A Letter to Neale

Reader Question:

Dear Neale... I am extremely thankful for your book, Conversations with God. I would not doubt it becomes the Bible of the next millennium. It has helped me to clear things up and put them in their proper perspective.

If I had to give up all of my books (in the hundreds) and keep just one, this would be the book. Before I finished CwG I knew I would be reading it perpetually, again and again. I would like you to consider the following questions that were not touched upon in the first book.

(1) Do we really have a guardian angel, or are they spirits who have once lived on earth? I've read of both.

(2) Why are some spirits so earthbound? Why is there no one on the other side to help them move on with no problem?

(3) There are those who have had near-death experiences who claim to have talked to angels or highly spirited beings. Are they angels or earthly-departed beings?

(4) There are books which talk about the complete process of dying, looking over your past life, selecting a new one and coming back. Why is it that in this state of being, no one reports seeing angels?

Blessings to you, and keep on writing.
Devon, Country Club Hills, IL.

Neale Responds

Dear Devon... There really is a fantastic amount of interest right now in the subject of angels. So to your first question let me say that Book 3 in the trilogy touches on this question. But let me tell you what I understand about angels.

Yes, Angels are real. They are just that: angels. That is, wonderful beings of love who minister to us every moment of our time in this reality. They become very attached to us, and in this sense are our guardians. They hover over us and do exert some control over physical life and the dangers around us.

Examples? The driver careening toward us who swerves at the last minute. The manhole around the corner that we just miraculously avoided. The paint bucket falling from the window ledge above us as we walk by the office building, missing us by inches. Even emotional collisions. That "bite your tongue" feeling which comes over you at just the last moment, saving you from blurting something which would surely have led to an enormous emotional "accident."

Those feelings, those maneuverings of physical form, are the manifestations of angels, who walk a delicate line, seeking to protect us from the hurts of life without interfering in any tangible way (which they may not do) in our own free choices and creations, or the path we are walking.

Are angels "angelic creatures" who have never been human, or are they the spirit forms of beings who have once lived upon the earth? That's a very good question. Some would say they are both. In fact, I understand us to have two kinds of "helpers." There are what I will call our "guides": these are spirit forms of beings once incarnated. And there are "angels": spirit forms which have never incarnated-"Fingers of God," if you please-tapping us on the shoulder to make us aware of danger, holding us in their embrace to comfort us through our tears, dancing with joy in their hearts when we celebrate our own wonder and our softest moments of love, which is God truly expressed.

The previously incarnated souls who choose to act as our guides do so out of love for us. They may be beings who have been close to us in this very life (although this is not very often so), or beings who have partnered with us in the life experience prior to this present incarnation (more often the case). They have chosen to be close to us at times because... well, simply because they are close to us (that is, they feel a closeness to us always), and it pleases them to give us guidance from time to time.

Guides, as opposed to angels, are not with us always. As previously incarnated beings, they have other things to do, other adventures to take, other challenges and growings to experience in what we would call "the afterlife." But they fly to our side instantly when they can feel we need guidance or help, or when we call upon them. Because they have shared a special kinship with us in this or another life, their presence can often be "felt" by us.

(1) The presence of angels is much more etheric, a "wispier" sort of feeling, if it is felt at all. Yet their power is greater than that of guides, if I could put it that way. It is not really a case of "power," but our human words are so inadequate to describe larger realities. Perhaps the word purpose should be substituted here. Or a new word, a combination of the two. Then we could say that their "porwer" is greater than that of guides. Their instant intercessions can change the course of physical or emotional events in ways I have mentioned. Guides do not have this "power."

(2) People are "earthbound," as you put it, because they choose to be. There are spirits who are there to help them "move on with no problems," but in the afterlife as well as in this life, no spirit, no guide, no angel, no being of any kind, not even God, will ever interfere with our free choice. Ever.

(3) Generally in so-called NDEs (Near Death Experiences), the spirits to whom people say they have spoken are guides (often loved ones who have gone before), or ancient ones (souls of once incarnated beings), and not what we would call angels. On the other hand, there could be a conversation or an interaction with an angel. I very definitely feel that I had such an interaction during an NDE in 1980 which profoundly changed my life.

(4) You ask why, in the complete process of dying, people don't report seeing angels. For the same reasons people do not generally report conversations with angels during NDEs. When we have left the body, the work of angels is done, so to speak. Angels are literally the "fingers of God." They are God's spirit, moving into form (however etheric) and hovering over physicality. This is the Holy Spirit, or the "Holy Ghost," which is mentioned in so much theological literature. It is the part of the one soul which knows. Its primary function is to inform that which is physical. When we become nonphysical once again, we already know that of which the Holy Spirit would seek to inform us.

In short, the Holy Spirit is our connecting link between physicality and spirituality (or between what I would call nonreality and reality). When we, ourselves, shed our bodies and become free spirits once again, we are experiencing ultimate reality, and that which connects us to ultimate reality is no longer needed. We are that which connects us to ultimate reality. Indeed, we and ultimate reality are one.

This is also true of Who We Are in our physical bodies. It's just that we don't know this.

And so the Holy Spirit is the part of all which re-minds us of this, and brings us other information from the realm of the absolute about our physical experience in this, the realm of the relative.

This "Holy Spirit" aspect of God is working through me right now as I seek to answer this question for you. This is my "guardian angel" at work!

Many blessings,