Across the Universe

I never knew walking could be such a profound experience. It’s better than meditation. As I walk, I become aware of the concrete beneath my feet, the way my feet flex inside my shoes, my breathing and muscles all come into focus. I’ll bet if I concentrated hard enough, I could feel the biochemical processes, the ATP working in my muscles!

There are ducks and geese in the water, birds flying overhead and swooping in front of me. I can feel their spirit as I walk by them. I can feel the spirits of the trees and the grass. Anyone who has ever meditated will know what I’m talking about.

Today I cast my energy away from myself and reached out. I remembered an experience I had when I was twelve when I was lying in my bed and daydreaming. All my life I always had trouble getting to sleep and this particular night was no exception. It was about the time I started studying astronomy, my newfound hobby, and this night, I started thinking about the earth and it’s relationship with the universe. I imagined leaving my bed and my room and going up out of my house into the air. I could see my house, my street, my hometown, the roads as I got higher and higher. I kept going until I was above the earth, and saw the continents and then the moon as I went further out into space. As I went past Mars, I could see the other planets and the sun and I just kept going in my mind past Saturn, Jupiter, Uranus, Neptune, and Pluto. This was more than just a review of the solar system because I kept going until the Milky Way was distant and I could see the other solar systems. And I kept going and going and going….until my mind could go no further. What was out there? I asked.

I knew the answer. Somehow it came to me. We were part of something bigger. Only a small part of something beyond comprehension, a microcosm. I saw us as an ecosystem similar to bacteria. What if we were the bacteria of another larger world? Like the atoms are like small systems in ours.

Then later that year, I picked up one of my favorite comics, the Fantastic Four. In it, there was a story which explored a micro world. It was the first of many ideas I was to come up with that actually existed.

Looking back I realize that I was very close to becoming an enlightened being at the age of 14. I wonder what would have happened with proper guidance?

I think it’s happening now. Because now I know that everything revolves from atoms to the universe. Our lives revolve too, from what we learn as a child is applied to our knowledge later in life as an adult and then to our own children. It comes full circle. Nothing moves in a straight line. And this does not even begin to explain all the things I am learning now.