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Sublime


I close my eyes.

At first, all I notice is the remnants of the bright world around me scorched on the retinas of my tired eyes. Vivid shades of magenta and purple and yellow and white, like old film negatives, bring light to the darkness behind my eyelids. It is not real light - just shadows of light that has already dispersed.

Slowly I notice other things around me. The humming of the air conditioning. The gentle pressure of the chair supporting me. My arms resting on my desk. My feet snug in my shoes. Soft breezes blowing across my arms, barely even there. I hear sounds - sounds of construction far away, sounds of traffic down country roads, sounds of birds...

Soon that begins to melt away. The light that had burned my retinas is purged from my eyes and all becomes darkness.

I become aware of my breathing. I do not breathe deep - just slowly and gently pulling the life-giving oxygen into my lungs and propelling the used portion back out. I am aware of the gentle rise and fall of my chest and stomach. I become aware of a pulse - barely there but insistent. It traces across the light entering through my eyelids. It is an ever-so-gentle throb that seems to echo the very beginnings of the universe, bounding across all space and time and life, yet returning sweetly and gently. It is powerful, yet it is soft. It is everywhere, yet it is within me. It is full of light, yet it contains all darkness as well. It is not me, but it is who I am. It is my life, but it is also the harbinger of my eventual demise.

There is no time in the void I've constructed for myself. My thoughts, at first a mad jumble of confused desires, passions, schedules, and pressures, begin to respond to that beat, that pulse. I feel my body - aware of it, yet also aware of the separateness of it. My body is not me, yet it is connected to me like a string that holds a kite. My mind and spirit soar above what I cannot see, in the dark and in the light as well, perfectly bright, infinitely dark.

Therein lies the mystery.

Yet for some reason, I am not concerned about the mystery. It is enough for me to know that it is, that I am. I float in it - not carried away like a leaf in a stream. More like that leaf caught in an eddy behind a rock, suspended and flowing but stationary... clear water flowing above me, soft gentle air surrounding me...

The world is gone. The universe is within me. I am powerful. I am meek. I am proud. I am lowly. I can do anything. I know nothing.

I am free.

The universe in all its majesty unfolds before my view, and I am one with it.

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