In Awe of the Magic of the Universe
When I sit in the sun, feeling the warmth on my face—I can only think of how magical it is that the sun is millions and millions of miles away, and just the right distance for its rays to travel through space, get slightly filtered by earth’s atmosphere and land softly on my cheek.
Writer:
Ryan Willms
It wasn’t that long ago that I was feeling very disconnected. From myself, from nature, from friends and family, from intimacy, and especially from the universe. It took a number of steps along my path to slowly drive a wedge between all of these things and I didn’t really realize what was happening for a few years. I knew I wasn’t happy, I knew I felt increasingly alone and I knew my body was breaking down physically, but why?
The best thing I could have done whats to honestly ask myself “why” in this case. It was not an A to B journey by any means but by starting to pull at the thread I was able to eventually get onto a path of healing—physically, emotionally and spiritually. I’ve always been a fairly emotional person, in my career, in my relationships and in sports—I’ve poured myself into these areas resulting in great joy and also unrelenting tears. But I’d never explored spirituality. My parents had been turned off by misguided modern religion that had been prevalent in their own parents lives and in our society, and had never introduced my brother and I to any form of spiritual practice outside of going to church a couple times before the age of ten, and then never again. That always sat completely fine by me, I didn’t think I was missing out on anything.
In 2016 I took two weeks to travel to Thailand and attend a 10-day Vipassanā. I really didn’t know what I was doing and I was there at the times desperately searching for answers to the physical aliments that I’d been struggling with. But it turned out to be my first real introduction to a spiritual practice, the teachings of the Buddha and Taoist approach to the universe. It was a minor shift, but it was cracking open my eyes to something deeper from what I understood religion to be from the outside. It wasn’t until last summer however that I had an absolutely life changing, change, to my own foundation and how I view the world each day, but each step you take is just as important as the next, some of them are just more memorable.
In early June last summer I tore my ACL. I felt like I couldn’t catch a break, as much progress as I was making I kept getting in juried, my gut wasn’t working well and I was emotionally at war with loving myself. I couldn’t do it, I was not good enough in any way that I could find. And if I can’t love myself, it makes it pretty difficult to believe anybody else could love me, let alone really love another person. I felt stranded and the ACL injury just made the hole feel that much deeper.
On June 9th my brother and I drove down to San Diego for Paul Chek’s Zen in the Garden one day workshop. I’d started following Paul a few months earlier and was already blown away by his wisdom and ability to teach on a variety of levels. I didn’t have a lot of expectation for the day however but was open and looking forward to hobbling around the garden looking for some sense of Zen. It was a great day overall, Paul shed plenty of gems and the hands on painting practice was interesting and enjoyable as well as insightful. Then, as we were wrapping up Paul asked if anyone had any more questions, and I mustered up the courage to admit that I was having a really hard time figuring out how to love myself—so what do I do about that?
Luckily for me that was just the kind of question that can send Paul off for a solid 45 minutes to an hour. Partially directed at me in front of the class, and partially to the group, Paul went on to bluntly explain how silly that was. He reminded us all of the incredible number of miracles that it took for each of us to be walking around on this earth at any given moment. How is it possible the sun is in just the right place in the universe, and the moon, so that these planets rotate around at just the right speed and gravitational pull to allow human existence and all thats happened since? Over millions of years our ancestors have evolved eventually creating our parents, who somehow met one another and created a new life that combined with one of the 60 million souls waiting for a body, happened to create the very one and only “us” or “me”. There is only one version of ourselves, ever, so of course we are perfect, and unperfect. We are so special and unique, how can we not be in love with the millions of miracles that have happened in the universe just for us to be able to live in this experience?
Stone Buddhas at Haven House
That’s a very summarized version of what Paul had to say in response to my ongoing internal turmoil, but it shifted things. I left that day feeling refreshed, feeling that I was indeed a miracle and that we all are. Each day is. And how lucky I was to have everything in my life that I did. About 10 days later, I went on the most challenging plant medicine journey I’ve been on, lasting one week and including isolation and fasting for multiple days, and when I emerged from the experience, combined with the teaching from Paul, I was changed so deeply at my core that I have not been the same since and probably never will be again.
I’ve started a regular prayer practice, directed to the Universe, God, Love and Light, whom which are interchangeable to me. Each day I enjoy the smallest moments of joy: a child smiling, a happy dog, a delicious bite of food, a wild thought my Ego puts into my mind. I never feel alone when I see a tree or feel the breeze, I never feel hard done by when I can take a deep breath of air or drink a glass of water. It may sound a little silly, but my life has absolutely changed forever by discovering the absolute magic of every day life, and keeping in mind the literally unbelievable number of miracles it takes for any of us to walk around on planet earth each day. So why not smile? Whey not enjoy every minute of it? It’s only human to feel emotions of all sorts, to get angry or distracted but by practicing each day and remind myself to be in awe of the magic of the universe, it makes it pretty easy to get back to appreciating the little things each day.