She traversed the desert. For forty years she walked the sands hot and cold. Many times, she stopped at oases with various degrees of comfort. All of them were full of water and some form of comfort. Some were fragrant and sumptuous, others more primitive. She always left them, in a restless search for home.
She heard on the wind the call of her soul, and each time she stopped to listen, she felt she was that much closer. Then she realized that the call came not from the wind, but on the whisper of her own breath. So, then she began her search inside, staying still in the desert for what seemed an eternity. Still, she was no closer.
She resumed her external search and even in her sleep she was haunted with her fear of not knowing her soul’s aim. In her dreams she saw another soul, a being of light and love. She began to look for it outside herself and wondered if she might ever realize her dream of peace and oneness. There was so much noise she lost sight of the point, she became tired and laid down on the sand to rest.
In the twilight of a night, she laid her cheek upon the cool sand and allowed herself to listen. She felt she could hear the breath of the world in the rustling sand beneath her cheek. For the first time ever, she allowed herself to listen, to be comforted by the sounds of infinity. She cuddled close to the earth and felt the sand embrace her, heard her heart beat slow, and allowed herself to surrender to the will of not knowing. There she lingered between sleep and awakening, allowing herself for the first time to experience relaxation of body and soul.
Drifting on this wave, she entered the dance of life. Her heart began to split open like a seed bursting with life, and she remained still. Images flashed across the screen of her mind, lifetimes lived and yet to come. She was traveling through space and time without moving a muscle. Again, she saw the being of love and light, this time he was holding out his hand to her heart. This moved her and she reached out to him with her whole self and in that instant she awoke.
Her eyes opened upon snow-capped mountains in the distance, and she blinked to find herself enclosed in a room, her head on a soft pillow not the desert sands. Confused for a moment she was not sure which part of her was in the dream. The desert or the room looking out over snow-capped mountains?
Tentatively she placed her feet on the floor and stood up, all the while looking out the window at the light snow on the mountains in the distance. As she took a step she was filled with pain, there was something strangling her left leg. Looking down, there was nothing evident, and the pain persisted. At once familiar and estranged with the place in which she found herself, she reached for her mat and prepared for her morning routine. Hot lemon water, exercise, yoga, chanting, and meditation. She did these activities like one breathes, to sustain her life. There was something primordial about her need to reach this connection each day, to feel herself beyond the confines of the walls of the building that contained her earthly home.
Slowly she moved into herself with the feeling that she was putting herself together with these movements, sounds, and vibrations. On this particular morning her meditation brought her back to the desert. She saw herself sitting in the vastness of its sands, at one with the world. Next to her there was another soul, he was holding her hand and they were silent in their oneness. As she wrote about this in her journal, she found herself again asking which was her reality, the desert, or the snow-capped mountains?
On this day she was compelled to explore this notion through a commitment to write for 1 hour each day, from the minute she woke up. She set herself a challenge to dare this possibility into reality.
Compliments of Elisabeth Heimann, Gujarat, India
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