The Heart of the Universe
In 1986, I met my life partner during a pivotal moment of choice.
I was headed out of this world. I was 21 years of age, struggling to make good while attending university full time and working several jobs to pay my way. My life skills consisted of studying hard to make good grades, people pleasing, and knowing alcohol was how to feel like a normal person.
I went dancing a couple of nights a week at an Atlanta club; I loved flailing around for hours on the dance floor…it was a tremendous release for me. Observers used to say in admiring tones that I “danced angry”. My alcohol consumption was completely dependent on other people buying me drinks (because I couldn’t afford to even eat at this stage of my life.) When I drank, I felt better. I loosened up and let go.
My pain was palpable; I was a young woman fighting to survive in a big city, with no idea of the inner demons that chased her…or that she was a survivor of childhood sexual abuse. I was lost, and getting more lost as I attempted to find solace.
There came a day near the end of July 1986 that I was driving, hung over and in a fog, on Monroe St. and Piedmont Ave., when I heard a voice. It said, “Licia. You will be dead by the time you are twenty five if you keep this up.”
This voice seemed to come from the passenger seat next to me. However, I was alone in the car. I actually looked over at the seat and into the back of the car because the voice had been audible. Who was this voice? A product of my own mind? A helpful and loving Angel? A voice of God? I didn’t know.
But I heard it loud and clear. For some reason and by some miracle, I took those words into myself and clung to them like a lifeline. Someone or something cared enough about me to prevent me from destroying myself. And I responded as a desert flower responds to the rain; I soaked it in.
My behavior changed utterly; I stopped going out to the dance club, stopped allowing myself to be a target for sexual predators, stopped drinking. I slept, drank water, held myself as if I were someone who deserved to be taken care of. For three weeks, I lived an almost monastic life, focusing on study and taking care of myself. There was a palpable hum that I can sometimes still feel when I come into alignment with the Heart of this Universe, the Center of All Things.
On August 12, 1986, literally 3 weeks after I heard the voice, I walked into an Atlanta restaurant for an interview and met the love of my life. When I saw him, it was as if I recognized him. There was something about him, as if light came through the place that his body occupied in in the fabric of space. We have been together ever since, now going on our 30th year.
What followed from that moment when I chose to listen to that voice has been extraordinary. Not only have I doubled my life expectancy, but my daily existence has unfolded like a miracle. The darkness that would have been my short life transformed into such a bright and kind life; the possibility of so much good to offer the world was given to me in the moment that I heard that loving but firm warning.
I’m convinced that my choice to listen to the warning saved my life…AND opened a completely new realm of possibility for what I could do with it. The love and joy and healing has proven a catalyst for me to generate so much love and be a force of positive change in the world.
It’s so basic, right? We grow up in an abusive home and we generate destructive behavior, unless we heal. We encounter something profound and we allow it to change our life, or we hang on to the pain and habits that we know, and experience more of the same. It’s a choice, plain and simple.
When we choose to align in someone/something that cares about us, we are receiving impulses that are life affirming instead of self destructive. We begin to listen to the voices (internally and externally) that love us instead of the voices that tear us down. What results is nothing less than a sea change.
JOIN Peter and I for our new teleclass!
HIGHER LOVE 101: Introduction to the UNIFY Codex
A 4-week course designed to bring you a Higher Love!
JOIN Licia and Peter Berry, with a FRESH perspective that you’ve NEVER HEARD before for this 4-week exploration of partnered, respectful love…within and with others! Course includes:
- 3 LIVE teleclasses on Monday nights (recorded in case you need to miss it! Dates: Nov. 30, Dec. 7 and 14),
- The UNIFY Codex Manual,
- Comraderie in a new community of people dedicated to a higher ideal of love,
- Email prompts with engaging questions
- Email support and invitations to engage with us personally,
- BONUS 3 additional podcasts:
- “How to Love”,
- “The Frontier Inside”,
- and “Dreaming Your Relationship into Being”
- BONUS copy of Licia’s 2008 book LOVE LETTER
