Between worlds

Hidden in the mist, Grizzly Peak and half the town cannot be seen. There is an atmosphere of poetic mystery. Like in the haiku:

In the dense mist
What is being shouted
Between hill and boat?

A mist creates an atmosphere of mystery. The Thuata de Dannan arrived to Ireland in a magic mist. It gives the idea of a gate to another world, like the Irish expression Idir Eathru, that means between worlds, but it’s more suggestive. Like a mist, that is neither solid nor liquid. It could be the beginning of a fairy tale. Quite early one morning, looking out of the window, the mountain is hidden in a mist. Later, some two hours before midday, the mist fades away and, lo and behold! There is no mountain, but the vast winter ocean.

How would you feel if that would actually happen? What emotions would arise in your heart? Fear? Amazement? Astonishment? The joy of adventure? Would you ask your cat, and then wonder what he meant by meoooow? No matter what emotions, they would be intense: before you, the impossible has become possible. When we are startled, our emotions become intense. It feels as if we don’t have room in our heart-mind for what startles us. We are too attached to forms. Our conditioning leads us to put things-events into boxes. These boxes don’t necessarily match reality, they are just useful to keep some things going. Sometimes, however, we take the boxes for reality. It is similar to taking the weight for the thing weighted.

Thoughts and emotions are closely related. Emotions generate thoughts. Thoughts generate emotions. The power of literature is that it takes us to emotional states through our thoughts. Poetry can do it with a few words, like waves from a pebble thrown in a lake. Some startling thoughts and emotions makes us uneasy because we don’t have a box for them. Maybe we have one, but not large enough. We use a box instead of the mind. Boxes are limited. The mind is not. The mind is like empty space. It contains our planet, the sun, the moon, the solar system, the milky way galaxy and innumerable galaxies more. Such is the nature of the mind. Thoughts and emotions arise in the mind. Then, fade away. Another one comes and fades away… in the mind. Like small waves.

Instead of boxes, we can remain in a relaxed awareness of the mind, the box as limitless as empty space. There we have room for mountain and ocean. Then, if the fairy tale comes true… let’s share a cup of tea on the beach!