As modern humans, we are always hinged to our civilized world. Even in our solitude (whether it comes by choice or not), we find a way out. We pull out our smartphones – our gateway to another world. In our ignorance, we forget, that the world we know, is, in fact, created by our brains – a reflection from our mind’s eyes. What we call “reality,” is actually a highly edited version of the original.

But undeniably, we can portray ourselves as the most curious species on the planet so far. With evolution in our favour, scientists say, that the human brain size has grown the fastest during the last 200,000 to 800,000 years. Many historians and scientists have attributed this evolutionary change to various causes.

An important one?

This growth in brain size was because of our need to better survive in many complex and unpredictable environments. With growing size, it also grew in its complexity as an organ, which allowed it to perform with unfettered capabilities. It led us to exploit the peaks of development – like increasing the average human’s life span – or sending people off to journey the nearby planets.

Much of what we know about ourselves stays inconclusive, theoretical, and an enigma. We (along with our highly differentiated brains) remain a part of nature. A mystery, unsolvable to an end. All theories often fall prey to futility, when they try to answer questions like: "Where did we, and everything around us, come from?”, “What is the source of existence?”, “What is the origin of energy that moves everything?”, et cetera.

We are all connected

An invisible thread weaves together everything; what we individually experience (in varying nature and degrees), does, in fact, belong to a unified field of energy (which we ourselves are part of.) We are constantly perceiving and exchanging energy. We are all (intrinsically) connected.

In looking at this mystery within and without, we must differentiate our ability to ponder curiously from our ability to perceive without any hindrance from thoughts – experiencing without any interference from (our) knowledge. This knack or the skill thereof, comes with practice – when we stay as perceivers, just experiencing whatever comes across us, while time and thinking, fade away in the background. This allows us to tap into the mystery, which is often unveiled in our astute presence.

Surprisingly unsurprising, we all experience these gaps: whether looking at our beloved with love, walking in the woods, listening to birdsongs, or, just gawking over the horizon at a setting sun. We all experience these instances we might label as “magical,” but which are, in fact, just, regular happenings!

An opening into the present moment

On one fine summer evening, I strode back from school. The mighty sun, probably in solstice, shimmered warmth on the street I walked on. The sunbeams pierced through the cityscapes and fell on the left half of the face. This completely took me off guard. Before I decided to cross the third zebra-stretch of the walk, I couldn’t overcome how what I was feeling. Like the hand of a loving parent, kept slightly over two seconds. And instead of withdrawing myself from such an embrace, I turned my face completely in its direction, simultaneously closing my eyes and drawing a deep breath.

I knew then, that, I had allowed that moment to unfold completely. Allowed myself to receive love and truth from existence. I was experiencing without the intrusion of thought! I was conversing with existence’s deeper layers – in ‘that-present-moment.’

For the next few minutes, whatever I perceived, felt divine. The colours turned vivid: white stripes on the tar, yellow on the traffic lights, clothes on loiterers, hues on signboards, and plain blue of the sky! I lifted my chin and allowed my vision to sink into its substance. Crisp and uniform, the sky, vast and blue, held me! Everything seemed to fade in the background and whatever did stay, felt merry. The honks, chatters, clanks, buzzes, and bangs, synchronized into a dim tune, not just tolerable, but favourable to that moment. It was not an alchemy (of converting noise into music), but a feeling from accepting the present moment completely, as it was.

The vastness of the blue sky held me! Held me completely off-guard! Its simplicity surpassed every complicated mesh of barriers I had draped on myself – that which had stopped me from seeing it so directly, so astutely. The blueness of the vast sky held me! Only the process of seeing (without any object, form, or substance to see it), remained. The seer faded, just "watching” remained.

The change I felt in my body, was much palpable (Like how easy it is, for us, to notice the change in the temperature, rather than guessing exact measures).

Windows to my soul had opened. I had pondered how I always misunderstood everything – both about the world and myself. Realized all the knowledge, the problems, the pain, the suffering, and the utter mirage I had weaved together, where I always resided in, were untrue. I could see the futility of all that I had allowed to impose on myself.

An epiphany unveiled: The world is like a coin with two sides, telling two different stories. One is real, and the other is the real-real. And the understanding, if allowed to deepen, dismantles this illusion of duality as well. But this disillusionment needs the vast sky and its blue substance.

I walked in this feeling to my apartment building. Like every day, I walked on the flawlessly paved footpath, beside a strip of linearly planted trees. But something was different. The vision stayed vivid, the earth felt more grounding, and the rustles seemed animating gracefully. The birds tweeted mesmerizingly, as if they had perched over my shoulders, to sing directly into my ears.

I was not daydreaming. That moment was instilling breath and life to every nook of my body!

A few minutes passed and after I walked through the main doors of my apartment building, the moment got washed over. But a feeling of lightness stayed. I felt at ease, all through the rest of the day.

I wish such a realization occur to us all. I trust that, with awareness, our human race can again evolve – but in its consciousness – to a place of deep compassion and celebration. In these times of overpopulation, climate change, depletion of resources, destruction of nature, and deterioration of the ‘quality of lives’ we live, I trust we overcome it all, and free ourselves from what all splits us into parts...

Ever since this awakening, I don’t fail to recall and relate to, how ‘The sky, vast and blue, [once] held me!’