15th February
Woods Elliott
I guess this deep wish to understand why existence is all that it is has always been tugging at my mind. As though my purpose in life was to keep trying to grasp why I am, why we all are what we are, like Annie Dillard says in her book, For the Time Being: why are we here? The mind can be put in the service of this unquenchable curiosity over life’s meaning and purpose. This is ‘metaphysical mind’, an aspect of cosmos trying to see itself in the mirror. Why is there a gigantic cosmos and where do we fit in?
To be sure, there is huge category of human experiences which most people are familiar with and could broadly be defined as the most sublime and marvelous experiences of a life time. In search of them, we have our finest and most satisfying experiences. These sublime experiences are described by poets, artists, musicians, meditators, athletes, and in many ordinary people around the world, from different religions, cultures, world views, beliefs, and ways of life, who tell us they know what kind of experiences we’re talking about. The high quality, the numinous and radiant properties of these experiences can be identified by how hard it is to find words that adequately describe these lucid states of being. As Eckhart Tolle teaches: words can only point toward something which is by definition undefinable. Reality contains an ineffable dimension. I’m inclined to perceive it, these days, as an energetic dimension or baseline grid of some kind that all life forms are tied up with, or into. The energetic nature of our varied relationships with others points to a collective energy body and collective consciousness that underlie and unify the biosphere. It must be that in these most magnificent soulful moments, we feel the Oneness and glimpse the underlying magnificence of the cosmos, ordinary consciousness hides from us.
So I get thrilled by this notion that in our most brilliant states of being extraordinarily alive, we catch glimpses of how magnificent existence is and what fortunate beings we truly are to become knowing witnesses and more sentient participants. To me, one of the most mysterious things remains why such an extraordinary existence, lively cosmos, and conscious beings like us?! What possible reasons can there be for so much enfolded grandeur and existential magnificence? How could there be so much implanted and latently built into the nature of our partially enfolded and unfolded world?
The curious mind in humans is bewildered and bedazzled by the unspeakable vastness and exquisiteness of being alive and surrounded by a ginormous cosmos. We must, at the core of our being, be shaking with fright over the imponderability of existence. To be faced by insurmountable mystery at every turn.
There must be also an existential rapture at the core of being an awakened human being. A rapture from recognizing that somehow, someway, we are an intrinsic, meaningful part of the grand reason for the whole of existence. Imagine that: we play some part, some role in the unfoldment of a magnificent, practically infinite cosmos. What more purpose could one want to have, than to be even a small aspect of a magnificent universe? We might have been an aspect of a ho-hum, mediocre universe. But that never happened.
When people are having their finest moments of being magnificently alive and sentient, they may be partaking of, and receptive of the real, truly radiant nature of existence, normally hidden and denied in ordinary semi-consciousness. At deepest levels, the cores of life and existence seem radiant. Why would that be so? Amazing human beings, and even more amazing than that, all life forms, the whole glorious biosphere, other cosmic beings if they exist, are part of this whole brilliant inconceivable cosmos.
Coincidently, it’s such a dire and parlous time to be human. People are feeling so bummed and disheartened, feel so fearful, powerless and hopeless in the face of so many downward trends in our collective life. It’s really because of this, Rosy and I began asking ourselves how we might help people to maintain a vital hopefulness about their lives and futures. I even found myself puzzled by what hope is, and how critical it is for humans to have adequate stockpiles. Truth is, life, while chuck full of pain and insufferable times, is also a magnificent, joyful celebration too, and an in-depth study of our magnificent moments of being would be a timely and welcomed way to help people remember all the “diamonds in their pockets” as well. From an evolutionary point of view, we are alive to have the richest and deepest experiences we can eventuate and manifest, and when we do this we actuate evolutionary potential as fully as we can and by doing so offer our most evolved self to the world.
Do people have the right to life conditions and minimal provisions which allow these finest, most beautiful and impactful experiences of which we’re capable to be realized. If people are given an opportunity and permission to look upon their most wonderful experiences and be encouraged to foster more extraordinary experiences, would such a shift make it possible for everybody’s life to take on a special radiance of its own and give satisfaction to our deepest wish to live a full, meaningful life?
In the spirit of believing deeply in this, Rosy and I would like to use our website to solicit stories of extraordinary, magnificent experiences from people of all ages, walks of life, religions, cultures, and nations around the world, with the intent to compile and study them, assign different categories that seem to appropriately describe particular qualities and features of these experiences, compose extraordinary collections of them for sale and distribution, and eventually create a world library of humanity’s finest moments. We can’t come up with a project that would have wider appeal and be a more promising project for giving people an opportunity to feel more united, in a “one life” family. Share the moving, poignant, life-changing moments, our most memorable moments of being alive. Have an opportunity to read stories that have been the most meaningful of them all people have, and see the common human nature and common human spirit which will emerge across nations, religions, and cultural differences.
So in this first entry on exceptional human experiences, which will cover many different forms of superior experiences, I’m taken by the sort of revelatory experience that seems to disclose a dimension of reality that has hitherto been hidden from me and is now revealed. In these moments, new eyes reveal more of what’s there.
a numinous personal experience
It was just another July thunderstorm in my mountain paradise, beloved Manitou Springs, Colorado. I was feeling enormously unhappy and stressed in my personal life, so I put on my sneakers and decide to try and jog the suffering out. As I rounded the ole house on the Avenue, I grabbed a trash bag to do some litter pickup. You might have seen me doing this along Serpentine. One of the reasons I got started is because I noticed that trashing behavior dramatically increases if the area isn’t kept mostly clean. It is very satisfying to pick up litter along Serpentine, or anywhere in Manitou for that matter. I wish I could get more folks into doing it. It’s a simple way to undo something which is wrong and demoralizing to everyone. It gives me an easy, direct way to show my deep gratitude and love for Manitou and Mother Nature.
I have another motivation for picking up trash. It might seem a bit strange to some of you, but my poppa died a year and a half ago and he was very observant, always finding what was there visually. His wedge- wood blue eyes looked around a lot and he enjoyed finding things: dropped pennies, puzzle pieces, buoys, shark’s teeth, golf balls in the rough, something unexpected and overlooked. Anyhow you probably have already guessed this litter pickup ritual of mine helps me to feel closer to him and to honor my memory of his looking for things. I miss him to the marrow of my bones. Sometimes I dedicate these winded jogs up to Higginbothams Flats to him: “This one’s for you, poppa, and you know they’re not easy for me!”
In light rain I start my slow, 55 year old bod and put it into second gear along Manitou Ave to the west. I shuffle past the old bottling plant and finally to the creek itself where a little more rugged nature, wild flowers, and dipper birds deepen the wild element in the scenery. I love the creek here. It’s tonic for my spirit. I slow down to catch my breath and see there are lots of alfalfa grasses I’ll snag for my guinea pigs on the way back.
I slow to a crawl at the loop in the road and start up the big incline. At this point heading up over the town, I can see that the storm was banked down in the canyon and that I’m jogging up and over it. The 7 pm sun is breaking through the clouds behind me creating that wonderful fragmented sunlight that illumines the air and space itself, and as I lift my head see a rainbow is waiting for me on top. Wow! Who can feel bad surrounded by all this glory? I feel my mood lift.
For those of you familiar with this steep incline to the Flats, from here on is utterly and magnificently picturesque and enchanting. You look down on Manitou Ave from a couple of hundred feet above and take in the bigger picture of where you live and see the Rocky Mountains tumbling to the plains. The scene is breathtaking and unbelievably beautiful.
More of the rainbow appears as I stomp on up the hill, now deeply renewed and beguiled by the magnificent scenery. Finally, nearing the crest, I see not a single but an incredible double rainbow, spanning perfectly from the one side of the canyon to the other, and both ends of each rainbow in full view. I stop running..unable to absorb what is visually there. I‘d jogged above the thunderstorm. The sky’s the color of poppa’s eyes, and over Manitou, lay stacked up a mosaic of storm clouds from brightest white to the darkest of charcoal gray. The sun sinks behind Pikes Peak. The scene titrates my awareness. There is more than I can allow in. I drop down in a lotus position on the dirt road, just south of the central field up there, awed by what I was witnessing and filled with indescribable timelessness. Harmonically, the rainbows, blue sky, storm clouds, the darting swallows swooping for insects in the field and me became one; the separating boundaries between self and universe dissolved and I felt bathed in love and unity consciousness.
If you ask people around Manitou about superb experiences like this one I just described, you come away with the impression that it happens all the time. You know why? Because it does! A powerful proof for the awesome beauty of Manitou is here in this story about one who started out on a jog to the Flats in the bottom of his worst state of mind, and ended up on the Flats, a most fortunate being.
I’m getting ready to leave Manitou at the end of this summer. That might be part of the reason why this happened to me up there. I must be the most grateful guy for Manitou who ever was. What makes this spot so special is the same reason why Tibet’s Himalayas have birthed some of the most exalted centers of spiritual practice on earth, and why most of the splendid monasteries and spiritual retreats throughout the world are built up on the sides of beautiful mountains where the human spirit can soar and commune with the heavens. This special experience I had was as uplifting and joyful as previous ones, in fact with something new added that I forgot to mention. During the most intense moments on the Flats, I thought I was seeing little filaments of energy or light that united everything in my visual field. They were short, squiggly lines that vibrated and pulsated. The special state lasted perhaps 15 minutes. When I “came to” the rainbows were gone. For minutes at a time I had experienced myself and the world around me as one. This was a first for me. I “became” the rainbows, the swallows, the field, the earth, the clouds and sky. I somehow became what I saw. No subject/object split anymore. This experience proves Krishnamurti’s famous insight that the observer and the observed are truly the same.
This story is from Woods’ book Dazzlephrenia, see http://www.awholenewworld.net/books.htm
The photo is of an original art work by Manitou artist, C.H. Rockey.
