"I am somehow drawn to ancient landscapes", I hear myself say to Julie, my therapist. On my way to her practice I thought about it but couldn't figure out why it came to me. In our sessions we had explored different inner landscapes, usually connected to a conflict I was experiencing or an issue I was working on. That morning, before I arrived at her house, I realized that I had no idea what to talk to her about - or so I thought.
So we spoke about a couple of things like my work and my son's visit and my girlfriend. About an hour into the session, I hear myself mentioning the ancient landscapes to her and that I somehow felt drawn to them. There was nothing specific in my mind. No imagery, no picture of old pyramids or anything similar. Julie, my therapist, asked me if I wanted to close my eyes for a minute and see what comes up. Usually, for that, I'd lie on her table and we go through this process a bit differently but we didn't have that much time left and I really wanted to see where this ancient landscape was and what it meant, if anything.
So I closed my eyes and for a while I waited for an image to show up. It didn't. Nothing happened until at some point the words "before time was" appeared. I told Julie about it and that I felt that the ancient landscape I was referring to might have been there before time was. This was obviously an oxymoron because how can something exist - a stone, a tree or a forest - before time existed? Without time there is no growth and nothing can start or end or be at all. Those and other thoughts came through my mind in a split second. But I felt that there was something else there, something I had missed or hadn't understood properly.
Then I saw, almost in a close up, a couple of old stones overgrown with moss. As I pulled back, I realized that I stood in the middle of what must have been an old foundation. The stones were almost completely grown into the ground. Grass covered the soil. Judging by the outline and size, it must have been an old church or chapel at some point. For some reason I had the distinct feeling that the ground I stood on was very holy. Holy in the sense of clean, untouched, undisturbed - and very old. Another thing was very interesting for there was absolutely no sound. It wasn't just the absence of noise. It was complete stillness. Nothing moved. The spot and its immediate surroundings felt suspended. I realized, when I spoke to Julie about what I saw, that I was barely breathing. My breath was completely quiet. As if I almost didn't need to breathe at all. For a second I panicked and thought about what if I stopped breathing altogether. But that passed.
I could feel the ancientness (if that's a word) of this place. It did feel as if it had been there before time was. And then something very unexpectedly happened. As I looked at the partial wall in front of me, where I surmised once stood the altar of the church, suddenly - and I can't describe this any differently - the walls began to rebuild themselves. But not with their original materials made out of stone, granite, plaster and wood. No. The walls rebuilt themselves out of light. As if the stones had merely the shape of a stone but were not made of stone at all but of pure light. After a while, the church walls reached the ceiling, closing the gap until what I saw was the most beautiful building imaginable, with all the details like moldings, figurines and ornaments completely intact but made not of their usual material but out of light. The whole building had a soft glow to it. It was slightly transparent but looked very solid. And yet not solid in the usual sense. Clearly defined, very strong, but transparent.
What I saw was a perfect representation of what had been there originally. And what was broken, fallen down, deteriorated by eons of time, was still there - untouched and unchanged. As if everything that exists in time, still has its original shape from before time was. The image of the finely outlined church made of light, against the grey sky, was magnificent.
Then, for reasons that escape me now, I thought about chocolate kisses. Bear with me for a moment. I'll get there. My girlfriend sometimes puts little Hershey chocolate kisses on my desk in my office. A while back I found some of those kisses made not of chocolate but of clear hand blown glass. I gave her one and kept one for myself. Last week mine somehow fell to the floor and the tip broke off. I was upset for a moment and asked myself, naturally, what that was all about but calmed myself down after thinking that this was a bit silly.
Now I saw this broken piece of glass in my mind on the mantle piece of my living room. And overlaying it was its perfect shape made out of light. Nothing was broken, it was still there in its intended form and it was absolutely beautiful. I couldn't really grasp the meaning of it all but I knew that it was significant. Then I thought that our body and everything we see and feel and touch, has a perfect representation that is made of light. Our families, our past, our cars, a blade of grass and a tea cup have - unseen for us - a perfectly intact representation of itself overlaying it. Relationships that seemed to end or were destroyed or broken, are still intact in their original form. The body of a sick person has its perfect light form still present. And things we destroyed, people we hurt, parts of us that were damaged, are still there, untouched and far, far beyond destruction.
I thought about the twin towers and the beams of light that are now visible there. At that moment, I saw the original buildings, complete in all their details but made out of light, still towering over Manhattan in absolute beauty that was beyond this world. Destruction, as much as we try sometimes, as much as we all want to destroy others and ourselves, is impossible. For what is, what was there before time was, cannot be destroyed.
In closing, I think about the 2-line summary of A Course In Miracles (a 1200 page book outlining a very substantial and complete spiritual path for living in our time). It says there: "Nothing real can be threatened. Nothing unreal exists. Herein lies the peace of God”
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