Writing from the Heart: ‘Are you allowing it?’

In the late Nineties, I heard about the Abraham teachings, a spiritual entity channeled through a woman named Esther Hicks. The work centered around what she called the law of attraction. She said, The universe is an interactive place, and the power of thought and emotion shapes one’s reality. Her words made so much sense to me.

And since my son Dan, at that point, had been diagnosed with multiple sclerosis, and was already dealing with juvenile diabetes and was angry every minute of every day, I figured maybe this disembodied wisdom would help him. At the very least, I figured it would help me.

So I would put his wheelchair on the bike rack, plop him in the front seat, and drive around playing the tapes on a constant loop. I felt that his negativity was as much of a problem as what was happening to his physical body.

Esther said that you have to be open to anything you really want –– that not being receptive, being negative, you are the one who is keeping it from happening. She used a great example. She said, “Let’s say you want to listen to jazz on your radio, but you can’t seem to tune it in. The reason it doesn’t work is because you keep setting your dial at hard rock or rap or classical.” 

One of the phrases she used repeatedly was, “Are you allowing it?” 

Half the time, Dan would fall asleep, and the other half he would swear at my tape deck. His anger didn’t dissipate, and my struggle to convince him his negativity was just as harmful to his body as the disease didn’t dissipate either. 

One day, I was taking him to the Harbor View for lunch, and he was wearing his “Shallow Hal” (from Peter Farrelly’s movie) T shirt. I put his jean jacket on him, and off we went. Once again, Esther was lecturing in the car. “Are you allowing it? Are you lettin’ it in? You want to meet a girl? You want a better job? You want your health to improve? Then allow it. You’re the one who’s blocking with your anger.” Oh, how I loved Esther in those moments. I had an ally.

We arrived at the restaurant, and I got Dan settled and sat across from him. The lapels of the jacket had covered some of the letters of the Shallow Hal logo. And the remaining letters spelled out the word “Allow.” I got a smile out of Dan (which was not easy in those days) when he admitted there was something kinda woo-woo about what had just happened. And I hoped he would try using the method Esther always suggested. “Breathe,” she would say. “Count 17 seconds, and go from negative to positive.” 

That same week, a cashmere sweater that had been sitting in its original box, a gift from Dan’s friend Remy, became another example of what the Abraham teachings were about. Every time I suggested to Dan that he wear his gorgeous sweater, I was met with new and louder expletives. But this particular day, right after the “Shallow Hal” incident, Dan was open to being open, and as we were getting ready to go out, my friend Gerry wrote on the sweater box, “CAUTION: COULD CAUSE PLEASURE.” Dan laughed, and finally wore the classy cashmere.

Dan went from angry to surrendered. I’ll never know how that actually happened. If the Abraham teachings had anything to do with that transformation, then thank you, Abraham.

These days, with so much fear and sorrow around what is happening in the world, I am trying to invoke Esther and her philosophy. 

I still think the universe is an interactive place, and I still believe our thoughts have power to affect our reality, but with the number of wars that are happening right now, and the starvation in Gaza, and Russia’s constant bombing of Ukraine, and innocent folks being picked up off the streets of our own free country, and detention centers being built right here in the land of the free, and the elimination of protections of our air and our water, and the continuing burning of the planet, and women’s rights down the drain, and, and, and, I’m pretty sure it’s gonna take more than 17 seconds.