Understanding & Clarity by Ron Toel

Imagine if you will……..a humongous warehouse filled with small cubicals. You live in one of these small cubicals. There is no light in this warehouse, and you only have one tiny flashlight to see by. Everything you know that is contained in this warehouse has been lit up by this tiny flashlight.

When ever you want something, you have to find it…….because your beam is small, you may or may not find it. However, that does not mean it does not exist. It is there, but you have not shone your light on it. If you do find it , it may appear different or it may be difficult to make it out. You may get a close idea as to what it is, but you are often left wondering as you can only see what is in the beam of your flashlight.

That is what our life is like. If one stays in their cubical to be safe and secure, we miss out on many things through the lack of exploration. We can only focus on one thing at a time (like a camera) as that which is seen in our beam…..which is our senses. We can only understand that which we are already aware and those things with which we are familiar.

Now imagine, if you will, that one day, someone flicks a switch, and a bright light lights up the whole warehouse for the first time. In a sudden burst of brilliance and sound and color, the whole warehouse is visible. Everything in it is on display, and it is nothing at all like that what we imagined when we were living by the flashlight.

There is such a vast Calliope of color and sounds……music and singing such as we have never heard…….colors we have never seen…….smells we cannot fathom as to whether they are good or bad, however they make us drool for taste we have never experienced…….everything is unimaginable

The vastness, complexity, depth, and breadth of everything going on around you is overwhelming. Your senses only allow you to see so far, but you realize there is more beyond the space you can grasp and take in from the torrent that is tantalizing your emotions. You get the feeling that you are a part of something alive, infinite, and fantastic. You realize that you are a part of a large unfolding tapestry that goes beyond one’s senses.

It is understandable that which you used to think, when you lived in the beam which then was your reality, was actually a speck of dust in this humongous warehouse. It suddenly becomes aware how all the parts are interrelated, how they play off each other and astoundingly how it all fits. You become aware of all the unknowns to you and everything becomes surreal.

Even when the light goes back off, nothing can take away your understanding and clarity, the wonder and beauty, or the aliveness of the experience. nothing can ever cancel your knowledge of all that exist in the warehouse. You are far more aware, than you ever were with the flashlight. You are left with a sense of awe over those lucid moments that you experienced when the lights were on. Your life now takes on a new meaning. These new experiences move you forward from the moments created from this awareness.

This is what it was like for me to become a nature photographer and learn about the life that was created for us to enjoy and photograph. One might also expound on this as to what our next life may be like.