On Saturday October 18th, the Spiritual Warrior journey for me started at 5:30am to make an 8am flight and to arrive early enough to prepare for the 5pm screening of Spiritual Warriors. Knowing that a lot of time, expense and audience anticipation was on the line…I DID NOT want to miss my flight. I calmly arrived to the airport about 6:45am. PLENTY of time to make my flight. I will spare you the airport drama…i.e. Karma, and let’s just say it involved a check-in bag that exceeded the “almighty airline weight limit”, a poor attitude, a supervisor and an unimaginably long security line…on a SATURDAY! As you may have guessed…I missed the flight 🙁
After the self inflicted 5 hour layover, I entered the gate for the next available flight left which was leaving on time…thank God…and I did that too 😉 As a traveler (yes, the other kind) I’m generally NOT much of a talker. I am quiet and use airplane time to read either my Discourse or smut magazines…I know…I tend to get distracted with my priorities. 😉 On this day though, I got a sense of how things are just perfect and I just need to hold and remember…GOD HAS A PLAN…in this case a FLIGHT PLAN.
While waiting for more people to board, here plopped my seat partner for the next 2 hours. A jolly and friendly potato farmer named Winston…”Hi there…how ya doing”. Because of that friendly hello…let’s just say I am still behind on my Discourses and who is kissing or divorcing who in Hollywood. The next 2 hours were filled with some of the most amazing conversation. I learned so much from this twenty-something and his family business that supplies Frito Lay with a major chunk of potatoes for their chip business. WOW. As we moved the discussion to Spiritual Warriors and John-Roger he then began to share how stressed he is in his life. He had come to the awareness that it was affecting his physical body in a negative way and was starting to have stomach problems. He said that he has been searching for a solution and he needs to make some changes soon. We talked about MSIA and meditation (SE’s) and his face lit up and wanted me to explain more about that. I happen to have grabbed one of the SW books from my carry on, to read on the plane, and it was sticking out of the seat pocket. He grabbed it and said that he needed to buy one…maybe this would be the solution he was looking for. Of course, I gave him one and said it was a gift. He was filled with gratitude…so Light to that and the Traveler’s works…(yes…THAT one!)
My awareness, for this short journey and some airport drama, is that God and the Traveler have a plan…a bigger plan, and since I don’t know what that is, I just need to cooperate with HOWEVER it unfolds…even if it means missing my “scheduled flight”.
Upon my arrival into Portland I was met by a dear fellow Minister John Rawlings Dritsas who ushered me off to the convention center for the screening. Grace had been bestowed upon me, as I had an hour to test the movie and prepare our infamous table of books, DVDs and marketing materials before our show-time…a sigh of relief!
I had a little time, so I walked the expo to see how many people and what kind’s of things were being exhibited. To my surprise the facility was empty of attendees…”maybe” a couple hundred. If you have ever been to an expo…that’s pretty empty. I got a bit concerned that we wouldn’t have many people viewing the movie…but I guess that was handled too…
I walked out of the hall to head over to our screening room and I saw a line forming. Where were these people coming from? They sure weren’t in the exhibit hall. By 5:10pm we had a packed house with just a few empty seats and by 5:20pm we were turning people away. We were at capacity! SUCCESS! I still scratch my head at that one…because during the movie…the expo was still empty!
The power of intention: I had set a goal…a purpose…an intention for this trip. I wanted to sell lots of DVDs and distribute a case of SW books. During our DSS class this weekend, http://theblessings.org/about-2 had a sharing on Friday night. He caught me off guard when he called my name and said…”Where you going Rick?”. I was like…ummm…”no where”. Aren’t you going somewhere this weekend for SW? I was like, “Oh yeah”. I gave a brief description of the Portland trip and asked people to send Light that I sell lots of DVDs. Later that same night, I was at J-R’s and briefly went over the event and asked for HIS blessing too. Well…a strong intention and purpose, mixed with everyone’s Light, topped with the Traveler’s support we sold a lot of DVDs!! Thank you to ALL…a team effort!
Big hugs and thank you’s to all those involved in the Portland trip that I personally did not meet and MAJOR gratitude to John and Connie Rawlings Dritsas who assisted with the selling, took me to dinner, drove me to and from the airport and made my stay in Portland grace filled and easy.
Love and Light to all,
Rick Ojeda.
