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| Majestic Mountain Lake by Bob Ross |
There is a land, somewhere in my imagination.
It is beautiful; it has lakes, mountains, and forests.
In this land, many lived. The inhabitants of this land were divided; each group occupied a different part of the land, and no one left the place where they thought - or rather knew- they belonged. They never considered leaving, and so they lived and died, in their separate parts of the land.
They lived and died, and never knew what they were missing out on; the beauty of the place they lived in.
Those in the forests lived among the trees. Embraced by tall tightly packed trees, that allowed only the rays of the sun to come in, and brighten up their days. Those people never saw the majestic sun as it rose every morning, to warm up the earth and bring forth a new day, a new beginning. They never saw the sunset either; they never saw the way the sun said goodbye, and the way the sky's heart bruised every single time the sun kissed it farewell, and how no amount of reassuring could stop the sky from bleeding out in colors. They never heard the sun promise: "I'll be back tomorrow" as the sky let it go gracefully, waiting patiently for it to come back in a few hours.
Those in the mountains lived in the cold snow, but they never saw the forests, they never saw the beautiful colors of the forest flowers, the way the trees never give up in trying to reach the sky, so hopeful, always aiming to go higher, and the way the branches stretched out like arms, up to the sky praying for the sun to come, for the rain to pour down.
Those by the lakes lived by the water, but they never got the chance to the see the world from above, from the mountain tops, and never were they embraced by the trees, and welcomed into the forests. They never saw how glorious the mountain tops looked when they put on their white gowns, trying to charm the stars and make them fall in love, while the moon glowed making every mountain top jealous.
But then there were those who did not belong. They didn't live on the mountain tops, or in the forests, or by the lakes. They did not belong, and they did not want to belong, for they were wanderers. No place was big enough to contain their adventurous souls.
The wanderers felt lost most of the time. Lost but free, or rather lost and free; free from the chains of certainty. They did not know where they should be; and figured that maybe they should be everywhere. They enjoyed being lost, for it was their motivation for seeking more. They liked not knowing; for it was their uncertainty that led them to different places, different parts of the land. They wanted to see it all. They wanted to walk down every path, and see the land from every place they could. They wanted to be part of the mountains, the forests, and the lakes, and they were; everywhere they went, they made it feel like home.
They saw the birds, they were embraced by the forests, welcomed by the lakes, and danced on the mountain tops. Their hearts were brave; they had no roots to hold them to the ground, but they still ventured. They explored the land, every corner of it. They ran between the mountains, into the forests and jumped into the lakes.
The wanderers were like feathers, they went with the wind, wherever the wind took them. They refused to be tied down, and flew all around. Lost, they wandered, and the more they wandered, the more they found. They learnt the secrets of the skies, of the forests, the mountains, the lakes, and of their souls. That was all they wanted; they did not need the security of belonging. They lingered in the joy of being astray. They were lost, and alone, but they were together in their lost loneliness. They recognized each other, even walked together sometimes. They were simple, and pure; as if freshly born every day, and they knew that this was what life was about.
That is the story of the land, somewhere in my imagination.
Now let me tell you the story, or at least part of the story of another land; the land we live in.
There is a land, where we live, somewhere in the universe.
These people have chosen different beliefs, and each group defends its own belief, as if it were the only right way. They are people who have failed to understand one another. They have failed to see the view from one another's part of this land. They rejected all that was unfamiliar because they preferred to be secure and safe.
In this land, there are wanderers. We are neither secure nor safe, we are lost but free, or rather lost and free. We break the chains of certainty, we rid our minds of judgement, and we see life through other people's eyes. We do not have a set of beliefs which we think is better than others', and our minds are deep enough to take in all beliefs, all ideas, everything we encounter. We don't have a framework through we which see our lives or the lives of others through, but rather we see life as it is; frameless and unbound. In abandoning our limiting certainty, we leave room for possibility, and in that possibility is where miracles happen.
We want to live and die, knowing that we did not miss out on the beauty of the diverse world we live in.
We question all that is around us, we are mesmerized by the mysteries behind the simplest of occurrences. We don't choose one path, for we want to stroll down all the different ones, and we don't want to belong, because we love to wander. We love to wander, because we know; that is what life is about.
We are the wanderers. We belong to no place, and to no one. We know nothing for certain, and that is why we explore. We search for answers, in all the unfamiliar places and faces we encounter. We wander around, and we see life, we see the world, we see it all.
'Majestic Mountain Lake' whispers: Join the wanderers, for they will see it all.
