socially-focused non-profits.            

Tiring of all the “head-work”, I became a licensed construction contractor, and that was my main livelihood for the next twelve years.  I also did side-work as a musician and comedienne during this time (check me out in “Revolutionary Laughter” by Roz Warren).

Not really much to write home about (Ok, ok, maybe I’m minimizing a bit).

So, people often ask me how all this stuff with Carruch began . . .

As is true with many people, my spiritual journey has been a winding road rather than a bolt of lightning.  My first real metaphysical interest began in 1979, when I was “busqueing” (playing folk music on the street) at the Portland Saturday Market.  There, I was approached by a street-person.  He wanted some money from my hat – I gave him enough for the pack of smokes he said he wanted, and went back to playing music.  When I finished my next song, I looked down and there was a much-used tarot deck splayed into my hat.  Asking the small group of people who had been listening where it came from, they pointed to the man I’d just given money to – just as he was disappearing around the corner.  I ran to the corner which he had rounded moments before -- to find no one there, on a block that had no doorways to go into.  “Well,” I thought, “Time to learn something about this!”

I began reading about the Tarot (as you can imagine, a Tarot deck is not something you run into every day in rural Kansas), and found myself immediately engaged by the symbolism of the images, and the meanings of the cards.  As a kid, I had had a fascination with mythology, and the Tarot held many of the same icons and symbols which had held my interest then.  

I was 23, the big city was unfolding around me, and the Tarot seemed to offer some universal reference point.  I think this was the first inkling I had that the whole world might actually be connected.  I had been raised Lutheran, and had been a religious kid (I actually wept at my confirmation), but had sensed early on that this “little” view on God was pretty incomplete (I was known for driving my pastor crazy during catechism class by asking questions like “If thou shalt not kill, why does God tell the Israelites to smite the Philistines?”).

It was 1979 and time for me to “grow up”, so I kept my Tarot deck around, but I went to work at a “real" job, working with elderly folks.

In 1981, when my much-loved Grandfather died and my nephew was born 5 hours later (that you Grandpa?), I had an interesting experience upon returning to Kansas for his funeral.  One of my friends there took me to a “channeler”.  By this time, I had read “Seth Speaks” (everyone in groovy Portland was doing it), but that felt like something far away and, possibly, fictional.  This channeler was in the room with me, in Kansas, no less.  She gave me a “guide reading”, which at the time, seemed pretty confusing – listening to the tape of this reading now, I realize it was on the button (but I was a pretty dense cookie in those days).

After that, I occasionally dabbled in things metaphysical, but only if they didn’t interfere with my “real life” (ha-ha!) – the life of work, money, and possessions.  I worked my way up the job ladder working with the old folks, played with my friends, worried about the bills, etc., etc., etc..

Fast forward to 1987.  I had been working as a full-time state employee for six years, and somehow, it just felt like my skin was on too tight.  I was encouraged by a friend (the same one who had taken me to the channel in Wichita) to see a channel he had just worked with in Portland.  I did, and once again, had an experience of slight disbelief – the guy was telling me how I’d been this big healer in Atlantis, and a shaman for the Apaches, and, and, and . . . .  now just as I’m thinking “Oh right. When was I just a scumbag in Detroit?”, he pops up spontaneously with something he could not possibly know.  From that point in the reading, I started listening a little harder.

I decided shortly thereafter to quit my job and become self-employed.  Originally I made a baby-step and stayed in the field I’d been in, writing grants and doing consulting for non-profits working with elders.  However, I had some carpentry experience, and had worked with a friend on a few little construction jobs.  She was now in California, and asked me to come down and help her do a volunteer job for the Women’s Spirituality Weekend (nicknamed “Psychic Camp”).  They needed a handicap ramp built so they could do their retreat in a new space.  They couldn’t pay me, but I’d be welcome to take any of the workshops offered during the weekend.  I arrived in Modesto with my toolbelt, built the ramp with my friend, and camped among the eucalyptus trees in the midst of 300 psychic people.

On a whim, I attended the Akaashic Record Reading workshop.  It was a lark really – I had no faith that I’d be able to actually do it.  To my surprise, the amazing technique taught by the presenter (the incomparable Rae Amour, to whom I extend my eternal gratitude wherever she is) was simple, reproducible, and consistent (it’s provided the base technology for what I teach people in Channeling class to this day).  I flew home to Portland where I resumed my “normal” life, having no idea how profoundly that serendipitous weekend would resonate through my existence.

Still, I didn’t exactly pick up the work.  I would occasionally channel for friends, more for amusement value than anything else, and even taught a couple of people the technique, always carefully teaching them the ethics and principles that Rae had insisted were so vital to using this tool for the benefit of beings.

In 1991, my “normal” life came apart.  My seven-year relationship ended, my residence changed, my work shifted – everything changed drastically and suddenly as we entered the 90’s.  My interest in things metaphysical had been growing since 1988, and now I was looking carefully at how to weave spiritual essence into my daily life.  I began reading voraciously, practicing various techniques, and opening myself to a much wider view of the Universe.

One day, as I was cleaning someone’s house, I noticed that I was having a conversation in my head with someone – and it didn’t seem to be me.  Having been taught by Rae Amour that channeling required a high degree of discernment, and that it wasn’t necessarily safe, or wise, to just let anyone walk in and start talking in your head, I questioned this voice rigorously:

“Who are you?” I asked.

“My name is Carruch,” was the answer.  

I continued questioning him for months, asking about his intentions, his origins, and what he wanted from me.  This process was intensely personal, mostly confined to my journaling, and although I told a few very close friends about what I was experiencing, I remember that I always did so with a bit of dread, worrying that they would think I was “crazy”.

At that time, Carruch simply said that he wanted “to be with” me.  He encouraged me to test the information that he gave me, and see what was produced in my life if I used techniques and understandings he imparted.  

When asked what he looked like, he indicated that I would probably think of him as an “angel” if I could see his physical form.  He told me that he came from the Pleiades – a constellation I knew in the sky as the “Seven Little Sisters”.   

I had always been drawn to this constellation, even as a child – it was the first one I could pick out of the sky when doing star-gazing in girl scouts.  Naturally, at this point, I thought “I’m just making this up – projecting my own stuff onto this so-called cosmic being.”  Imagine my surprise when Carruch said “You’re from there, too.”  As in the experience with the second channeler, my internal response was, “Yeah, right”.  (Strap yourself in, there’s a lot of this kind of response from me as the story goes on.)

I did test Carruch’s information out, despite my skepticism.

I also found him incredibly respectful of my sovereignty – if he made a suggestion and I said “No”, he just went “OK” . . .  and that was the end of it.  (Remember, at this point, I have not channeled him directly at all – to me, he was just a voice in my head, which sometimes made me question whether he was “real” or not.)

So, in the following months, I find myself traveling in Arizona.  A friend of mine has shown me the book “ET 101 – The Cosmic Instruction Manual – An Emergency Remedial Edition” – a very humorous and important little book about how beings from other star-systems have come to do service on earth but often don’t remember who they are, once they incarnate.  

It was funny, and fascinating.  I decided, while traveling, to visit Sedona, Arizona, and try to visit the author of the ET 101 book.  The author was pleased when I bought five of the books (they had been hard to locate), but didn’t seem interested in discussing it with me.  So, I trotted off and dropped into one of the (many) local “woo-woo” bookstores.

This place was HUGE!  I love books and bookstores, but had a weird experience in this one.  Here were thousands of books, many of which were about the type of experiences I’d been having (I was astounded that there was this much material about all this stuff!) – and I couldn’t find a single book I wanted to buy.  I did pick up Jose Arguelles’ “The Mayan Factor” and leafed through it, but found I had a kind of second-grade response of “This book is too hard for me!”  (Which, indeed, at that time, it was.)

So I approach the clerk, and I say, completely on a whim, “Do you have something that’s been on the shelf for a while but hasn’t been selling, and you’ve wondered why?”

She cocks her head for a moment and says, “Let me think . . .”

“No, don’t think.”

“Oh!  In that case, yes . . .”

She guides me to a case that I haven’t looked at, pulls out a book, and puts it in my hands:  Bringers of the Dawn: Teachings from the Pleiadians, by Barbara Marciniak.

“Hmm,” I say, “I’m supposed to be from there.”

She shivers and says “I just hate it when that happens.”  Then she laughs.

So, as I drive back from Sedona to Portland, winding my way through Southern California and up the coast, I am reading this book, which is blowing my mind.  For starters, it validates everything Carruch has been telling me, which I have been fastidiously recording in my journals.  AND, it gives techniques for aligning with this new energy that’s arising on the planet.

I start practicing some of these techniques – and that’s where the real “fun” began.