Laura Bedford lives by the words, “inner peace and joy are always within us.”
Laura recently completed an incredible walking journey across the United States starting in Bellingham and ending in Charleston, South Carolina. Her mission was to raise awareness about the inner peace and joy within us.
Wearing a shirt that said “Walking Coast to Coast Supporting Inner Peace and Healing for Grown-ups, Kids and Horses,” Laura encountered the best humanity can offer anyone. And, in the spirit of what a pilgrimage is and represents, Laura found that everything she needed was provided along the way, leaving Bellingham with only what she could carry.
The Beginning
“I’ve always had big questions since I was young, having a first mystical experience, which ended when I was five,” says Laura of her life experiences and desire to pursue this purpose-based journey. “No one I knew talked about such things.”
When her burning questions could no longer be contained, she began a very intentional search for information in her late 20’s. Eventually, the story of a woman named Peace Pilgrim who walked the planet over a period of 28 years came to Laura’s attention. After Peace’s death, many of her fans and followers had written a book on her experiences based on her writings and notes. When this book crossed Laura’s path, the idea took hold.
“I read this book and the idea felt like home,” says Laura. “We all have what we need within. We don’t have to make peace. It’s already there.”
This idea of raising our own self-awareness and trusting that natural, innate expanded awareness is part of the journey to realizing that inner peace is already within us. It’s not a surrender of who we are but a surrender of thoughts that make up our ego. It’s being comfortable with the unknown.
Laura says that, as a child and to this day, she does not discount her own awareness of the vibrational nature of thoughts and feelings, even though, as a child she wasn’t verbalizing this awareness. She didn’t necessarily know what to do about it.
The People. The Community.
Laura recalls a part of her pilgrimage that has special meaning. East of the Wenatchee River, in very hot weather and a long walk up hill, a man in a pick up truck stopped to see if she needed anything.
“No thanks,” Laura recalls responding to the man.
The next day, a woman stopped. “My husband told me about you last night and said if I saw you I should give you some water,” the woman said. “I’ll stop on my way back to give you some more.”
Laura realized, after discussion, she had taken a wrong turn and was far from her walking route. The woman took her to her home where she had lunch and ultimately stayed overnight with the family. She experienced life on a farm for a night and even had the opportunity to ride a combine, something she’d never done.
The next day, the family got her back on her route wishing her well on her journey.
Laura also describes an experience that involved a question of safety in a part of the route where many trucks were hauling gravel from a nearby quarry.
“What I knew was that I had to walk it,” says Laura of the experience. “I didn’t approach it in fear. I made sure that I waved with a huge smile to every trucker that drove by. As the day wore on, the truckers were honking and waving at me. When we show up in this space of love and light, we find the world responds to that.”
“You get to see how much of the world doesn’t revolve around you,” says Laura when she realized that many times cars, especially trucks, were simply stopping on the side of the road and not for her or anything to do with her.
A truly special moment for Laura happened while walking in Alabama. Visiting with a man curious about what she was doing, she noticed his litter of puppies that he said had never been handled by a human. One of the puppies came to Laura and allowed her to pick him up. There was a connection as Laura observed the puppy turning his head to the sun.
“It was a moment I can’t explain,” Laura says of the encounter.
Laura stayed on the man’s property that night. Through the rest of the day and next morning, Laura observed the puppy seemingly less energetic than his three brothers. She wondered if he was sick.
“I knew what having a puppy would mean,” she said. “I decided I would only take him if he followed me down the long driveway when I left. He followed me.”
The puppy, named Surrey, short for Surrender Into Peace, became her walking companion, riding in a jogging stroller Laura picked up along the way.
Laura’s destination in Charleston took her to the very same church where nine people had been killed by one individual.
“The mission of the pilgrimage supporting inner peace and healing is to expand awareness regarding the fact that inner peace is within us,” she explains. “That young man, and any who act out, that killed those nine people was in a thought-feeling energy pain and trying to rid himself of that inner pain by projecting onto others. Suppressing pain within, without the tools for dealing with it and healing it, leads to the appearance of difficult experiences the world over.”
Laura believes that, while this journey was a pilgrimage by definition, life is truly a pilgrimage. Working with others, she demonstrates the effects of vibrations and energies directly related to the types of thinking and thoughts, negative and positive, that people have.
“Pause and focus on your breath,” she says when we feel a trigger or any thoughts from fear to love. “Inquire within. Who is thinking this thought?”
When we ask that question the first response that comes to mind is usually ME. This “me” that responds is always our ego, our personal self of self. This self is not our true self. Laura the explains that our ego isn’t bad, it’s simply not aware of the truth but only perceptions.
Laura suggests following the pointing of enlightened masters to “be still and know I AM.” In being still and deeply relaxing beyond the initial response, a thought or feeling that does not feel uplifting will fade because, as Laura explains, it is not a true thought, only a perception. Being still and relaxing within opens a space within our awareness for expanding our perception.
For Laura, her pilgrimage continues with a new name, “Walkabout the World Supporting Inner Peace and Healing Joy for Grown-ups, Kids and Horses.”
Laura will be speaking further about this journey and beyond on November 20 at Wise Awakening in downtown Bellingham.
