I am caught between two realities – that of the earth and another reality not of the earth, a reality that is floating free.
The first, the earthly reality, is where we begin, into which we are born. We grow and play, we learn, we suffer until eventually we are full to overflowing and begin to look for something else. We search for this something else, that somewhere else, in myriads of ways and the search takes time. More often than not more than a lifetime. But all the time a door is opening, ever so gradually and silently. We perceive it not. We go on with our search, our activities becoming more and more frenzied. But one day, in one lifetime, something happens. Something within us shifts, moves aside, to let the door reveal another reality – a reality so totally different, so beautiful and so alien from our earthly existence. A reality we instinctively know not to be of the earth.
Perhaps we quickly close the door. How can there be such a thing, something else? Weird. Weird is the word. So we try to forget it, get back to our life.
But we can’t forget it. It’s as if something within us has been touched, has been triggered and can’t be ignored. A strange longing begins, a curiosity about this weird experience, a need to have more.
Why do we perceive this as weird? Are we not a bit afraid, afraid to admit there might be something better than the life we have built for ourselves? Afraid to let go? But the longing won’t let go, we now carry it within us, somewhere deep inside. And the door we have so carefully closed swings open from time to time, at first without our cooperation. We glimpse once again the different reality. Over a period of time we become accustomed to it. The weirdness diminishes and we begin to feel less and less discomfort with its presence. With the sudden periods of peace and tranquillity, not generated by anything we do, just “there”. Appearing when we least expect it.
We begin to find it preferable to the world around us, a world of constant agitation, increasing tensions and much sadness intertwined with its opposite, with earthly happiness and seeming beauty. A world we suddenly realise we are now beginning to perceive as “weird”, a weird world.
Obviously our perception of the world has changed, but we realise also that we have changed. We have lost interest in so many ways, have gradually become detached from things and yet we continue on with our life and our responsibilities. There are days when we are fully involved with our earthly activities, other days when we feel trapped between the two realities, oscillating back and forth between them in considerable discomfort, and then gloriously blissful days of peace and inner stillness which seem to come from nowhere, from somewhere else. Weird is the word, weird has become our “old” world.
The inner longing carries us onward, through days of sudden sadness, through grief, through guilt. But always, just when we think we can endure no more, there is peace, deep gratitude, and inner joy. A deep inner and outer silence in the midst of the whirlwind of life around us. We persevere, we cross the threshold. We enter a new world.
