Hillary’s Beethoven Vision
On January 27, 2015, Brad did something he had only done once before in his life—he prayed that Hillary be sent to the highest classrooms. He did this many years earlier for his son and that same night he went up the rope to God. While Hillary had visited numerous visionary classrooms before, this evening Brad prayed that she encounter the highest mysteries. He did not tell her that he made this prayer.
Hillary woke me Brad up just after five in the morning, saying she had been sent to a spiritual classroom. She was overcome with emotion. After weeping together with joy, he asked her to immediately get up and write it down. Here is her report:
I was in a small classroom on an old campus. It seemed crowded even though there were less than ten students. It looked like the private school I attended as a teenager—a very traditional place with brick walls covered with ivy. I was very excited to be back in school because the teacher was challenging and I loved learning and being a good student. I sat at the front of the class and the teacher was stern.
The subject of the lesson was Ludwig van Beethoven. The instructor was teaching that Beethoven was not only a great composer, but also a scientist who discovered a very important equation. He found that when something is being measured, at some point it becomes its negative or opposite. For example, at a certain point, “+1” becomes “–1.” Beethoven, the teacher said, first discovered this equation and scientific law in relationship to measuring a mountain. I was concentrating very hard and was excited for the teacher to reveal more about what seemed like an impossible theory to grasp fully, knowing that it held an important truth about the nature of reality.
As the teacher was slowly revealing more, I suddenly thought that time must be the missing factor. I raised my hand and asked, being deliberate and careful with my words, “But at what point in time—or at what instance—does the mountain become its negative?” I had an image in my mind of the fabric of time bending the mountain in on itself, and thought this surely must be what Beethoven had discovered. The teacher responded strictly, “Wait, we haven’t gotten that far yet.”
Then the teacher went on to the say that Beethoven had been persecuted for being misunderstood and thrown in jail. There he languished, was forgotten by his peers, and almost lost his mind. He thought he could not finish developing his theory of how things
can exist as both their positive and negative. He was utterly broken and felt he could no longer compose music. Afterward, the teacher said, after being released from jail, Beethoven sat alone one night in deep sorrow. At this moment in my vision I could actually see Beethoven slumped over in his chair, cast in darkness and shadow. It is difficult to convey the depth of sorrow and anguish I witnessed in him. Suddenly, however, I heard musical notes rise up and out of Beethoven’s heart.
When I heard this, it pierced my heart and I began to weep. The teacher then went over to his piano and played the first few notes of the song that rose from Beethoven’s heart, which I now recognized as the melody from “The Windmills of Your Mind.” While this song was actually composed by Michel Legrand, it follows a similar harmonic progression that Beethoven used in “Moonlight Sonata.” I felt the notes so deeply that I experienced myself merge with Beethoven—I could see inside Beethoven’s heart and feel his sadness lift with every musical note. I exclaimed to the teacher, “This story and this music move me so much!” The teacher was very excited and I was surprised to notice that I was the only student in the class who was moved by the teaching.
Then the teacher said, “When Beethoven heard these notes arise from inside his heart, he immediately realized that the rest of his theory concerning the relationship of the positive and negative addressed the tension that enables the heart to open like an envelope, revealing musical notes that arise from empty space.” I saw, floating in front of me, a small, white envelope shaped not like a letter envelope but like a pouch that opens at the top when the sides are squeezed slightly together. I understood that the music rose out of this space in Beethoven’s heart. I was so moved by the truth of Beethoven’s experience—that he was alone, broken, and nearly empty inside, and then the melody came bubbling up out of his heart and brought all of his life to fruition.
After telling me about the envelope, the teacher went back to his piano and played the entire song, “Windmills of Your Mind,” in a classical style with such passion, precision, and fervor that I began weeping again. Words cannot readily convey the extraordinary emotion I felt. The music filled the room and I was saturated with the power of the song. Though this vision brought many teachings, its clearest teaching echoed what Brad had often told me: Music is the holiest medicine and a spiritual lifeline delivered straight from God into your heart. When all else fails and you are truly broken, divine music arrives to lift you straight to heaven.