Angel Visions:
How, What, Why, and Where
 by
Doreen Virtue, Ph.D.
Have
you ever seen an angel? Many people have.
Perhaps you, too, have seen an angel and
didn't know it.
An
angel vision is an experience of seeing the
Divine, or that which is usually considered
invisible. There is a diverse array of angel
visions. Some people actually see
Renaissance-type angels, complete with wings,
with their eyes open. Other people experience
their angels as an interaction with an
apparition of a deceased loved one. For
others, the angel vision comes during a dream,
yet the dream is profound, extra-vivid, and
often prophetic. Still others have
interactions with Jesus, Mary, a saint, or an
avatar.
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Angel
visions also involve pivotal meetings with
helpful strangers, who either intervene or
deliver an important message... and then
vanish without a trace. And some people's
angel visions occur when they see signs from
above, including unexplained lights, sparkles,
and colors.
As
a psychotherapist, I was trained to believe
that when people see something that isn't
there, this represents a visual hallucination.
In fact, I worked clinically with many people
diagnosed as schizophrenic who told me that
they were seeing things and people that I
couldn't see. I can only speculate how many of
my patients were actually seeing across the
veil of heaven and were having angel visions,
which we therapists inaccurately referred to
as hallucinations.
Many
of the angel vision experiences... happened to
children, which should come as no surprise.
After all, children are less skeptical and
less preoccupied with worldly matters, two
factors that I believe hamper adults' angel
visions. A 1995 University of Ohio study by
Dr. William MacDonald concluded that children
were statistically more likely to exhibit
clairvoyant and telepathic abilities than were
adults.
I
remember seeing sparkling lights as a child,
and feeling deliciously comforted by their
presence. The vision of what I now know to be
"angel trails" or the electrical
sparks radiated by moving angels, has been
continual throughout my life. I always knew
that, when I saw the bright flash of light or
the Fourth-of-July-like sparkles, this was a
happy sign validating my current choices.
However, I didn't talk about these incidents
until recently. Now that I am "out of the
spiritual closet" with respect to my
angel visions, I find that thousands of other
rational, sane, intelligent adults also see
angel trails.
Angels
in All Shapes and Sizes
Between
72 and 85 percent of Americans believe in
angels, according to various polls. One recent
survey found that more than 32 percent of
Americans said they have encountered an angel.
One third of the people surveyed for The
Skeptic magazine's poll said that they've seen
a "celestial being". Eighty percent
of people believe in miracles, and one third
have witnessed miracles, according to a 1999
CBS television poll. So one could conclude
that it is normal to believe in angels and
miracles, and that seeing an angel is a
relatively common experience!
But
are all of these people talking about the same
thing when they say they believe in
"angels"? Everyone seems to have
their own definition of what an angel is. To
me, an angel is anyone who unselfishly helps
us. When I talk about angels, I'm usually
referring to someone in the spirit world, such
as a deceased loved one, a winged Biblical
type of angel, Jesus, or a saint, and, of
course, God.
Yet,
angels also appear on Earth... an opaque, real
person who lends help or delivers a timely
message. The person later disappears as
mysteriously as they first appeared. This is
the type of angel that Apostle Paul was
undoubtedly referencing when he wrote in his
Hebrew letters, "Be careful when
entertaining strangers, for by so doing, many
have entertained angels unaware."
From
a purely technical standpoint, the word angel
refers to a spiritual, nonphysical being with
wings. The angels are messengers sent to us by
our Creator to lend help, guidance, support,
and protection. These angelic beings are
recognized by all major Eastern and Western
religions.
Deceased
loved ones are usually called "spirit
guides" because they have lived lives as
human beings. The implication is that, once we
have lived as a fallible human, we are a
little denser and less enlightened than angels
who have not lived a life on Earth. Of course,
the spiritual truth is that we all are one
with God and the angels. We are all God's
perfect creations. However, in this dream of
life, it appears that the angels are less
Earthbound in their thinking, and therefore
are more centered in a pure consciousness of
love.
Jesus,
Mary, the saints, and other great spiritual
teachers are usually called "ascended
masters". They stay closely involved with
Earth's population, and are accessible to all
who call upon them, regardless of one's
religious orientation or practices.
Angel
Encounters
Because
apparition experiences and angel encounters
have happened to so many people, considerable
research and documentation is being conducted
worldwide.
For
instance, since 1998, Emma Heathcote, a
theologist from Birmingham University in the
United Kingdom, has interviewed several
hundred people who have encountered angels.
Interestingly, those who were in the age range
of 36 to 55 had the highest percentage of
angel experiences. Heathcote categorized her
study group as follows:
-
26
percent saw a traditional-style angel with
wings.
-
21
percent saw a human form, which appeared
and then disappeared.
-
15
percent felt a force or a presence.
-
11
percent saw a figure in white.
-
7
percent smelled an unusual, unexplainable
scent.
-
6
percent were engulfed by light.
-
6
percent heard a disembodied voice, or
heard the voice of the angel or
apparition.
-
4
percent felt or saw that they were
enveloped in wings.
-
Other:
4 percent.
Apparition
Experiences
I
had an apparition experience, meaning that I
saw and talked to my deceased loved one. It
happened when I was 17 years old. My Grandma
Pearl and Pop-Pop Ben were visiting my
parents, my brother, and me, and I was very
excited about it. They'd driven a long way
from their Bishop, California, home to our
house in the town of Escondido, just north of
San Diego.
As
a budding adolescent, I was in that stage
where I preferred to spend more time with my
friends than with my family. Pop-Pop must have
understood this, because he insisted on
driving me to a party that one of my best
friends was having on a Saturday night. During
the drive, Pop-Pop told me stories of his own
teenage days. I felt a renewed closeness to my
grandfather that evening as he dropped me off
with a hug.
The
next day, Pop-Pop and Grandma Pearl left for
their drive back home. It had been a wonderful
visit for us all. But about 6 p.m., the phone
rang. I watched my father's body shudder
violently, and he exclaimed, "Oh,
no!" Something was terribly wrong.
"There's been an accident," he told
us. "Grandma Pearl's in the hospital, and
Ben's dead." His words about Pop-Pop's
death "Ben's dead"still echo in my
ears.
My
Mom, Dad, and brother seemed to go into a
flurry of emotional upset. They were loudly
protesting the situation, crying, and hugging
one another. To escape my own distress, I went
into my darkened bedroom and grabbed my
acoustic guitar.
I
absentmindedly strummed the strings, feeling
terribly guilty that I wasn't crying about my
grandfather's death. It wasn't that I didn't
love him, but my honest feelings were that my
Pop-Pop Ben was peaceful and that there was no
need to feel sad.
Just
then, a bluish-white light just past the foot
of my bed grabbed my attention. There,
standing in the middle of the light was my
Pop-Pop! When I first saw the first Star Wars
movie years later, the scene with Princess
Leia projected from C3PO's stored memory
reminded me of how my Pop-Pop looked to me. He
was at once three-dimensional, and half of his
original size, like a four-foot-tall hologram.
Although
I don't recall my grandfather moving his lips,
he transferred his thoughts to me with the
same familiar voice he'd always had. His
words, somehow telepathically transmitted into
my mind, were, "You are right to feel
this way [referring to my peacefulness]. I am
fine." My guilt vanished, and I realized
that there was no need for grief. Pop-Pop was
all right.
Many
of the stories on apparition experiences have
similar themes, where a deceased loved one
tells the living person, "I'm okay.
Please don't worry about me."
Paranormal
researchers define apparitions by their
features, such as their ability to instantly
appear and disappear, with no trace of coming
or going. Apparitions also pass through solid
objects, walls, and closed doors. They also
glide or float, rather than walk.
Surveys
in Great Britain and the United States show
that between 10 and 27 percent of the general
population have had an apparition experience,
where they saw and interacted with a deceased
loved one. According to author, priest, and
sociologist Andrew M. Greeley of the General
Social Survey at the University of Chicago,
nearly two-thirds of widows have had an
apparition experience, mostly with their
deceased husbands.
Continued
on the next page:
* Belief in Life After Death;
* Dreaming
of Angels and Deceased Loved Ones;
* Could
It Just Be My Imagination?
* Seeing is Believing.
This article was excerpted with permission
from the book
Angel
Visions: True
Stories of People Who Have Seen Angels,
and
How You Can See Angels, Too!,
?2000, by Doreen Virtue, Ph.D.
Reprinted with
permission of the publisher, Hay House Inc., www.hayhouse.com.
For
more info or to order book.
About The
Author
Doreen
Virtue, Ph.D., is a psychotherapist who works with the angelic
realm. She has appeared on Oprah, CNN, The View, and other talk shows,
where she is frequently referred to as "The Angel Lady". Dr.
Virtue gives angel readings at workshops across North America each
weekend; and she teaches audience members how to see, hear, feel, and
know their guardian angels. Doreen's workshop schedule appears on her
Website at: www.AngelTherapy.com.
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