I have been consumed with the purpose of life since I was a child. As far as I can remember I would look into the sky and wonder if there was "more". I would think about what is right, wrong, and how would I know when I am doing either. I had my first indication of the thing that would tell me when I was five. This was also when I had my first orgasm. After the orgasm I remember a feeling of euphoria and kept thinking that I wanted to feel that all of the time...so I masturbated over and over and over again. Then when I was about 10 I looked into the mirror, after masturbating one evening, and it felt as though there was "something" staring back at me. It felt as if my body were standing there and "something" was in it. I referred to this "something" as a soul. I stood in the mirror confused. I wondered if my body had just masturbated or if my soul had. I knew it felt good and that feeling had to belonged to my body, but as I stood in the mirror my eyes starring at my body I felt as if my body and soul were two different entities.
In the book, Entangled Mines, Dean Radin, poses several questions that I have wondered since childhood. He asks: Why are we here? Is this all we're capable of? Does life have any real purpose or is all this emphasis on arithmetic and spelling just a distraction to avert our attention from more important questions like futility of existence? These are questions that my soul has asked; they are questions that come up when I stand at the ocean and my body feels micro. Even though the questions multiply, a bigger question always follows: will I be able to find the answers to all of my soul's questions?
Today I am just as confused as I was when I was ten. There are still a lot of questions that come to mind and little reasonable answers. I suppose I have the rest of my life to figure things out, but what happens when I do figure the above out? Will my soul leave my body like I felt it did after an orgasm, only this time for good....
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For me, the feeling of separation between body and soul has also been life changing.
ReplyDeleteEarlier in my life I felt this division in times of deep prayer and meditation; when Christian values guided my life completely. At these times I thought I already had all the answers and so my experiences invariably reinforced the beliefs I held.
At an older age I became less and less sheltered of course. I began to consider all the conflicting knowledge I picked up and eventually reevaluated the unquestioning confidence I had in my answers to the biggest questions. Eventually this led to crisis. I had thought that my search for truth would lead me to a different Christian group that had a better grasp of the Bible but I ended up dropping my respect for the Bible as the primary source of truth; and this in turn removed every piece of solid footing I had previously based my life upon.
The next time I felt this separation between soul and body occurred much later, after experimenting with a substance. I won't get too much into the details here because I don't trust my thinking as clear while I was in this state. But nevertheless the experience left me with something very powerful. During my 'trip' I fully explored all the big questions I had left unanswered and the conclusions I came to scared me to death. Utter meaninglessness. Hopelessness. As I slowly gave into this feeling...a process that felt like a slow motion death...I waited for a rock bottom but all I sensed was a free fall. I actually felt as though I might fall into a self inflicted coma or stop my own heart as I felt for the first time that I understood the phrase 'cosmic joke.' It was all a cruel joke that makes you laugh bitterly for a moment; but then you can only cry.
And then I let go. I let go of my need to be in control, to care, to have meaning, even my need to exist. And then suddenly I had what could be called a mental orgasm. I was flooded with peace; and somehow, meaning. Even the total lack of meaning in the end was meaningful. I had stared into the abyss of infinity, and it had stared back into me. All of my previously held definitions of god seemed silly, because god is by definition infinite. And so I drew meaning not from an afterlife, but in the eternal connection of every person and thing. My ability to see and understand even a little bit of this world around me became a gift; and even more so the ability to interact and change things. Even if it is all a dream that will soon pass, I will enjoy it. And for some reason, I derive most of my joy from people around me being happy. So even if it's for the most selfish reasons, I aim to be a positive influence on the world around me :]
wow. thanks for sharing your story!! :)
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