August 2005

There are these touching moments in life. Sometimes, they are more than touching; they are overwhelming. They change our whole perception of life. We think differently and behave differently after one of these moments. We see intense love between parent and child, unquestioning sacrifice between lovers, deep devotion of one human to others, hear bone stirring beautiful pieces of music, see splashes of brilliant colors in sunsets, and we melt. We are stopped in our tracks. We get chills, goose bumps, get weak, or we cry, because it is so beautiful. Sometimes we are too busy to pay attention to them, but at those times these moments strike us; they take over our whole senses. We feel like we are, at this single moment in time, an integral part of the universe. We are at one with everything around us. We may not understand rationally why this moment is so meaningful to us, but emotionally feel that we are communicating with God, the Creator, the Universe, or something out there which is everywhere, and at that moment, felt intensely by us. We live for these special moments when all senses are heightened, we are aware of everything everywhere, surrounded by an aura of pleasure, and floating. Wow.

Lest you become deluded that this is a special category of emotion and spiritual state which is unique and isolated to itself, we hasten to add that this road has a lane across the divide going the other way. There are not only moments of intense beauty, there are an equal number of moments of intense pain. An example is having the person you love with all your soul tell you she wants someone else. An example is having your best friend get killed in a senseless auto accident. An example is getting ready to go teach Sunday school and have your wife come in, sit on your lap, and tell you she wants a divorce. An example is watching the video of JFK’s head being blown open. The pain is so intense, you don’t know how you are going to survive. You know that your whole world has changed forever, and it will be for the worse. It feels as if one of your limbs or other essential part of you has been torn away. The pain seems to linger forever. The only way you can survive is to stumble forward: work, study, create, and more intensely love those who you still have in your life. Emotional wounds are much like physical wounds. A deep wound leaves a deep scar. It will become less painful over time, but it never goes away.

Having balanced those intense moments in life, however, leaves us asking just exactly what world we are in at those times. Is this one of those other universes that the physicists keep telling us about? Is this the contact with the divine the mystics keep talking about? Is this the sign of the Creator that He, She or It is there and is communicating with us at those times? Are humans the only creatures that feel these intense otherworldly life-changing moments? The intensity of these moments is certainly out of this world. Nothing else in life seems too important at those times.

We are aware that there are many, if not the majority of humans who exist on this planet, who will say that these moments are exactly that: proof that there is a Divine being somewhere out there who is communicating with us. We are aware that these moments are so special that they do not seem to fit in any mundane rational scheme of existence. We are acutely aware that if there are any weaknesses in the belief that the beginning of creation is unknown, and that life once begun evolved through natural evolution – this is one of them. Events that seem out of this world do not fit nicely in a scheme that addresses only what we know about this world we are in now. We understand why there are so many who choose to believe in a divine creator who began and who controls and manipulates all of life.

We just don’t happen to believe that way. We happen to believe that this is a universe of jagged edges, exceptions, deviations and extremes at either end of the bell-shaped curve. That’s the way it’s made. We happen to believe that this is not the normal universe that we know unless there are these extremes. We happen to believe that everything happens according to the laws of chance. We believe that these exceptions are the proof of that rule, and that the Laws of Chance and Chaos are God. We happen to believe that an elephant mother who sees her baby grabbed and drowned, to be eaten by an alligator is overcome with grief and deep sorrow. We believe that she knows her life has changed forever and that she never forgets that intense grief. We believe that all forms of life remember in some way moments of intense pain or pleasure, and are guided by those memories for the rest of their lives. We will beg the question of which life form feels pain and pleasure the most intensely. All of life has defining moments which register the most cogently in their neural systems, whether those moments are for them good or bad.

We believe that these otherworldly moments are an integral part of this world. Our God of Chance has decreed it to be so.

 

“Whether upon a Brahmin graced with learning and humility, a cow, an elephant, dog, or eater of dogs, the enlightened will look with equal eye.”

- Bhagavad Gita

“When we consider the immensity of the universe, we must confess that man is insignificant. Man’s life can hardly be considered the god of the universe. Its margin of existence is always so precarious. A man is ethical only when he considers every living cell, whether plant or animal, sacred and divine.”

- Albert Schweitzer

“The earth and myself are of one mind. We are all made from the same elements. We are all manifestations of the mystery. From the common first came Homo Sapiens. From that same first and that same material came every other living organism. The little chipmunk is of the same dust as we, and he breathes the same wind and drinks the same waters. His days are warmed by the same sun and his little heart rocks just like ours.”

- Chief Joseph