{"id":4858,"date":"2012-06-13T08:56:35","date_gmt":"2012-06-13T12:56:35","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/dreamgates\/?p=4858"},"modified":"2012-06-13T08:57:16","modified_gmt":"2012-06-13T12:57:16","slug":"4858","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/dreamgates\/2012\/06\/4858.html","title":{"rendered":"The world’s oldest female bodybuilder – because of a dream visit from her dead sister"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>
Ernestine Shepherd<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Ernestine Shepherd is 75 and is\u00a0the world’s oldest competitive female bodybuilder. She starts her days by running 10 miles. Never athletic in early life, she decided to start exercising when she and her sister went to the beach in their swimsuits, in their mid-50s, and decided they did not like the way they looked. They went to the gym together for a while, but Ernestine lost motivation and quit going.<\/p>\n

Then, after her sister died of a brain aneurysm four years ago, Ernestine received a dream visitation. In her dream, her deceased sister\u00a0chided her for giving up exercise. “You’re not doing what we agreed to do.” This restored Ernestine’s motivation.\u00a0At 71\u00a0she started\u00a0bodybuilding and is now leading fitness classes for women in church groups.<\/p>\n

You can watch Ernestine in action, and hear her tell her own story, in a BBC program\u00a0here.<\/a>\u00a0She certainly does not look or move like a woman of 75, and has found her place in the Guinness Book of World Records.<\/p>\n

Yet another case of how a dream visitation from the deceased can inspire and motivate. I think of people on the Other Side who have offered me life-changing or life-confirming guidance over the years. Not being especially athletic, I’m grateful they haven’t pressed me to take up bodybuilding, though!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Ernestine Shepherd is 75 and is\u00a0the world’s oldest competitive female bodybuilder. She starts her days by running 10 miles. Never athletic in early life, she decided to start exercising when she and her sister went to the beach in their swimsuits, in their mid-50s, and decided they did not like the way they looked. They…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":224,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10,5,23],"tags":[1360,1359,1361],"class_list":["post-4858","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-conscious-dreaming","category-dreams","category-dreams-of-the-dead","tag-dream-visitation","tag-ernestine-shepherd","tag-worlds-oldest-female-bodybuilder"],"yoast_head":"\nThe world's oldest female bodybuilder - because of a dream visit from her dead sister - Dream Gates<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/dreamgates\/2012\/06\/4858.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"The world's oldest female bodybuilder - because of a dream visit from her dead sister - Dream Gates\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Ernestine Shepherd is 75 and is\u00a0the world’s oldest competitive female bodybuilder. 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He is the creator of Active Dreaming, an original synthesis of dreamwork and shamanism. Born in Australia, he survived three near-death experiences in childhood. He leads popular seminars all over the world, including a three-year training for teachers of Active Dreaming. A former lecturer in ancient history at the Australian National University, he is a best-selling novelist, journalist and independent scholar. His nine books on dreaming, shamanism and imagination include Conscious Dreaming, Dreamways of the Iroquois, The Dreamer's Book of the Dead, The Three \"\"Only\"\" Things, The Secret History of Dreaming, Dreamgates, Active Dreaming and Dreaming the Soul Back Home: Shamanic Dreaming for Healing and Becoming Whole. His most recent book is The Boy Who Died and Came Back: Adventures of a Dream Archaeologist in the Multiverse. Over the past 20 years, he has led seminars at the Esalen Institute, Kripalu, the Omega Institute, the New York Open Center, Bastyr University, John F. Kennedy University, Meriter Hospital, and many other centers and institutions. He has taught depth workshops in Active Dreaming in the UK, Australia, Canada, Costa Rica, France, the Netherlands, Denmark, Sweden, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Romania, Brazil and Austria and leads a three-year training for teachers of Active Dreaming. He hosts the \"\"Way of the Dreamer\"\" radio show at www.healthylife.net. He has appeared on many TV and radio shows, ranging from Charlie Rose and the Today show to Coast to Coast and the Diane Rehm show on NPR. His articles on dreaming have been published in media ranging from Parade to Shaman's Drum.","sameAs":["http:\/\/www.mossdreams.com"],"url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/dreamgates\/author\/rmoss"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/dreamgates\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4858","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/dreamgates\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/dreamgates\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/dreamgates\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/224"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/dreamgates\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4858"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/dreamgates\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4858\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4862,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/dreamgates\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4858\/revisions\/4862"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/dreamgates\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4858"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/dreamgates\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4858"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/dreamgates\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4858"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}