illusion illumined

These two months have been a fascinating time to me. I prayed, raised questions, took small steps of expressing myself in person and wrote. I did all these, a little more than before.

I learned things about myself and i'm glad for it. For there can be no knowledge if it were not given to me as rain blesses the earth, and not even because i deserved it. Very much on the contrary.

I now know, no doubt, that this is not going to be the end. The funny thing about human life and the Designer of its course is that there will be no end to discovery, even when one would like to believe, or really does believe that he has come to understand what the human life is all about. Maybe this is the reason scientists are never done needing to know more. The thirst will never end and cannot be quenched, unless by Wisdom itself, the fountain of life.

God is so vast, immense and infinite that there will be no end to getting to know Him. And i do not, in my human vanity, attempt to understand Him anymore. Would the clay ever say to its potter; "Why do you create me as such?" For as the heavens are exalted above the earth, so are my ways exalted above your ways, and my thoughts above your thougths. --Isaiah 55:9

Anyway, what i can see now is that i've been living the past 20 years of my life blinded by an illusion (which could be one out of many). I have lived by a lie so commonly told into my face i couldn't recognise it for what it is.

I've had it told to me since birth. Told to me by the media, by education, by everything i've seen and heard thus far.

This is the lie, one so easily sown and what an effective chain it has been in binding humankind; that you are alone in every single thing you go through. 

What an erroneous belief!

Countries today scream out for individualism, the media tells youngsters they need no one if they've got freedom and the education system is all about racing to the top, at the expense of everyone else and even ignoring great talents a child could have harnessed.

A pretty dangerous era. Too much noise, too many voices, too much motion.

So i fell into the trap.

For such a trap to work, of course, for such a clever trap to work, pride is its disguise.

If there's one thing i'm terribly poor at doing, it's asking for help. By what sorcery i don't know, i've come to believe that it is better to trust no one with what i myself am capable of doing.

Well this is how it begins, anyway.
Next, the pit is laid, disguised naturally by grass, twigs and what not.

I fell into the trap, too easily.

And because of the belief that i can get myself out of it (dang, shoulda known earlier it's impossible with this 5 feet height) and the belief that nobody's around (the belief of being alone) to give me a hand or heck, who'd even cared or shown compassion, i've refused to cry out for help.

If only i'd learned not to be surprised in falling and learned what's most important is completing the journey.

Thus i remained stuck for years, clawing and writhing in despair, only to find no way out.

And because i remained stuck in a pit i've failed to recognise as such, i have come to a warped conclusion that it makes me a terrible person, maybe somewhat useless even.

It takes a lifetime to learn to cry out, to abandon all pride and pretense, to recognise that this self- effort is futile and to pray that someone out there will just listen, look beyond those grass and twigs and pull me out of this endless pit.

That's when i saw a nail- pierced hand reach down to pull me back up to the ground.

You may not believe me, but really, it's the only way a person can save himself from himself.

And perhaps the next time a pit were in the way, one would be able to learn to walk about it instead of falling into it.