The Way of the Warrior-Wizard
Chapter 19: The Dawn of Compassion

Yvonne guided Duncan/Gaius toward a powerful light. Duncan felt as though he were experiencing something through Gaius that he had already experienced before. As he came closer to the light, he began to perceive it as a gateway. “Gaius” had somehow already gone through it, and so Duncan stood by the gate, unsure of what he should do. He felt that it was not his time to go into the afterlife, and so he stood still for a moment.

“Where am I?” he thought, “Am I not supposed to go back to my body?”

As if in answer to his question, the scene changed suddenly. Surrounding him were the walls of a beautifully rustic old log cabin. In front of him was a man of dark complexion, wearing a navy blue robe filled with shining golden-silver stars. The stars emanated from his cloak as if they were truly stars in the night sky.

“Hello, there, son,” the man said, tossing a silver log onto the fire-place. It seemed as if the fire was of a golden hue, and as bright as the sun on a hot afternoon.

“I...uh...” Duncan replied, somewhat disoriented. Was he even supposed to be here?

“Of course you are,” the man responded, as if having read Duncan’s mind, “Since you are here, right now. If you’re here, then that means that you’re supposed to be here.”

“I...I’m sorry, Sir, but...who are you?”

“I,” replied the man with a beaming smile, “am Herald of the Inter-Life. I’m what you call a wizard, a wise-man, or a sage...but I prefer to call myself a Wise Guy.”

“A Wise-Guy,” Duncan murmured, “well...yes, Mr. Herald...but I was supposed to have been having a past-life regression. I was brought back to the age of the Roman Empire, where...”

“Yes, I know,” Herald interrupted, “You skipped all the boring stuff and went straight to the Big Moment. Yvonne directed you here in order to help you process the experience. So—what’d you think of ol’ Gaius Maximus?”

“Well...” Duncan responded hesitantly, “I’m glad that he made the right choice, in the end. Killing Avulus would not have been right, even if he did run off and marry Gaius’ sister...but what is disturbing to me is that Gaius, this man that I used to be, was going to kill Avulus. I could feel it in his body. He was getting ready to stab Avulus in the heart! The only reason he did not is that Avulus’ son came forth and revealed himself to be his sister’s child.”

Herald the Wise-Guy peered at Duncan.

“And did you recognize the identity of the young boy?”

Duncan thought for a moment and it suddenly dawned on him who his “nephew” was: it was his new friend, Jack Kingston!

“It was Jack,” Duncan concluded, “and Professor Donaldson was the Centurion, Marcus. No wonder Jack doesn’t like him!”

“Marcus Maximus Octavius was the Centurion’s full name,” Herald told him, “You and he shared a gens, or common ancestor. Nowadays, of course, he’s known as Professor Jerome Donaldson. Don’t worry, though...he’s come a long way since the day he stabbed you in the back for not killing an old man.”

“It’s absolutely absurd, what he did!” Duncan exclaimed angrily, “and it was ridiculous what I was going to do in the name of family honour! I can’t really judge Marcus, however, because I was just as bad.”

“The important thing is, you stopped the cycle of madness,” Herald informed him, “you chose to re-visit this sad scene from the past in order to witness the first glimmering of a compassion that was always within you but which had been banished to your unconscious mind by many life-times spent fighting as a warrior. This moment was a re-awakening of that compassion in you.”

“What compassion?” Duncan asked in a somewhat dismal tone, “He would have done it if it hadn’t been for the young nephew.”

“You felt it as “something else” bubbling underneath the rage,” Herald explained, “Let me show you scenes from some of your other lives—we won’t make you go through all of them because most were short, brutish, and generally not much fun.”

Herald waved his hand and a round light-mirror appeared. Duncan felt as though he was in the midst of a fairy-tale movie. The images which Herald showed him, however, were definitely not the “fluff-n’-stuff” of modern-day cartoon stories.

He saw himself as a rigorously trained Spartan warrior, killing a Messinian rebel. He knew without asking that this unfortunate rebel was Avulus/Hamish, or whatever identity the man held in this particular hapless existence. Other scenes flashed by of Duncan and Hamish battling each other as gladiators in various blood-soaked Roman circuses. In some of the "scenes" the two warriors were fighting side by side in battle, slaying their enemies. In lifetime after lifetime, the pair of them seemed to both form a bond with each other and at the same time sever that bond by one of them killing the other. In one memorable battle in a Roman arena, “Hamish” stabbed “Duncan” in the heart and then stabbed himself out of remorse.

“It seems as though my Father and I have this bond that remains unbroken underneath all these horrible wars and battles,” Duncan noted, “it’s as if we naturally want to be friends, but it's difficult because we’re often being pitted against each other.”

“Yes, you became stuck into a cycle of violence and karma,” Herald explained, “You had to keep re-experiencing the same thing until one of you decided to stop the cycle...which is what you did as Gaius, Duncan.”

“But I didn’t stop anything!” Duncan cried, discouraged, “It was Jack—that is, the nephew—who stopped me from doing it.”

“You did notice the mercy bubbling up from underneath the rage, did you not? Perhaps you did not consciously intend to spare Avulus’ life, but you did put down your weapon...and when you performed that critical act, you brought into your darkened existence The Dawn of Compassion. After you did that, your subsequent lives improved tremendously...you were then involved with war less and self-development more.”

Herald cleared the “Light-Mirror” of battle images and instead showed Duncan fleeting “scenes” from the lives he had spent as monks, priests, and scholars. In these comparatively more enlightened life-times, he saw that either his father or sometimes his twin brother Caleb often showed up as his mentor. In other “scenes”, he saw that his mother Kyra, sisters Cara, Fiona, and Mairi, and his brothers Glenlachlan and Sage were participants in many of his “Life Dramas”.

In one early European life, he saw himself as the acolyte of a priest, whom he instinctively recognized as being his father’s twin brother, Calvin. Hamish and his twin brother had barely spoken to each other over the past fifty years, and so Duncan did not know his Uncle particularly well. Nonetheless, when Calvin did visit, he felt an inexplicable bond with the man. Perhaps it was because they once shared this student-teacher relationship.

Herald showed Duncan a few more “scenes” from lives where he had lived in poverty, either as a peasant or as a slave. Once in a long while, someone familiar would step forth to hand him a scrap of food or release him from a dark prison, but he could not determine their identities because the “scenes” that the mirror was showing were so depleted of light. It seemed to Duncan that these lives were miserable and barren of meaning. He felt depressed just watching the dismal parade of his woe-begotten identities living out their existences.

The only bright light in this particular tapestry of Life-Moments was one in which Duncan experienced himself as a young child in South Africa, probably at the time of the second Anglo-Boer war. The time period was one marred by terrible violence, but the light that Duncan felt from the child's mother seemed to keep it all at bay.

An African woman was holding a young girl close to her, humming a lullaby. The scene was so powerful that it drew Duncan in, to the point where he was experiencing himself as the young South African girl. He intuited that the mother was none other than his "past-lives medium", Yvonne; and her inner power was absolutely indomitable. He felt the scene shifting to an overcrowded camp where many of the people were starving, including his mother and "himself" as the young girl. She felt such intense fear, and the pangs of hunger in her body were terrible to bear. He realized that this was what it was like to live in a concentration camp, and that it was more appalling than he ever could have possibly imagined. He also had a sense that this was how she and her mother died, but Herald pulled him out of the life scene before the death occurred.

"You've already been through one traumatic death, Duncan...that's enough for now. Why don't we change the scene? Let's go back to a pre-colonial era," Herald suggested, waving his arm once more.

A big panoramic view shone forth from the mirror to display a lush forest of evergreens. An ancient man with bronze-coloured skin was surveying the forest from his lofty perch on a big mountain. He was sitting on a rock with his hands held out, as if receiving transmissions from Nature and the Universe. As with the African mother, Duncan could feel a powerful spirit emanating from the man. He was like a warrior, except that he seemed very priest-like and holy...the term Spirit Warrior entered his thoughts.

“Amazing!” Duncan exclaimed, “It looks like North America in its pristine state, before the Europeans descended upon the continent. Is this ancient man my father...or is it...?”

“Yes,” Herald told him with a grin, “It’s you. You’re the Turtle Island Shaman, and this “scene” represents a life which was lived with great integrity. You and your people lived in a very holistic way, and you all showed appreciation for the interconnectedness of life. You were grateful for everything in your environment and everyone in your life. When you went hunting, you thanked every animal that you caught for sacrificing its life so that you and your family could eat and therefore live. You shared everything that you caught with the community, and you used every single part of the animal—there was no waste. This was how you were before the “Dominator cultures”, those which grew out of the historical ashes of the Roman Empire, infected your thinking. You spoke against them in a subsequent life, again as a Shaman; but as a British soldier you later joined them in conquering the lands of others, just as the Greeks and the Romans had done before them...it was like a perpetual cycle of generational violence."

Herald paused for a moment to let Duncan process what he had just told him.

"You were part of large group of Humans who believed in hierarchical structures and the concept of ownership of the land and its inhabitants,” he concluded, "as well, you were among those who were affected by these conquests. You have felt both the terrible woe of the 'victim' and the vain glory of the 'victor'."

Duncan sighed. Was there no end to the merciless nature of the Human psyche?

“But, enough of Empire,” Herald said, “Or at least the violent aspect of it. I have just one more “scene” to show you before you leave here...I think Yvonne is urging me to send you back before your mother Kyra becomes worried about you.”

The mirror clouded over for a moment and then transformed into a “scene” that seemed to be taking place within a small croft or cabin similar to the appearance of the one that he and Herald were occupying, except that it was obviously cruder in its general make-up. The croft was constructed from stone and Duncan surmised that it probably had a thatched roof made from mud and straw. There was a fire burning in the hearth, which brought light into the room. By the fire, a brown dog was sleeping...Duncan even had a general sense that the dog’s identity was the same as his present-day German Shepherd guardian, Davy!

Who knew that dogs reincarnated? Duncan wondered as he observed the animal.

Nearby the dog, a young man and an old man with a long white beard were working on the creation of some kind of mixture.

The young man wore a simple beige tunic made of wool, which to Duncan suggested that he was probably a peasant. The older man wore a blue cloak which looked as though it were made from fine linen, suggesting that he came from a higher station in life than the younger man. Looking at them from this vantage point, it would not have surprised Duncan to learn that they were living in the late Middle Ages, probably somewhere in England or Scotland. Obviously, if they were from different stations in life, they were not supposed to be relating to each other as equals. It therefore seemed to be a highly unconventional partnership.

“They are involved in the art of alchemy, that which seeks to transform base metals into gold,” Herald told him, “but in this “scene” I believe that “you” and your “father” are trying to create an elixir of perpetual youth.”

Duncan nodded.

“Yes, alchemy was a kind of proto-science—a strange mixture of early science, philosophy, and mysticism. Perhaps the old man thought he could practice his art more freely amongst the common folk?”

“That’s right,” replied Herald, “He considered himself a magician, and you were his apprentice; but while his chief interest was replaceing the secret to Eternal Life, you were secretly developing another objective. You were far more interested in replaceing the antidote to war and violence...an effect of all your lives spent as a warrior. You didn’t replace it in this life-time, as you were afraid to make your quest known to your Magical Mentor. You spent this life-time trying to learn and carry on his twin arts of alchemy and elixirs of youth because you admired him so much. You were also in an "inferior" position to his and that made it difficult for you to assert your interests. That was why you left “magic” behind and concentrated on developing the intellect in your subsequent lives. For now though, my boy, we’re out of “time” as you would say in your world...quite a feat in the Land of the Timeless. The Past Lives Movie finishes with you and your father working together for one of the first times in your personal history to create something which might benefit Humanity...”

“And did this ‘potion of youth’ actually benefit anybody?” Duncan interrupted, skeptical of the benefits of such an elixir.

“Whether it benefited anyone or not,” replied Herald, “is beside the point. What is important is that two people previously at odds with each other began the process of healing their bond. You have spent many life-times working on that, to arrive at your currently close relationship with your father.”

“Is that what all these...hodge-podge of past existences...this evolution of the soul...have been working towards?” Duncan asked, perplexed, “Working together and forming bonds is very important, of course, but why did it take us so long to do something so simple? What was the point of all the barbarism and the battles?”

“Aha,” responded Herald, “What indeed? You did spend a great deal of energy in your next group of lives learning and making progress, however, so don’t be too hard on yourself. The rest of the people in your Soul Group were essentially doing the same thing, once the transitional period of time that is sometimes known as The Dark Ages had unfolded...you refer to the next age as The Enlightenment, but here in the spirit realms we simply see it as an early educational period. The development of your intellectual and creative potential has been a major project of yours over the centuries; but it was also a period whereby the exercise of power through conquest was developing, as we’ve seen. People had learned about domination from their past experiences with the Roman Empire, and unfortunately this was an element that was passed on through the ages. Most of the Wisdom Cultures, such as the one of which you were once a part as The Turtle Island Shaman, either disappeared completely or suffered greatly from the power abuses meted out to them by Western ‘civilization’.”

“From a spiritual perspective, however, you and many others are beginning to realize that there are more important things in this Great Universe of ours than status, intellect, or worldly power. It is time now to return to your present existence as Duncan MacGregor, in a global era where the effects of Empire and hierarchical power are still very much present. Is there anything that you have learned from all this that you would like to bring back to your current life?”

Duncan thought for a moment about all the fleeting moments of his personal history that had been revealed to him through this odd...“vision”, or whatever it was. The relationship between himself and his father was obviously a main theme, if he were to look at it as a “Literature of Lives”.

“I would say compassion,” Duncan finally responded, “I suppose you could call it ‘love’, as exemplified by Gaius’ hesitation in killing Avulus after he learns that his sister had a child with the old man. Perhaps this was the beginning of the development of wisdom, as you mentioned that I spent a number of life-times developing my intellectual potential. This collection of “scenes” that you have shown to me was rather random, and so I can’t classify or categorize them into any kind of recognizable historiography...”

“Oh, forget about historiographies!” Herald scoffed affably, “Tell me about the love, my boy.”

Duncan thought further about the experience that he had undergone. He had “begun” his story in prehistory, amongst people who had lived in a holistic manner and who believed in a more interdependent society as opposed to the hierarchical, “dog-eat-dog” world of the later aggressive Empires of the world.

It seemed to Duncan that he had been “born” into a natural way of wisdom, but that he had descended into rage and ignorance, represented by his lives as warriors in the “Dominator” cultures. It then seemed as if he had, in a painstaking manner, crawled out of that dark hole through education and a re-claiming of his inner wisdom, as shown by his lives spent in contemplation and study...almost like transforming the ordinary material of his lives into spiritual “gold”. The powerful experience of the South African mother's love towards her young daughter was also an important part of that "gold" because it shone out straight through the misery of war and poverty.

As he directed his attention inward, it dawned on him then that love, compassion, and forgiveness were the chief means whereby an individual could re-claim his or her lost heart. He had always known this in his mind, but at the moment he was experiencing it deeply through his heart and spirit.

“Eureka! Yes, I think you’ve got it!” Herald exclaimed, “Remember to let your heart into the game as well, Duncan. Your heart and mind need to function together as one team...they are both a part of who you are.”

“I see that,” Duncan acknowledged, “although after this experience I am beginning to question what and who I am. Am I Duncan? Am I Gaius? The Turtle Island Shaman? The young African girl? The student of Alchemy?”

“And how can you answer your own question?” asked Herald, “Remember to go within.”

Duncan looked within and realized that he was all and none of these identities. Who he was...was not as important as who he was being right now. He felt love pouring into his heart from the many family members whom he had cared about through the ages, from his mother and father to his sisters, brothers, mentors, friends, and animal companions. At that moment, he forgave his various “selves” for their imperfections...from the ruthless, vengeful mentality of Gaius and the other warriors to his present-day self, the one who was focused on the world of the intellect and who was also attempting to integrate love and heart-wisdom into his mental state.

Before he departed, he saw another panorama flickering across the mirror, this time of a generalized future. In it, he saw himself as part of a tapestry...the weaving of a large number of souls who were engaged in helping society transition from the domination of “Empire” to the return of a more holistic and spiritual age. This age, Duncan realized, could hold potential for a new kind of power. Instead of being led by the merciless hunger for outward power, he saw the possibility for a world where human beings were led by the love and wisdom of their own inner spirits.

“Say ‘hi’ to Yvonne for me, will you, Warrior-Wiz?” Herald called out as the magical surroundings faded and Duncan awoke to the relieved faces of Yvonne and his mother Kyra.