~*~Chapter one~*~

Just like everyone else, I had to abandon the warmth of my mother’s womb only to come into this mind-boggling adventure of a lifetime and play the game of “lose yourself to learn to find yourself”, yet again.

I was expected to be something else for most of my life. My mother hoped I was a boy. My country hoped I was a mindless labourer. My heart perpetually wandered between dimensions in the search of Truth. For many years I fed the persona everyone else wanted me to be and helter-skeltered my way into trouble, time and time again. I made almost all possible mistakes…running away from the person I was turning into only to, ever so often, meet myself on the other side of the dream. Who knows how much of a difference it would have made to be properly instructed upon arrival about the fascinations, tumults, and perils of this complex, hypnotic illusion that is life. A sublimely tragico-romantic Love story of souls masquerading as humans, playing their roles so entirely and utterly truthful.

I travelled in and out of myself for 28 years before I arrived at home in my heart and got smacked again into reality; this time around an inner discipline began to settle and guide me with a warm and gracious, crystal clear voice. As clear and pure as the waters that nearly killed me two times over. Yes, I almost died twice. And the third time, the “I” died. Or better said, the veil of illusion completely dropped and my pineal gland got the biggest flash of Light I had ever had until then.

First, the river called me. She lured me into her fierce torrent and my fragile 7 years old heart leaned on the presence of my father for safety. It was in between gasps of air that I caught a glimpse of him sitting on the steep shore, hands on his waist, frozen in panic. Nevertheless, the angels were there for me in the form of two brave boys that fished me out of the seething river.

The second time, about 19 years later, a similarly irrational trust enticed me to emotionally cling unto this guy I was at (the) sea with. Waves were wild…as wild as my laughter and sun-kissed, cascading hair locks in salty waters. All fun and games until the seafloor got swept away from beneath my feet and I couldn’t reach the sand anymore. No more grounding in the sea fury that I so foolishly mistook for a play. But She was mad. Ooh, how mad She was! She was reinventing herself intensely that day. And so did I, as I slithered back to the scorching seashore, ushered by a bizarre calmness of mind. I remember the cold, relentless waves slapping me out of my senses into a suddenly expanded perception of time and space, and I remember the strong voice inside my head continuously reassuring me “not today, not like this”.

It was a truly surreal moment of perceptual disruption. The heavy chaos, the abstract void, the violent tornado of a dying ego – it all tumbled down into a flash of spectacular fractality. I was holistically brimming with life, yet randomly existing in a perpetual illusion. As I collapsed down on my wobbly knees and panted my heart out for a moment, I remember how strangely familiar everything felt. For a moment of peculiar serenity, my mind was empty. I was detachedly observing my body as it went back to the seawater, rinsed away the sand from the shaky right hand and shoved two fingers down its throat. “You swallowed a great deal of salty water, you gotta purge it out, otherwise you’re gonna feel like crap for the rest of the day”, said the voice inside my head, ever so calm and knowing. Tears enwrapped my eyelashes in a warm blast as I exiled the Sea out of my stomach and sinuses and heavy eyes were pulsating out of my skull. By and by I recovered from those gut-wrenching moments and soon I was back deep into ignorance,  comfortably numb in the shallow frivolity of the ego.

Her mad waves were strong and  I was not ready yet to keep an open eye. The impulse of illusion was still strong enough to choke down the Light emerging from within.

A few years went by as I continued to sleepwalk through life, but the powerful encounter with Eternity was bubbling up inside my subconscious and airing out all shadows from within. One toxic relationship after another, one neglect after another, more abuse on top of my self-abuse, and then there I was, saddled to the grim rock bottom of my deepest shame and sadness, staring into the abyss of despair with empty eyes and a frozen heart. How nauseating it was then, amid an all-encompassing withdrawal…how heart-warming it is now to look back and see with a clear mind and an open heart the wondrous grace of everything unfolding!

A tacit decision to sober up and brace myself lead me into the safe haven of my lover’s arms. I relinquished in his heart space like the caterpillar willingly crawls itself into a chrysalis, only to be born again, with new, colourful wings.

I slowly started breaking one vice at a time, not without a fight, not without emotional eruptions, not without a blind thirst for egoic gimmicks. But the force was growing strong with this one and the momentum of that short awakening was steadily steering me towards the next soulful event, in 2017.

It was a magnificent midsummer’s day when the Cycladic sea spray came to meet me in my sleepy bed. The ultramarine framed windows invited in the rompy breeze only to nominate me the sole witness of a silken dance of gauzy white curtains. There is no smile like a morning smile on a Greek isle!

I levitated out of bed guided by an inner symphony singing a song of “Happy Birthday” to myself. I felt easy at heart like no other time before…unlike previous occasions, I wasn’t selfishly wanting all the world to see me, praise me and applaud in awe of my birthday. On the contrary, I was lavishing in a grounding humbleness and my body felt light and murmuring with silent inner joy.

(to be continued)