GOD: An Autobiography, As Told to a Philosopher - The Podcast
GOD: An Autobiography, As Told to a Philosopher - The Podcast
255. What’s Your Spiritual Story: Laura Buck on Becoming Visible, Intuition, Loss & the Inner Voice
What does it feel like when God guides you from within?
For Laura Buck, that quiet voice has been there all along, leading, nudging, comforting.
In this intimate spiritual story, Laura opens up about growing up between religious worlds, learning to trust intuition over expectation, and discovering that God speaks through the feelings we often overlook.
She shares powerful moments of being held by grace during panic, the breathtaking sign that appeared after losing someone she deeply loved, and the soulful companionship of Fizzy — a dog with wisdom in her eyes.
Now stepping into a new chapter of life, Laura reflects on becoming visible again after decades defined by caregiving… and how mindfulness, Buddhism, and presence are helping her reconnect with the woman she has always been.
✨ A story for anyone who has ever felt guided — even when you didn’t know by whom.
Other Series:
The podcast began with the Dramatic Adaptation of the book and now has several series:
The Life Wisdom Project – Spiritual insights on living a wiser, more meaningful life.
From God to Jerry to You – Divine messages and breakthroughs for seekers.
Two Philosophers Wrestle With God – A dialogue on God, truth, and reason.
Jerry & Abigail: An Intimate Dialogue – Love, faith, and divine presence in partnership.
What’s Your Spiritual Story – Real stories of people changed by encounters with God.
What’s On Our Mind – Reflections from Jerry and Scott on recent episodes.
What’s On Your Mind – Listener questions, divine answers, and open dialogue.
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Scott Langdon [ 00:00:17 ] This is God: An Autobiography, The Podcast — a dramatic adaptation and continuing discussion of the book God: An Autobiography, As Told to a Philosopher by Jerry L. Martin. He was a lifelong agnostic, but one day he had an occasion to pray. To his vast surprise, God answered — in words. Being a philosopher, he had a lot of questions, and God had a lot to tell him.
Scott Langdon [ 00:01:07 ] Hello, and welcome to God: An Autobiography, The Podcast. I'm your host, Scott Langdon, and on today's episode, we have a very special spiritual story interview. Recently, Jerry sat down with our very own Laura Buck, and the two had a wonderful conversation about Laura's spiritual journey.
Scott Langdon [ 00:01:26 ] Throughout the course of her life, Laura has had a sense of a deeper connection between herself and something inside of her, perhaps a higher self? She has since come to understand that connection as God moving in her life. And with that understanding, has moved into a more peaceful time, despite some very difficult challenges. It was such a joy for me to hear Laura open up and share herself in this way, and I know you'll get a lot out of this conversation as well. Here's Jerry to start things off. I hope you enjoy the episode.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:02:07 ] Well, thank you, Laura Buck, for joining me to talk about your spiritual story. I often say, everybody has a story. It doesn't have to be just religious people or spiritually, guru people, you know, but everybody has a story. And I find stories of just boundless interest, you know, because everyone has a path and they make choices in response to different circumstances and they make them with some end in view, you know, for a reason. Or, oops.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:02:42 ] Not a reason. I just kind of slipped into a situation. But every story starts somewhere, and people's spiritual story usually starts with early life. It may be a religious story raised in a certain church, a spiritual story, or just where the person's spiritual story starts out with family circumstances or something like that— things that happen that affect the shape of their story thereafter. But if you were going to tell your story to your best friend, where would you begin your story? Just what were the formative moments of your early life?
Laura Buck [ 00:03:27 ] Okay. Well, first, thank you for having me. I know it's been a long time coming. You've asked me so many times and we've just never had a chance to make this happen. Basically, I really wasn't raised with any kind of organized religion. So my parents got divorced when I was around two. My mom and her side of the family; they weren't really a practicing, of any real religion. My grandparents were. But my dad and my stepmom were very Catholic.
Laura Buck [ 00:03:56 ] That was something that was very important to them. And I just remember there was not an argument, but there was kind of a power push, I think, between my dad and my stepmom, insisting that I go to Sunday school and become Catholic. And my mom, she didn't want me to feel pressured. So that never really happened, but I would see my dad on the weekends and they would take me to church on Sundays. I just remember being, why are you making me go at seven in the morning? And I just remember being there.
Laura Buck [ 00:04:32 ] I like the church that they went to. So it wasn't a bad thing by any means, but it was more or less presented to me as something that I had to do versus something that I really wanted to do. So I didn't really have a choice. So I didn't do... I didn't, you know, receive communion or do any of that. I didn't really have the full experience. When I would visit my mom's parents, my grandparents, my one aunt would always go to church for Christmas or Easter or whatever. I remember going with them when they would come from New York and we'd all be together.
Laura Buck [ 00:05:10 ] You know, going for the holidays, just feeling left out because I wasn't Catholic and everyone else was receiving communion, you know, and I would just sit there and be. Because as you're younger, you feel kind of left out. Everyone else gets up and goes and you're sitting there. So I'm kind of in a way that was kind of, I didn't really, I guess I didn't really understand that it didn't matter, but I just remember feeling like a little uncomfortable with that, but not enough that I was like, 'Hey, I want to, I just, it just wasn't that important to me as a kid.' Just, I said, I felt like I was forced to do, to go to church with my dad. And then it just kind of was always a negative thing, I guess
Laura Buck [ 00:05:52] I guess I was around 13 or 12, we had really great friends that my mom and I lived on a farm with another family. We lived upstairs and they lived downstairs. They were very born again Christian. So I was exposed to a lot of that. And I remember thinking.
Laura Buck [ 00:06:18 ] A lot of the conversations were that. Everything, you had to thank Jesus or God for everything that you did. Everything was affected by them. Like nothing could just occur. Where I was always like, this was God's will or God's doing this or God's doing that. And I remember thinking, 'I wasn't really sure about that.' And I did go to their church. Quite a few times I joined a group.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:06:42 ] Was that voluntary going to their church?
Laura Buck [ 00:06:45 ] It was because I really did like them. We were like family.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:06:47 ] That was your first really voluntary.
Laura Buck [ 00:06:50 ] So I was like, 'Yeah, I'll go because they talked to me.' I went to this little group called Pioneer Girls. I had a friend, my other friend went with me that I was really close with. We went together and, I liked that, but then it came to a point, after a few, I don't know, times that we were together.
Laura Buck [ 00:07:10 ] The people who are running our little group were like, 'Okay, we're all going to go in a circle now and we're all going to pray and we're all going to give our hearts to Jesus.' This is what we're going to do now. Right. And I remember thinking, okay, so we got in the circle and we all prayed. If you feel like you want to have Jesus enter your heart and be saved and born again, we had our eyes closed, raise your hand or whatever.
Laura Buck [ 00:07:38 ] I didn't feel that because I just didn't. And we finished that. And I remember my best friend at the time, she had raised her hand and I didn't know that. So they kind of separated us out. So some of us that didn't, and then she was in a different group. So I kind of felt like, oh, I honestly didn't feel that I wanted to do that. I think if I honestly had felt something, I would do that. But I didn't feel like any kind of connection.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:08:08 ] Being honest, that's a good principle.
Laura Buck [ 00:08:11 ] Right. I didn't feel like I had to because I needed to belong. I just felt like I didn't feel that. But then again, I felt like an outcast a little bit again, because then there was that group, that the little group that did that and accepted that. And that kind of was again, feeling like a little left out with my choices.
Laura Buck [ 00:08:32 ] We didn't stay in that group very long because, then we were becoming teenagers, I guess. But I just remember that feeling of …I didn't make a mistake, but I wasn't a bad person. So that was different. I felt, when I was younger, that I had to maybe become Catholic, but I didn't feel the pressure here. But I also felt like I didn't feel the pressure to do it because it wasn't, I didn't feel it.
Laura Buck [ 00:09:01 ] Then I went to a Catholic college because I wanted a small college. I wanted more, almost an all-girls college. But I went to a Catholic college, but not because I was Catholic. And it turned out too. There weren't—everyone there wasn't Catholic. So it was okay with that too. I worked for some of the nuns there who were lovely.
Laura Buck [ 00:09:23 ] That was a great thing. I really appreciated them. So that was a really good experience, just getting to know them. And some of my professors were just amazing people. And I just really loved that. So that was a great experience that way. But there was— my mom has this memory of calling me on a Sunday morning at my dorm when the phones are always out in the hallway.
Laura Buck [ 00:09:51 ] I wasn't in my room. Who knows? We were probably out all night as college kids do. And someone answering the phone, and she asked for me, and my friend said, 'Oh, no, no,' she's not here. She's at church. And my mom thinking, 'Oh, no, no.'
Dr. Jerry L. Martin: This can't be. Laura, your story so far is fascinating in the following regard. That you are subjected to so many different religious influences, different religions. And, of course, the people are embodying those religions. A lot of one's reaction isn't true. The religion as an abstract embodiment, or even the ceremony, you know, what happens in church, but it's the people. And some you liked. I don't think you hated anybody or any church, but you got a great distance from some of them, like, 'why am I here?' But some you liked.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:10:57 ] And I think of the spiritual journey and a lot of other aspects of our life, too, as sort of following breadcrumbs or some ancient myth or something where the path through the labyrinth is by following some breadcrumbs and kind of clues that come along in life.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:11:16 ] Are there breadcrumbs that you found, you know, clues that kind of helped steer your journey from the point you've described on into the, well, to the woman you are now?
Laura Buck [ 00:11:30 ] I never really felt that there wasn't…I didn't really question if there was a God or not. So that was the other thing too. So I always kind of knew that there's some kind of somebody, you know, there. And I would pray at night.
Laura Buck [ 00:11:51 ] So I never felt, you know this is nonsense or anything. I just always knew that there was something there. So I would kind of just pull that in if I was feeling, you know, just sad or whatever. I do remember doing that for the longest time. I also remember my friend who was with me in that group, we would watch on TV, this guy, Oral Roberts or something. And I remember we gathered our money together and we mailed away for some little crystal statue or, there was not a statue; it was just something with a Bible verse on it. I remember that being a really interesting thing for us. We were just, we thought, 'Oh, that's kind of interesting,’ right? Because I don't know if a lot of kids watched that show at the time.
Laura Buck [ 00:12:42 ] I do remember that. I was pretty, fascinated with that. Just, you know, seeing someone else, not in a church setting, but just preaching, I guess, kind of.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:12:52 ] Yeah, so that's an interesting thing. I wasn't focusing on, you know, church and whatever, people's affiliations, but these days, even more. They're the media, and you can get anything, come right into your own living room, and a huge impact are people who... religious teachers and preachers who really have a flair for television and so forth and really project. And that can affect people in various ways, depending on the individual.
Laura Buck [ 00:13:26 ] And I've told you this so many times before. I always had a feeling about things that were going to happen. Right. I always had, I felt like, and I used to say it was my gut response to things.
Laura Buck [ 00:13:41 ] There was something that we wanted to do or I wanted to do, and I would get this nagging feeling in my gut. I remember not just thinking it was like... I don't know. I don't even know if we knew what anxiety was back then. Right. The mental health was a big thing, right?
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:13:58 ] Anxiety is a big thing now, but it wasn't back then.
Laura Buck [ 00:14:00 ] Right. So, I look back on that. It wasn't like I was anxious. There was just some things that I really knew deep down, like I didn't want to do or— maybe something I shouldn't do. And I never really knew what that was until years later, probably my early adulthood.
Laura Buck [ 00:14:23 ] There's a reason why things happen the way they do. And I have the choice to let them happen or not happen. Right. So I had that feeling and I went ahead with it anyway and did whatever I was thinking— maybe I shouldn't do. And then it turned out. You know, I didn't have a good time, or it just wasn't something that I wanted. Should have really done, or whatever— then I would be like, 'Hmm, what's telling me that?'
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:14:51 ] Right. Something inside you is responding in advance. Upcoming events, possibilities, and so forth.
Laura Buck [ 00:14:59 ] Yeah.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:15:00 ] And doing a rather good job of it, I gather.
Laura Buck: [ 00:15:03 ] Right. And not thinking that I could be a message from anybody outside the universe. I thought it was just something inside me saying it right… But now it's different for me that way.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:15:17 ] How so?
Laura Buck [ 00:15:18 ] And I haven't really realized a lot of that until I started working with you. I feel it's always been God telling me what to do. You're going to go this way, but you feel funny about it. So maybe it's not the best thing to do. And then if I don't like going somewhere or doing something, and then I feel fine and nothing bad happens. I'm just saying things like I remember being really when my daughter was 4.
Laura Buck [ 00:15:52 ] Before we were up in the Poconos, and I remember going, because this was significant. I remember being like, I don't know if we should really go up there. There was just something that was bothering me. I remember we went and she ended up getting really sick up there. And she ended up, we had to take her to the hospital because she was dehydrated. And, I remember coming home from that and thinking, 'something told me not to go, but we did.' And then that happened, right? Maybe if we were home, she would have still probably gotten sick, but it was so much more stressful because we were somewhere. We've never been to a hospital there. Things like that. I just know to listen to that now. Not to say that everything bad happens, but yeah, maybe it does. It's just a guidance or whatever. Or if I have to make a choice about something, I just listen to that now. More that I feel like there's a reason why I'm feeling this way.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:16:45 ] So you've learned to trust your feelings. And the feelings aren't just inner flux, you know. They're perceptions in a sense. They're somehow insights or intuitions of something that maybe you shouldn't do or maybe you should do. Maybe you have some positive ones. I don't know.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:17:05 ] But those are things you learn going along, and something I'm told over and over in God: An Autobiography and my prayers, are the many, many ways God communicates. And feelings are among them. I'm told— even one point— I think, your body, the feelings of your body, are the voice of God. You know, your body is a divine instrument. And what people say to you, listen to that. That may be God speaking to you. Through them, they are calling your attention to something. And certainly the kind of feelings you're talking about, uh-oh— I've got this deep inner feeling that this is not for me. Not for you, too.
Laura Buck [ 00:17:51 ] When I saw the job to work with you and I saw it online and I went, 'Oh, I'm going to get this job.' I just knew it. It was, I just, I just knew it. I went, 'Yep.'
Laura Buck [ 00:18:07 ] I'm going to end up getting this job. And then I met you guys and then I got the job. And it was just like, it was really, I mean, I'm looking at a bunch of different things and it was like this or this. And I'm like, oh, this is the one. And, it just kind of led me to answer, right? I could have answered anything else. And then I ended up with you. So I just feel like that was a definite nudge that way.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:18:28 ] And certainly from my side, that has been so providential. I do not use that concept carelessly. I don't have the feeling that God is rigging the scene. But God does sometimes put His divine thumb helpfully on the scale. So better thing, and certainly in that case, God sending you to me, I had a much narrower job I was hiring you for, in my mind, than what you ended up offering to the whole God project that we're engaged in. And so, you know, how is that? I wouldn't have known to hire you for this to be what I think of as chief operating officer of the whole God project. But I wouldn't have known how to advertise for that or anything. I just needed certain business-y type things. But yeah, that's so helpful when people learn.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:19:30 ] You're in a situation. You can go this way, that way. How do you know what way to go? There are always, in any given moment, many possibilities. But if they've got some kind of pause and pay attention to what's going on inside you, then you may learn just what you need to know about going forward.
Laura Buck [ 00:19:51 ] I never felt like I needed to be in an organized religion— as far as telling me, you know, I have to go on this day and pray and do this to know that God's around me or God loves me or my family, I can find it anywhere. I can find it in this room. I can find it. In my car, I could find it, you know, wherever I am. Outside, you know, things like that. There's messages, all the time. But you just have to look for them.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:20:26 ] Yeah. You kind of have to be open and be paying attention. But, yeah, it can be anywhere. That's a wonderful statement. There's nowhere God is absent. But what God is trying to communicate to you does require some attention. And acceptance.
Laura Buck [ 00:20:47 ] And be open to that. And also, I think I told you the one time, too, that I was...feeling really anxious when I was, I guess, with my uncle being sick and everything and just feeling really out of control. My emotions were really hard and just kind of feeling like almost like a panic attack kind of a thing and just driving, just going. Okay, I got to deal with this. And then this calm just went over me. And it just, it was like some, there was a religious station that only comes, I always listened to NPR, to public radio, when I'm in the car. But when I get up to the Poconos, that station turns into like a religious music station. And the music's really great, actually. It's modern. Like rock music or whatever, Christian music. And I remember this song coming on. I was listening to it and I was so stressed. And then something just came over me. It was almost like a warm blanket or something. And it all just calmed down, instantly. And I was like, okay, I'm good. And it was so fascinating to me because that was the first time I really had that. But I felt like there was something saying, 'it's going to be okay.' You're not alone.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:22:03 ] Was it through the words of the music or just the music brought the divine presence?
Laura Buck [ 00:22:06 ] It might have been. Some of the music is so beautiful and really, you know, just is really just the message in it. Yeah, it probably was that if I was listening to. just people talking— no but it just like everything just came at the right time and just kind… that was a really… I was like 'whoa'
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:22:27 ] And when that happens once isn't this true for you, Laura when it happens once then you retain it. It may not happen again in that way, but it tells you something about the nature of reality and of God and of you Ultimately, there is something safe.
Laura Buck [ 00:22:49 ] Yes, exactly. Or just having someone, I've had people really close to me pass away. I've been really involved with that. Never feeling scared for them or knowing that I think they're going to be okay or that I'm going to see them again. I really honestly, I believe that. I don't feel like this is a final goodbye. Like when someone's dying in hospice and you're like, 'You have to say goodbye.' I never feel like I have to say goodbye.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:23:50 ] Why don't you give us some background? We're talking about your Uncle Bob, who I gather was like a father to you. And I saw the photo of him after his passing. And you could— he's one of those people you could just tell at a glance, a fine fellow. You know, solid, what, I don't know, the Germans or the Jews or somebody called a mensch, a full man, full person.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:24:21 ] And that's my take on, you know, just looking at him. You might, you know, he deserves a moment of our consideration. You know, someone lives a life. Then, well, it shouldn't not just blip on the radar that comes and goes, but we should really take it in and ponder it, even if it's someone we didn't know personally.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:24:45 ] He has a life worth paying attention to and taking in, considering but just say a little bit about who Uncle Bob was and what he was to you
Laura Buck [ 00:25:02 ] Um, my uncle Bob kind of just kind of stepped in to be like my dad. Um, so sorry. He and my dad were good friends because my mom's side of the family and my dad's side of the family, everyone grew up together. So he just was really, he would, he was just a really special person and always, sorry, but he just always would check in with me.
Laura Buck [ 00:25:35 ] So I always felt really, I had a lot of conversations with him every week. And we would talk for like an hour or so. Everyone would kind of joke that when Uncle Bob would come. You had to make sure you had enough time because he was great at recapping your whole entire conversation when you say, 'I got to get off the phone now.' And he'll go, 'Well, like I was saying,' and he would recap.
Laura Buck [ 00:26:02 ] Yeah, it was just really, but I was just very close to him. I saw him so much and when he became sick with mesothelioma. Like I said, I'd been through cancer before with my dad and my stepmom. So I kind of knew what to expect.
Laura Buck [ 00:26:21 ] So it was just, we had a great opportunity for a few years that he was around and good and we could, see him. And, you know, it's unfortunate that where he worked all those years being exposed to asbestos, that this would happen, right? But he always said that. Um, it always says, 'Don't worry about me. I'm going to be fine.' And, um, you know, he had a great life and a lot of friends, really close with his family. So, he wasn't afraid of that, of passing away or he never really said that. Um, I would just kind of joke that he could be really stubborn. So I'm like, Uncle Bob, you're so stubborn. You're going to be around a long time because. There's a reason why you need to be around. So, and then, all of a sudden, yeah, things just kind of went downhill this past couple months. Yeah. So seeing him go through that was hard. And he passed away really suddenly.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:27:23 ] But after months of lingering, it seemed to me good because it meant a lot of time to say goodbye, in effect, to have last moments. It's not as if nobody knew anything was wrong and, oops, now he's dead.
Laura Buck [ 00:27:36 ] Right. And that was very important for me to be there as much as I could and visit him. And just knowing he had support. Right. We all knew, you know, we were all there for him.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:27:46 ] Another blessing if he passed away quickly when it finally came to it.
Laura Buck [ 00:27:50 ] Yes, which was something that we all wanted because who wants to see somebody suffer? I've seen that and it's terrible and nobody wanted that for him. So that was a good thing. You had asked me if I felt anything, his presence after he passed away, and I did not. Right. I didn't feel sad about that. I felt like that means everything is okay, right? That's how I felt. I'm like, I think that if there was... if things weren't okay, maybe I would feel uncomfortable.
Laura Buck [ 00:28:26 ] The funny thing is that the last time that we were up there, I was sleeping and I heard this squawking. I'm like, what the heck is that? And I get up and I look out the window and literally there are these four cranes, they're like three feet high. They're outside in the yard. And, I had never seen them before. I knew people had seen them, but they had never been on the property. And I remember my daughter Isabella telling me the day of his...
Laura Buck[ 00:28:58 ] She had stayed back because she wasn't feeling well, that she had seen these four cranes fly by. And she was like, that was really strange. So I went outside and I tried to get close to them and I videotaped all four of them. And I'm like, they were crazy. They were squawking and I'm like, I've never seen that before. Later in the day, they came back and they're walking around again. And I'm like, what is with… they're just here. And then I'm like, okay. So my grandmother and grandfather loved that lake and fished it and they passed away. My uncle Steve passed away two months before my uncle Bob, he loved that lake and Uncle Bob loved that lake and I was like that's that is my grandmother my grandfather and my two uncles they're together they're happy and I seriously feel like their spirits were there going: everything's good and they did not come back after that Okay. And I just felt this genuine look.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:29:57 ] They're doing fine.
Laura Buck [ 00:29:58 ] They're doing fine. I mean, I think you can come back in different ways and show people that things are good. Yeah. Some people might think that's really strange, but I honestly was like, that's why they're there. We had never seen them before until after he passed. And I just feel like that's just comforting to me. So I just feel that he's good. So I get really sad, but then I get really like, okay.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:30:24 ] Well, one misses them, but that doesn't mean that they're not well. You just miss them.
Laura Buck [ 00:30:29 ] Yeah, you're going to miss them because that's part of you. But I guess as I'm getting older, I'm realizing that's just a part of life.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:30:39 ] Yeah.
Laura Buck [ 00:30:40 ] You know, it's like life is a series of hellos and goodbyes, right? So, you know, people come in and out. Just getting older, it's just more permanent that way.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:30:50 ] Yeah.
Laura Buck [ 00:30:51 ] People leave us, but it's okay.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:30:54 ] I wanted to ask you about somebody else in your life.
Laura Buck [ 00:30:57 ] Yes.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:30:57 ] Your dog.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:30:59 ] You have said to me things... I've never owned a pet. I've never been quite pet oriented. Wouldn't want to take care of one. For one thing, it's too much responsibility. But you have said at various times, this dog…And I don't think you had previously owned dogs. You were not a dog person, but you got a dog. And you said, 'described him as an old soul.' Yeah. And you said, 'I have learned so much from that dog.'
Laura Buck [ 00:31:31 ] Oh, yeah. Yeah.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:31:33 ] Anyway, if you can, this may work. And to me, that's just a kind of wonderment that that could be a true description of a dog. I don't doubt it. I've had some observation. I'm not a dog owner, and yet I found them fascinating creatures.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:31:50 ] And I've read some things about the early rise of civilization, and it seems dogs may have had a big role in socializing people because they're such natural connectors, you might say, and responders to people's feelings. Talk about empathy. Dogs seem to... just go right in there. So I know that, just from observing people and their dogs, but I've not... It still doesn't quite... I don't know how to interpret the dog as an old soul or a dog from which you learn a lot, but maybe you can interpret that for me. What does that mean to you? And in what ways? What have you learned? In what ways have you learned? Or does the dog show the dog's wisdom?
Laura Buck [ 00:32:38 ] Yeah, right. We never had a dog here as a family. I never really had a dog. I had a horse and a goat and a hamster. But yeah, when we got Fizzy, she was a gift from my daughter's godfather who said, you know, Izzy, what do you want for your birthday? And she was in eighth grade. She's like, I want a dog. And we were like, okay. And I'm like, I don't want a dog. And I think I know we get a call and he's.I got Izzy a dog and we're like, what? So I'm thinking, oh my gosh, what am I going to do with a dog? I don't know what to do with a dog. You know, the dog's never going to go on the couch and the dog's never going to do this and that. And, so we had Fizzy and yeah. She's, so yeah, not having grown up with dogs, there's just times when, and it sounds like this is again, that I feel like she's an old soul. I feel like she's either someone I knew or I just. I just believe that when we die, our energy just doesn't disappear.
Laura Buck [ 00:33:41 ] I feel like it just goes somewhere and it can go into a tree or it can go. Anyway, she just has this way. And I'm sure most dog owners would know. They look at you with so much unconditional love and care that you're like, there's something very spiritual in that.
Laura Buck [ 00:34:03 ] Remember when thinking, one time she just would just look at me like, 'I'll be like, 'What do you like?' She's just staring at me, and I'll be like, 'Dad?, Is somebody in there?' Because, there's just this connection.
Laura Buck [ 00:34:21 ] Sometimes at night watching TV or it's just her and I and she'll just look around like she's looking at something is really interesting to me because there's absolutely nobody in the room. She'll kind of look around like following something. And then sometimes I'll get this — warm, like happiness— from that. So it's either she's seeing something or, you know, somebody is around me or, you know, she just kind of just.
Laura Buck [ 00:34:51 ] Just shows me something like she's trying to communicate. But anyway, when I feel bad, as all dogs do, they just come to you and they know you're sad and they just kind of want to be next to you because they want to take care of you. And I find that— really — extraordinary and I feel like it is something right, or is or is it God saying I'm here too? Right. Um, I don't have doubts with that either. I'm not saying that Fizzy can't be her own soul, but I really feel like dogs have souls.
Laura Buck [ 00:35:28 ] And most, you know, dog owners, I haven't gone through like a death of a pet like that. And I know friends who have. And I think about it all the time because she's older. But I also think about, you know, what she's brought to me and her wisdom with that. I just feel like she's a soul that I always knew.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:35:58 ] Do you feel, at this point in life a particular sense of, I always use the word trajectory? What I really mean is direction in a kind of dynamic sense, you know, kind of, is there, where are you going in life? Do you have a sense of direction or that the previous life has been a preparation for a next stage? Is it just a deepening or mellowing or something of, of where you've come to or what, you know, what. What's through the next door? What do you see through the next door?
Laura Buck [ 00:36:34 ] A few years ago, a friend and I went to the Buddhist center, you know, the next town over for a while. And I found that really, I really loved that. But I got away from that just because life got really crazy when kids were still home. And I've taken a lot from that as far as I want to go back to that, actually, because a lot of it has to do with the suffering.
Laura Buck [ 00:37:01 ] You know, in Buddhism, you want to get away from the suffering. And it taught me a lot about how to manage suffering and just clearing your head and being in the now, meditating and just being. You're here now versus you're not— your past, your future, but to feel like what you feel now. I want to become more centered, like that, because I feel like, just getting older, I feel like that's a more positive direction for me to go in. Where I'm not, see, I guess it's like this. I'm spiritual, but not religious, right? We've talked about that. Like I've learned a lot of that from you and from people and TWW and all that. But I feel like, if I had to pull something back in, that's something that I want to look more towards. I feel like that's something very personal and it's more about your… you as a spirit and an energy, versus just...
Laura Buck [ 00:38:02 ] I don't feel like I need to be like to pull in any other kind of religion. I don't feel like I have to be committed to a religion. Like, if I'm going to die, is God going to be, am I going to go to heaven? So I don't have that worry. I just think that, for just getting older and processing just the way life goes, that I think that it gives me more of a direction that way. I've had that pull in the last couple weeks. I kind of see me kind of settling in with something like that and looking more towards being one with, I guess more being one with me, the voice inside of me. Who's been with me since we all have that voice, right? But, to be more with that person that's there, that other, that voice inside of me or my soul or whatever, I feel like that's where I want to go.
Laura Buck [ 00:38:56 ] Because I feel like I will have a lot of peace with that. Because, like I said, as life gets older, life gets harder, I think, just because of losses and things like that. I think I could not benefit from that, I just think that's just a direction I'm just being led to, I guess, explore more.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:39:23 ] It sounds as if that inner self, if we use just that term for what you described, really has drawn out the wisdom from the experiences you've had. Most of our lives are lived in terms of social role, personality. Dealing with things, you know, around us, the hurly-burly of life, and in conventional ways, just in the way called upon by our...
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:39:59 ] By being a mother, or a next-door neighbor, or whatever. But there's, meanwhile, a kind of inner self, or soul, or different traditions use a different term, but a lot of traditions have a distinction between your personality, your self that's going through life, that you have a resume about, you know, did this, did that, did the other thing, and a deeper dimension that has some almost eternal…
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:40:30 ] Connection, because it's always in there, you know, that's why people talk about the 'now.' You know, it's always now. Things you've done go in the past, anticipated events in the future, they briefly pass through. But meanwhile, there's always the self— self with capital S, maybe, soul that's right here. Right. And kind of takes it all in.
Laura Buck [ 00:40:58 ] Right. I feel has done it before, because I honestly feel at times, no, I feel a lot that I've already done this before.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:41:08 ] Yeah. Yeah.
Laura Buck [ 00:41:10 ] This is where I am now, but this was my other journey. I just feel I've been, I guess, reincarnated. I just feel like I've been on a lot of different journeys.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:41:22 ] Yeah.
Laura Buck [ 00:41:22 ] So I look at it sometimes this is this journey.' Like, what did I learn from this journey? Right. Like, really, I've always had dreams that since I was little of just growing up in different places or being in different, and I always would dream the same stuff. So, you know, I was always really, well, I've always been … I love mystery, not my mystery, just like this. I guess that's spirituality of that or just the… I don't know how to put it. I was just always very curious about past lives. I've done a past life regression and I didn't think it was silly. I thought it was very, it's very real. So I feel like this journey that I'm on is like, it may be tragic in some ways, but yeah, I'm just learning. about suffering, right? So sometimes I'm like, why do I encounter all of that? And I know there's people who encounter so much more than me, but is it to help other people with that?
Laura Buck [ 00:42:28 ] Being a mom, you know, I went from being me, then being a wife, and then being a mom. And in that journey, there was no time for you. Like as far as in my life, there wasn't a time for me. I was always mom. But then when... My kids left. I mean, they didn't really leave. They're still, you know. But I mean, when empty nesting, that’s when you're like, 'Okay, who am I now?'
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:42:54 ] Yes, exactly.
Laura Buck [ 00:42:56 ] Because I wasn't really myself then, but now I'm myself. And that's what I think centering myself back to me is probably why I'm thinking more about. You know, why returning or exploring Buddhism more is because I didn't have an opportunity to explore the inner me all these years.
Laura Buck [ 00:43:18 ] You have to be a visible woman kind of a thing. I'm managing everybody else's life and making sure that they're okay.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin: That's a lot of the life of a mom, right?
Laura Buck: Yeah. Yeah, and it's great. I would never have traded that for the world. But, yeah, that's what I did. And then my needs were kind of, but now as sad as it is not to have everybody around all the time, thankfully I have my dog and my husband. But I'm just like, right, then it's more or less okay, I'm back to feeling like when I, you know, just the curiosity that you had in life before you became all of that.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:43:55 ] Yeah. Well, thank you, Laura Buck. You've had quite a spiritual journey, I must say. And I told you earlier, based on less evidence that I have at the end of this conversation, that you're a person with a lot of wisdom. And now we know why. You might say this wisdom doesn't just pop into your head one day. It's the result of the kind of journey that you've taken and with a kind of spiritual alertness. And so it's a blessing to us all. Thank you for visiting with me.
Laura Buck [ 00:44:30 ] Thank you. And I appreciate this opportunity to allow me to reflect on all of this because it's something I think I need to do. Thank you, Jerry.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:44:40 ] Very good. Very good.
Scott Langdon [ 00:45:00 ] Thank you for listening to God: An Autobiography, The Podcast. Subscribe for free today wherever you listen to your podcasts and hear a new episode every week. You can hear the complete dramatic adaptation of God: An Autobiography, As Told to a Philosopher by Jerry L. Martin by beginning with Episode 1 of our podcast and listening through its conclusion with Episode 44. You can read the original true story in the book from which this podcast is adapted — God: An Autobiography, As Told to a Philosopher — available now at amazon.com, and always at godanautobiography.com. Pick up your own copy today. If you have any questions about this or any other episode, please email us at questions@godanautobiography.com, and experience the world from God’s perspective — as it was told to a philosopher. This is Scott Langdon. I’ll see you next time.