Bella Karish’s Story
“I Lost My Voice to Find My Voice”

From Edward Walsh’s book:
Unbound Spirit: Personal Stories of Transformation

 

Introduction:

Author’s note: An introduction to Edgar Cayce’s life is important to fully understand Bella Karish’s story. Edgar Cayce is recognized as one of the greatest clairvoyants the world has ever known.

As a boy, Cayce had difficulty in school with his lessons. A daydreamer, he loved reading and studying the Bible. One day he overheard a church elder say that he read the Bible completely through each year, so Cayce decided to read the Bible from beginning to end for each previous year of his life and then for each year of his life thereafter. He carried his Bible continuously reading at every possible moment. He built himself a little lean-to out of branches and reeds in the woods, a place of his own for reading the Bible.

By his thirteenth year, he had read through the Bible twelve times and was in his lean-to reading the book of Ma-noah when he felt a presence. Looking up he saw a woman with a shadow shaped like wings standing before him. In melodious voice she said, “Your prayers have been heard. Tell me what you would like most of all so that I may give it to you.” Overwhelmed, Cayce could hardly speak but, with a voice full of trepidation and awe, he said, “Most of all I want to be helpful to others, especially children when they are sick.”

At school the next day, Cayce’s teacher, his Uncle Lucian, asked him to spell “Cabin.” Cayce’s difficulty with school was reflected in his ability to even spell this word. Later that same day, Uncle Lucian apparently told Cayce’s father about his son’s poor academic performance. Cayce’s father was very ashamed of him and kept him up to 11:00 P.M., studying his spelling lessons. All the studying that evening was in vain. Cayce’s spelling answers were still wrong. His father was so upset he knocked Cayce out of his chair twice. As Cayce was getting up for the second time, he heard inside himself the words of the lady he had seen the day before. She said, “If you can sleep awhile, we can help you.” Cayce was able to convince his father for a rest and dozed off with his spelling book under his head. Amazingly from that day forward, he could remember anything in a book so long as he first slept on it. Cayce then began to advance in school quickly and became the subject of much gossip.

One day he was hit on the spine while playing ball. For the rest of the day his behavior was quite out of the ordinary: He threw spit wads and acted out at school. He threw things at the dinner table and made fun of his father until he was sent to bed. His parents were quite worried, and when he fell asleep, he began to talk in his sleep saying that he was suffering from shock due to the injury of his spine; then he gave instructions for a poultice to be placed at the back of his head. Knowing that the items in the poultice were harmless, his confused parents decided to do what he said. The next morning he was fine.

Several years later Cayce was in Elkton as a traveling salesman. After suffering severe headaches for several weeks, he went to a doctor who gave him a powder to take with a glass of water. Swallowing the dose at the hotel was the last thing Cayce remembered before waking up in bed at home in Hopkinsville, two doctors anxiously looking at him. He could hardly talk, his voice a faint whisper. After several weeks, many doctors and specialists were unable to help, so out of desperation Cayce turned to Mr. Hart, a traveling showman-hypnotist.

Under hypnosis, Cayce’s voice was fully restored, but he still couldn’t talk when brought out of the trance. Before having to leave town, Hart tried several more times without success. Mr. Layne, the only hypnotist in town, hypnotized Cayce following the advice of Dr. Quackenboss, who suggested that while under a trance Cayce be told to discuss his own case. It worked! Cayce diagnosed the problem and prescribed a treatment that successfully restored his voice.

The next day, Layne put Cayce in a trance and asked him to give a diagnosis and treatment for a stomach problem he had, which doctors hadn’t been able to cure. Again, over time Cayce’s treatment was successful! Although it took some time before Cayce was fully involved in giving readings for the sick, this was indeed the beginning of Cayce’s work as the sleeping prophet, as he was later known.

Bella Karish’s Story
“I Lost My Voice to Find My Voice”

Bella Karish D.D.
November 12, 1910 – November 3, 2007


My name is Bella, and I am the President of the Fellowship of Universal Guidance. I channel wisdom teachings and help individuals with specific life situations and actions. I channel wisdom and understanding from Eternal Cosmos, or simply E.C., which comes from the band of Edgar Cayce Teachers. This band of particular teachers and guides transmit their wisdom through Eternal Cosmos and is delivered to our members through our Oracle Circles, the Three Selves Evaluations, and individual counseling sessions. Since 1960, we have helped many people through our work and service.

            This wonderful spiritual gift of wisdom and guidance from the spiritual realm has not always been a direct part of my life. I often tell people that I was quite square until I was 40 years old. Even though my life started out quite ordinary, I have had many fascinating experiences.

            I was born in Los Angeles in 1910 at the Queen of Angels Hospital. My brother and I were involved in the motion pictures in our youth. Being two years younger, he usually played a baby and I a child. When I was about nine years old, we lived directly across the street from the Mack Sennet Studios. I became very intrigued with movie stars, like Charlie Chaplin, Mable Norman, etc. One day, my brother and I crawled under the studio gates near the stage to watch the action. The stage was one big wheel and fascinating to watch. The director became furious and said, “Get those kids out of here!” but Mable Norman said, “Oh no, they can stay. I’ll take care of them; they will be under my supervision.” After that she used to invite me into her dressing room; she would talk to me and I would listen with awe. Watching everything on and offstage, I learned a great deal.

            Years later, I even baby-sat for Tomasina, the daughter of cowboy actor Tom Mix. When I was 16, I became an extra. In one film, I wore a wig and played an old lady. What a sight—a teenager with gray hair.
            My mother was close to Louis Meyer of Metro Goldwyn Meyer and his wife, and Charlie Chaplin once wrote about a place where actors could get sandwiches and odds and ends—that’s the little store my mother owned. A picture of where she worked was in one of the comedy books, and my picture was in a magazine standing next to one of the actors.

            My mother used to say, “Anyone can play the piano.” So at the age of eight I started my musical training by playing the cello. I still remember carrying that heavy cello over the hill for lessons at my teacher’s house. It was as big as I was.

            To help my mother, I worked for the Los Angeles Mirror Times delivering a well-known writer’s finished work to the Times for printing. When I was 19, I sold apples on the steps of the Federal building at the beginning of the depression.

            My future husband proposed to me just after we had left a group of friends. He said, “If you don’t say yes, someone else will. Will you marry me?” Because I was 24 and afraid I would be an old maid, I married him. Not long after his proposal, we moved back to Chicago to live with his family. I really suffered there. The Chicago weather can easily dip to 20 degrees below zero, and I had never even seen snow in all of my years of living in Southern California—it was a total shock to my system. Besides, his family was not happy with our living with them, so returning to sunny California was a great joy and relief.

            After our two children were born, I began performing with the Women’s Symphony Orchestra. We often played in quartets and trios, filling our house with exquisite sounds of music. My husband, who also played cello, enjoyed the music and fellowship when he could get away from his very busy work schedule. During this time, my mother helped by taking care of my babies until she was unable.

            Later, my husband finally required that I help him in his business which ended my affiliation with the symphony. A great loss. My husband was a bill collector and sent me out to collect milk bills from the poor. I definitely was not happy helping him, but I did it to keep peace in our house.

            After numerous separations—whereby my husband would simply walk out—we separated for the final time, ending 16 years of marriage. I can still remember that Christmas Day when we were supposed to have dinner with his family and never did. I had the feeling he was involved with the lady he finally married, so in 1949 I divorced him.     

            My future looked bleak and uncertain. Shortly after the divorce, I lost my job and was facing a serious operation because I had lost my voice and was hardly able to speak. “Strangulated throat,” was what one of the doctors called my ailment. He said the cause was severe stress and emotional upset. The suggested operation required my throat muscles to be surgically loosened, which caused me more anxiety, for I was still responsible for the care of my children.

            In the midst of all of this turmoil, my best friend Bertha and I traveled to Northern California to the Asilomar Conference grounds for a seminar on Edgar Cayce. At the conference, they spoke about Edgar’s astounding psychic abilities and the events that led up to them. Bertha and I were thoroughly fascinated and excited by all that we had learned about psychic phenomena.

            When we returned home, Bertha and I went to see a hypnotist who used regression and guided imagery to help people. I was one of four people picked out of the audience to be hypnotized. Under hypnosis and using guided imagery, he directed me to go inside a cave where he said I would find part of my problem. I refused. Then he brought me out of the trance stating, “This woman has a psychological problem, and I won’t attempt anything further today, but tonight she’ll have a dream indicating why she wouldn’t go into the cave.”

            That night I did have a dream and inside the cave was my former husband waiting to hit me over the head with a spiked club. Obviously, my “strangulated throat” problem was related to stress and strong emotions regarding my separation and divorce from my husband.

            Next came an event that changed my life completely. Bertha and I wanted to see if through channeling we could find out more about what had happened to my voice. First, Bertha tried to reach the spirit domain but nothing happened. Then I put my hand on hers and suddenly the Edgar voice came through me and said, “I’VE BEEN WAITING FOR YOU!” I was absolutely overwhelmed. Except for the lecture Bertha and I attended at Asilomar, I didn’t even know who Edgar Cayce was.

            In hindsight, I remember experiences that foretold my ability to channel. For instance, I would be walking on the street and see something that no one else could see. What’s more, I could talk about things that I knew nothing about and when people would say, “Where did you learn that?” I would say, “I don’t’ know.” I was already channeling without even knowing it. I soon began expecting these things to happen, despite the fact I didn’t really understand them.

            After Edgar Cayce voice came through me, Bertha and I went to Los Angeles to see Peter Ballbausch who had spoken at the Asilomar conference. He immediately recognized my voice as being the strangulated voice of Cayce and invited me to his meetings with the Theosophy group on Beechwood Drive , where I became the major Edgar Cayce channel; however the Cayce family did not accept that I was channeling their father’s pattern of teachings. They ostracized both me and Peter. When Hugh Lynn Cayce, the son of Edgar Cayce, came to see us, he said, “No one can be in my father’s image or be the voice of my father unless they can tell me certain things that only my father knew.” I was not involved with that kind of thing, so Hugh Lynn simply ignored us and never came back. This greatly upset Peter.

            I met Wayne Guthrie at Peter’s group, the Brotherhood of Universal Guidance, where I stayed for a number of years. Wayne and I had a lot in common and became very good friends. Wayne was an excellent metaphysician in his own right, having had studied for many years. Wayne was nearly always present at our closed meetings where I channeled wisdom teachings as we do now and when our meetings were open to the public, I channeled for individuals.

            Wayne and I learned a great deal from Peter who was a wonderful teacher, leader, and guide. Unfortunately, he began using hypnosis to control the minds of the channels to communicate what he wanted said. We felt that this was negative and evil, opposite to the Christ energy. One day he was talking through Bertha, controlling her thoughts. Wayne and I were horrified because we knew that was not Bertha talking; it was Peter talking through her. Wayne and I got up and said, “Sorry Peter, we cannot be a part of what you’re doing.”  Wayne, Bertha, and I simply walked out. We did not want to be controlled by his particular actions.

            After leaving, Wayne and I started our Fellowship of Universal Guidance. I was unemployed and Wayne had just left his job. At first, we struggled financially with the Fellowship being our only source of income. Still, it was such a wonderful and important endeavor that we dedicated and committed ourselves to what became primarily important, this work. Helping people is our commitment to the teachers and the Fellowship. To be totally involved and totally forget self is what makes our commitment work.

            I am grateful and blessed for this gift of spirit, constantly saying a prayer of thanks for being given this great gift. It is so precious, so beautiful that I am grateful to the sources that have kept me attuned with wisdom and truth. As I channel, I sit just outside my body and to the left of my head. Although I can see Edgar Cayce, I don’t know what Eternal Cosmos looks like. E.C. was offered as a teacher and guide personality because the Cayce family would not have allowed me the use of the Edgar Cayce name.

            Sometimes when the truth is offered from the teachers through Eternal Cosmos, it is not always accepted. The truth is not always what people want to hear. The subconscious is the memory bank of our past lives and is given by our teachers through E.C. We must realize that we ask, choose, and commit to our life occurrences to transform our karma into dharma. But often as human beings, we feel we don’t like our circumstances and protest even when the truth about our own karmic patterns are revealed. When people become angry, distressed, and sometimes leave, I can only beg, seek, and accept that my teachers tell the truth and only the truth for the highest good of all.

            Over the years and so very gently, I have changed and grown with spiritual understanding and wisdom, often not even realizing that I was changing. When I was young, and throughout all of my marriage, I wasn’t very spiritual. I simply believed that there was a God and his angels.

            When I was a child, my mother was a practicing Orthodox Jew very bound by Jewish tradition. I remember that she kept the tradition of separate kitchen dishes for different kinds of foods like dairy and meat, but her diligent efforts faded quickly when she began working at a restaurant; it was simply impossible to keep Kosher. Besides, we had an Irish nanny who used the dishes interchangeably; the dishes became so mixed up that my mother finally relinquished the tradition all together.

            Working and rearing children, my mother slowly moved from orthodox to reform to where tradition wasn’t as important. She became much more open and even let us children go to our friends for Christmas. This released me from a single spiritual point of view, but any spiritual feelings I did have were closed off during my sixteen years of marriage because my husband was so anti-religious and I didn’t want to offend him.

            Now I believe that I’ve been guided, helped, and given the greatest gift of channeling. Being a spiritual person through the great Creative Source, I believe in all religions and all spirituality. We have been every religion in the perfect past, and we are every religion now. We are all one, no matter the appearance.

            Spirituality is a state of mind, not a particular action. You can believe yourself to be spiritual and shout it from the housetops, and it might not mean a thing. But activated true spirituality follows the Christ principle of loving thy neighbor as thyself. It is an active participation at the Source of All Creation, with God, the Sources. God has many faces and is many faceted. God is anything and everything; God is personal, male and female, or a mass collective, if you want It to be. It is whatever you want to choose, to do, or to expect.

            I want to make it clear that I’m an instrument for the teachers, guides, and Eternal Cosmos. They have channeled the wisdom and knowledge in a way that it can be of help to people without my having to add my two cents. I can help people as long as I continue to believe and know that the teachers do it. My life pattern was chosen before I ever entered this plane. Here I really had no choice. The teachers waited for me in my subconscious mind which I now know to be true and final. I simply became affiliated as an instrument of Spirit. And that has become my job and my joy.

            My cage was leading a life devoid of spiritual contact. My freedom is working with the teachers and Spirit to help people. I truly lost my voice to find my voice, my spiritual voice.