Well, I did a freaking number on my right knee during kickboxing class last evening. I think it’s the Universe telling me, “You’re too old, granny,” but I’m not going to give up. Actually, I wasn’t even kickboxing at the time. We started our class as usual, with a slow jog around the mat. Ten steps in, my knee twisted a tiny bit, I heard and felt a pop, then a burning sensation. I limped through the rest of class, determined to finish, but today I can barely bear weight on it. As it so happens, I interviewed Bruce Lee through medium, Emma McIntosh, and asked him what I did. He said something jammed up into the knee cap. Pretty good, Dr. Lee, because when I flex my knee, I can feel the patella click and I can hear a loud pop. He said rest and ice should do it. I told him to send me the bill at his leisure. He also said he’d be my kickboxing guide, so yay! I need all the help I can get but Bruce Lee? Wow! He also said that this happened to me to teach me not to give up. I think I had that teachable moment presented to me again long ago when I wanted to start horseback riding so my husband and I could have a common interest. After all, I’m not about to get on a race bike and drag my knee on the track. But the first time up on the horse as it galloped up an embankment, the saddle came loose. The lady didn’t put it on correctly. So I fly down the cliff, hit my helmeted head on a rock, and the horse lost his footing and landed on top of me. All one could see was ass and hooves and a cloud of dust as he tried to right himself. I was left with several broken ribs and a concussion. I’d have been dead if I had not worn a helmet. After that, I was always afraid to get on an horse and never enjoyed it again. Eventually, I stopped. This won’t be the case with kickboxing. I like it because it’s a workout with attitude and the additional purpose of learning a form of self-defense. At this point, however, it looks like the only way I’ll be able to defend myself for now is by batting my assailant with a pair of crutches. Oh well. Send healing energy my way if you can, guys!

Here’s the third part of our interview with Omar Mateen.

Me: Okay. What do you think about your interpretation of Islam now?

Omar: My interpretation of Islam then and now is irrelevant. It was just something I used to feed my own anger and fear. Interpretations will always mold themselves into what you want or need them to be.

Me: True, but do you think that Islam should be a violent kind of religion? Do you think the infidels and homosexuals should be killed and women should be oppressed? Do you believe that now?

Omar: As a soul, that’s not conducive to being able to evolve and stay on the planet, but every religion has some flavor of that.

Me: Yeah.

Omar: It’s just that right now that’s what’s being focused on.

Me: But do you believe in Sharia law, for example? Right now, as a spirit.

Omar: I didn’t even believe in it then.

Me: Okay.

Omar: There were many people who, when an oppressive regime comes about, will fall underneath the umbrella of that. They feel powerless and want to go toward the thing that makes them feel powerful. But in the long term, they become victims of the very regime they were supporting.

Me: Okay. When you were doing all of this shooting, did you know that you would die?

Omar: Yes.

Me: Oh gosh. Were you afraid?

Omar: No.

Me: Why were you such an angry person from childhood on? Even as a child, you were expelled from school for a lot of different issues.

Omar: In my family, if a child misbehaves, you know this to be true: There is something going on in the family.

Me: Yeah.

Omar: That was true in my case. I don’t want to call out my family or anything, but there were things that happened that made me the way I was. Human beings are shaped by their experiences, and those experiences, I now know, are part of the design that our soul has for us in order to have certain experiences. Had I never grown up in the environment that I grew up in that made me so angry, then I would have never gone through with this spiritual agreement that we had that culminated in the shooting.

Me: So it was part of the design to be raised like that?

Omar: Yes, and then that ended up creating all this talk about what had happened: the hate, the dysfunction in society, all of those things are opportunities that enable us to talk about it. The more we keep talking about it and the more we have these experiences, the more it solidifies in our consciousness that we need to support each other in order to maintain everyone’s sense of security.

Me: Well, okay, so what in your childhood made you so angry? Was it your father? He talked about how he never taught you to be this way and that he loves this country, yet there’s a suggestion that he’s supportive of the Taliban.

Robert: He projects all this respect for his father and his family so he doesn’t feel like he should go there and talk about specifics about them. He’s got this thing about respect for them.

Me: Okay. Does your father have anything to do with how you feel about yourself?

Omar: I will say this. I am a lot like my father.

Me: Okay, so your father is an angry man?

Omar: My father has his issues.

Me: Okay, but did your father make you feel bad about yourself?

Omar: He passed those issues on to me.

Me: Did he make you feel bad about yourself?

Omar: Indirectly. My father has anger. If you’re growing up in circumstances like that, it can carry over and make you feel angry, too, and you can feel self-loathing because of that.

Me: What about your mother? Did she make you feel bad about yourself?

Omar: My mother was quiet.

Me: Probably had to be. Now, let’s talk about gun laws. Would they have helped in this situation, and is that the answer to fighting terrorism?

Robert: Erik’s taking this part, and Omar is stepping back. The woman that was with Omar that I call Brenda has her arm around him, and she’s telling him he did a good job. It’s really nice to me that this is what’s going on. I guess he didn’t get this kind of thing, and now it’s playing out to help his soul feel fulfilled. Sometimes when a person lives a life that was very dysfunctional, which most of us do, then whatever those parts are that were holding us back and keeping us in our anger and frustration, sometimes in spirit, the idealized version of what would have made that better plays out. So this woman is supporting him in this way to let him know that someone has his back.

Me: Okay.

Robert: And that they’re not judging him. And this woman was killed by him! That’s amazing.

Me: Yeah. That is amazing.

Erik: Gun laws would not have changed anything. You have to address the dysfunction that’s going on that would cause people who would even pursue that. We have to think about—

Robert: He’s talking about a driver’s license. Something about a car.

Erik: You wouldn’t drive a car without a license, so people need to be trained in these kinds of things.

Me: Trained? What do you mean?

Erik: In how to use these kinds of weapons.

Me: Okay, right.

Erik: I like all this stuff so I’m biased. In life I would have been, “It’s all good. Whatever. Let people do what they want to do.”

He loved guns, that’s for sure. Amazing that that’s what ended his life.

Erik: That’s my human side. My spirit side knows that all these things that we’re experiencing with people being able to buy a gun without a check or anything—

I guess he’s talking about the gun show loophole.

Erik: It’s teaching humanity something.

Robert: What’s it teaching?

Erik: We have to be respectful of life, but we also have to recognize that the people we’re giving these kinds of weapons to may not necessarily be able to use them in a responsible and safe way.

Me: Yeah, it’s not the gun that kills. It’s whoever pulls the trigger.

Erik: You’re right, Mom.

Don’t forget, tomorrow at 7 PM CT is Erik’s Hour of Enlightenment radio show. Call 619-639-4606 15 minutes prior to talk to Erik. http://goo.gl/aFHTzJ

Last but not least, here’s another short but sweet review of Erik’s amazing book, My Life After Death: A Memoir from Heaven. Remember it’s available in paperback, Audible, audiobook CDs, Kindle and Nook. Get your copy now for only 9 bucks and change. A cheap price to pay for a sense of peace. 

Elisa and Erik, thank you for walking me through your journey. I felt like I was in the book with Erik and experiencing every step in each page…..

–Steven Dallas