Apart from the golf, one of the advantages is the influence you can have. Well, actually I’m not sure whether I have had any influence on anybody, but you do get asked to give your views on a wide range of subjects – often ones you know nothing about.
It was coming up to June and the 1983 General Election, and I was beginning to be concerned about the outcome. I felt that Mrs Thatcher, as she then was, was a strong and sincere leader who was taking the country forward. I know many people will disagree with this, but it was my honest view. So I decided to do what I could to help her re-election.
In general, actors tend to keep their political opinions quiet for fear of alienating people. Whatever your political orientation, you are bound to upset potentially quite a broad section of the population. But I felt that now was the time to make my feelings known. Also, I didn’t really like the fact that because Ken Barlow was a committed socialist, a lot of people automatically assumed that I was too. I wanted to stand up for my own beliefs.
When I ran into the local Conservative MP, Neil Hamilton, and his wife Christine at a craft exhibition at Wilmslow library, I said, ‘If I can be of any help with the election, will you let me know?’
‘But,’ he said, ‘I thought you were – ’
‘No,’ I replied simply, ‘I’m not.’
‘Not everything is as it seems.’
After that I spent a very busy few weeks making appearances with Neil and other local Conservative MPs. I found this was very different from opening fêtes and so on as a celebrity. When you make those kind of appearances you get the happy impression that everyone loves you. But now I had people being aggressive and shouting things like ‘I’m not going to watch your show anymore!’ It could be unnerving. But on the whole more people were pleasant than hostile.
When Margaret Thatcher held a rally at Chester, I was invited along to meet her. I found her attentive and interested in what we had to say. She also seemed quite vulnerable in a way, not at all like her harsh image. She actually asked Sara and me what she could do to overcome that image and I told her, ‘Well, I just wish everyone could meet you.’
Above all, what I liked about Margaret Thatcher was that she was a conviction politician. Rightly or wrongly, she believed certain things were right for the country and she was determined to see them through. I think convictions are terribly important.
As my views became more widely known, I was invited to give after-dinner speeches to Conservative groups all round the country and I met many other members of parliament. I was also fortunate to have the pleasure of visiting Mrs Thatcher twice at Downing Street. The first time was just after the Falklands War and she took me through to the Cabinet Room. I thought she wouldn’t talk about the war, but she chatted very openly about getting the Queen Mary commissioned for it and how she felt about it. I found her very sensitive. I know she could seem alarming and quite strident, but that was because she was a person of great conviction. She only began to fail when she started listening to others. Interestingly, though, there usually comes a time when your own convictions may not be in everyone’s best interests; then it is time to go. What I don’t like about politics today is that people seem to have so few convictions. They’ll do anything to make themselves look good and to appease public opinion. They’ll go for immediate results rather than do unpopular things, but they’ll say they’re doing it for the long term if it all goes wrong. I think they’re all focusing on face-saving rather than doing what they feel to be right. Having said that, I must thank Cherie Blair for producing a wonderful chocolate cake on my last visit to Downing Street, which happened (and goodness knows how she knew) to coincide with my birthday.
I don’t think being a politician is an easy job – I wouldn’t want to be one for anything – and there are certainly some good honest people involved in politics who feel it is their way of contributing to society. However, so much of the media coverage focuses on the personal weaknesses of ministers or the faults of a particular policy, and that leads to political life becoming a big game of survival rather than a form of responsible leadership. It’s a hard game.
Life itself can be very hard, as I was about to find out.
CHAPTER 12
Love and Loss
‘If your life on Earth had no struggle you could count the experience a complete loss.’
The biggest test that I had, and the most tragic moment of my life, also gave me a beautiful spiritual experience. On 16 November 1984 my daughter Edwina died at the age of 18 months.
For about a week she had had a bad cold and we had called in the doctor, who had prescribed antibiotics and linctus. She was soon cool and comfortable and we thought she was on the mend. That night Sara’s parents, Sid and Kay, came round to babysit so that she and I could go out for a Chinese meal.
On returning from dinner Sara went up to see Edwina and found her sleeping peacefully. We talked to Sid and Kay for about half an hour, then they left for home.
As soon as they had gone Sara went up to see Edwina once again and found her lying motionless at the top of her cot. She was dead. We called the ambulance and I tried the kiss of life, to no avail. When the medical staff arrived they did all they could, but it was too late. It was not a cot death; it was a form of acute bronchitis.
Our children are not supposed to die before us. We are supposed to protect and look after them. So on top of the great grief at losing a child, there is the feeling of guilt because, as parents, it is something that we should not allow to happen. Though rationally Sara and I knew we had done all we could for our daughter, still we couldn’t help feeling that we had let her down in some way. We could not talk without bursting into tears; we could not eat. For three days we lived on hot chocolate. We couldn’t face going out of the house. We tried not to cry in front of Verity, who was three at the time, and to explain to her what had happened to her sister. But it was so difficult. We were utterly devastated. We went to bed the night before the funeral not knowing how we were going to get through the ceremony.
When I woke in the morning it was light. I lay there for a while preparing myself for the awful day ahead and then the most extraordinary thing happened. I suddenly saw the most beautiful golden light and in the middle of it was Edwina’s face. She was looking down, smiling at me as if to say, ‘Don’t worry. All is well and I am happy.’ All at once I had the most wonderful feeling of peace and I knew I could go forward.
From that moment on I gained strength. I told Sara, and although she hadn’t seen Edwina, she said that she too felt a lot stronger. So although only I had it, the experience was sent for both of us. It helped us enormously to get through the funeral and I carried Edwina’s coffin with a confidence I could never have mustered without it.
For four or five days after the funeral I still felt the guilt and grief as a physical pain, but I was aware that to some extent that was conditioning. At that time I already had enough spiritual understanding to realize that this would have been pre-planned and that we would all have chosen to experience it for a particular reason. After several days of intense grieving – which is totally understandable as the parent of a child – the true understanding came in and I realized that Edwina would have decided to incarnate just for a short while. It was a great lesson to learn and it wasn’t long before we were able to think about how much we had enjoyed the short time she had been with us rather than just feel sad about the fact that she had gone.
I also knew that she would be in a very loving place and would be very well cared for and that we would meet again.
In fact, as I mentioned in the Preface, several years later I did hear from Edwina again. In the early ’90s I received a letter from a remarkable woman, Peggy Kennard, who had seen me on the Heaven & Earth show one Sunday morning and realized that I had some understanding of spiritual matters. Peggy was an advanced soul with great wisdom and the ability to contact spirit. We stayed in touch for many years. She would send me spiritual books and excerpts that were always ama
zingly helpful and appropriate to my needs. She would also send me messages she had received from spirit. These were always accurate and very useful.
One day she wrote to say she hoped that I would not mind but she had received a message from Edwina. Mind? It was the most wonderful news imaginable. The message was long and detailed. Edwina started with an accurate explanation of who she was and went on to say that she had contacted Peggy because she was a friend of mine and that she ‘shone out like a beacon’ and was easy to get in touch with. She described her as ‘our finely tuned instrument’.
Edwina went on to say that she was very happy and was now working with young children who had arrived in the spiritual realms and, not knowing anything was different, were crying for their mothers. I realized that my daughter was a very beautifully evolved spiritual being doing great work. It was a beautiful feeling to have this communication from her.
Peggy’s messages were always loving, strong and informative. They ceased after a few years when Peggy herself went to the spiritual realms. She can now talk to Edwina face to face.
As I understand it, death occurs when the vibration of the body reaches a certain point and its destiny is fulfilled. So, unless you decide to commit suicide, you never go until your time is right. Then the body releases the spirit. That is a great liberation. We are all spiritual beings held temporarily in a material body and when we return to the spiritual realms we are free to be our true selves, our spiritual selves, with all the attributes, all the experiences, wisdom and worth that we have developed through various incarnations.
If we’ve had a traumatic death or a painful death, first of all we have a sleeping period, a resting period. That’s just to give us the chance to recover. When we wake, we will always find loved ones around us, ready to welcome us and help us, and we will be in the most beautiful place. People often say, ‘Oh, that’s wishful thinking, it’s just a philosophy of convenience,’ but it isn’t.
This first level of the spirit realms, where we wake, is the astral. It’s the nearest level to Earth. As I mentioned earlier, every night while we are sleeping we visit it and actively participate in the life there, but we are unable to retain the memory on returning to our bodies. This is why sleep is so essential, because while the causal body is out on the astral, the physical body is repairing all the damage that has been done during the day.
At some point soon after we have passed over we will review the life we have just lived. We will look at it and see what we’ve done, assess the good and the bad. We aren’t judged by others; we are our own judge. But we have guides and helpers who will assist us.
Eventually we will leave the astral and go to the level of our worth. There are realms ranging from the dark and unpleasant to the bright and heavenly, and most of us are destined for one somewhere in the middle. This will be a much brighter and freer version of life as we know it now, only there will be no physical needs, illnesses or death, as we are immortal. There will just be the eternal task of improving our state of being, searching for the truth and raising our consciousness.
People would lead far better lives if they knew that in the spiritual realms they went to the level of their worth. There is a mansion waiting for them, but what is its condition, what is the state of the neighbourhood and who are their neighbours? That will depend on how they have lived their lives. But there is no such thing as eternal damnation; anyone, however bad, will get help if they ask for it.
‘God never gives in. The god within us all waits with divine patience for the lesson to be learned.’
We will also be able to meet up with all our loved ones again, even our pets. People often say, ‘How, if you’ve had previous lives and previous husbands or wives, can you all exist happily together?’ But if there is genuine love between people, they will be together. And it’s nothing to do with whether you’re married or not married, it’s all to do with love. If there’s love between two people, they will be together. And there’ll be no possessive jealousy as there is here. In the spiritual realms it is understood that we all really love everybody. As eternal beings we love all other eternal beings. We have a different perspective there.
It may be of course that the level you are living on is different from that of someone you love, because we all go to the level of our worth. But there’s nothing to stop you from meeting up and being together whenever you wish. Love is a great connector.
Animals also have their own domain, but if you love an animal, it will come to you and stay with you for a certain length of time. At some point, though, you have to let animals go, because it is alien to their line of development to remain with you forever. But initially, the animals that you’ve loved will be with you.
People often tend to think that when they go to their true home in the spiritual realm they’ll suddenly know all the great truths. Unfortunately this is not the case. We still have to undergo a learning process. But there are many opportunities to do this at all levels. There are universities, music schools, art schools, libraries – anything you want. And there are always people willing to help you. Great work can be done in the spiritual realms. All great ideas and inventions are created there and then passed down to the Earth plane through flashes of inspiration.
You can make real progress in the spiritual realms, but eventually there will come a time when you will see that you need to discharge some negative energy and the only way to do that is to incarnate again on Earth. That will be worked out in advance by you yourself with help from higher beings. This is a hard school and we usually don’t want to come back here. Our loved ones in the spiritual realms will miss us too. There’s often great sorrow as somebody departs to incarnate, but an incarnation is nevertheless a great opportunity.
As I understand it, you incarnate into a family and an area that is right for you; a lot of other souls, of similar age in terms of soul development, may come in at the same time. Whenever anyone has a real effect on you during your earthly life, there will be a reason for it. You may have agreed together to perform certain roles in advance in order to give each other the chance to experience a particular situation and to learn from it.
As well as the Earth, there are other worlds into which we can incarnate. They may not be within our solar system. The other planets in our solar system are not currently inhabited by beings of a physical nature (well, not of our vibrational level) but probably were in the past. But there are other planets, around other suns, that offer other types of material existence, either more refined or less refined than ours. Even the most hard-nosed scientist looking out into the cosmos will say that according to the law of probability there have to be other planets out there in other solar systems with life approximately like ours.
I read once in a spiritual book – and I can only go by the fact that what I was reading seemed to be genuine in every other respect – that the Earth is not the densest of the material worlds; there is one other that is denser, lower in vibration. And there are others to suit every need. Then the time comes when you do not need to incarnate and continue to evolve only in the spiritual realms.
Once we understand reincarnation we also understand that we are responsible for ourselves and our actions and that it is in our own interest to improve ourselves.
Once we have learned all the lessons that can possibly be learned from material existence, then we don’t need to incarnate any more. To reach that point, though, you’ve got to be what we would call absolutely saintly, totally spiritual and selfless and totally loving and compassionate, so most of us have a long way to go!
Great teachers who have reached that point actually often choose to come back because they love humanity and want to help. There are masters here on Earth right now, highly evolved beings, but you would pass them by on the street. They usually keep a low profile and do their work quietly and unobtrusively with those who are ready to work with them.
Knowing all this, of course you can still experience great grief when someone dies. Sara and I s
uffered terribly at first. With some couples, a loss splits them totally, because they grieve in different ways, but Sara and I talked our way through it and helped each other through it. So there was a learning process, though not a conscious one – often learning is not conscious, something deeper is there – and then we grew to accept that it was wonderful to have had Edwina for the 18 months that we did.
It’s understandable to grieve when someone leaves you and it can be particularly hard to deal with if they have had a painful death. But often a painful death is in itself the discharging of great negative energy and that soul will grow and benefit from it. It’s hard for us to see that, of course. But every death that you experience in your life is part of your destiny and there is something to learn from every one.
When someone dies, there’s no need to worry about them. They’ve gone home, they’ve finished their toil, their time at school. They’re been released – early maybe, because they’ve done a good job. It’s understandable to miss someone you love and feel sad that they aren’t around, although they are, in a sense. You are upset by the loss of contact. But that’s not forever either. Love is the great connector and if someone was close to you they are only a thought away. So if you are grieving for someone, just send them love and say, ‘Well done. I miss you, of course, but we’ll meet again.’
This is where the Church, because it doesn’t truly understand life after death, is unable to help people in times of bereavement. But when you understand that the person who has died is fine and happy and has gone home and that you will be with them again, that’s a great comfort. In the meantime they will be missing you too, but they know they can send love to you and every loving thought is instantly received. If you wish, you can send them the thought, I love you and will continue to love you and I hope all is well, and they will receive it. It’s good to know that.
Soul on the Street Page 15