Spiritual Awakening on a Holiday

by Frank M. Wanderer

Being on a holiday is a great time for most people. The permanent obligation to meet expectations ceases for a while, we are relieved, and we fell that a vacant place is created around us. We do with our time what we want, there is nor reason to hurry. We can stay home, or go on a trip if we wish.

If we decide to stay at home, we may lie in our bed in the morning and watch the sunshine through the window. If we do not feel like waking up, no problem, we are on holiday, we may stay in bed the whole morning if we wish. We can spend our time leisurely, we can listen to music or watch a film. We are satisfied, and at present we want nothing more from life.

When we get bored of idling around, we may collect ideas for spending the free days ahead of us. At last, we are going to have enough time to read the books and watch the films we have been planning for weeks, but never had the time, because all our time was occupied by our work or family.

We are also going to have some time to stray aimlessly in the city, chat with acquaintances, recalling times long past.

If we do not want to stay at home, we may go for a trip for a few days. We may start planning with excitement as early as months earlier, looking for the best destination. When the day of departure has come, we anxiously look forward to the journey. During the trip we look at new lands, cultures and people. We absorb the new experiences with all our senses, and enjoy how wonderful the world around us is.

It is Good to be Alive

During our holiday–no matter whether we spend it at home or traveling around the world–we fell that we are alive, our life has a weight, a scent. The burdens of the bleak workdays are gone, left behind. The world is alive, pulsating around us, and we are amazed to realize, how wonderful it is to be alive. We believe that we are only alive Now.

We submit to the moment, sitting in our favorite armchair or lie on the beach, listening to the noises of our environment, enjoy the rest, the sunshine and fresh air. Both past and future are far away from us, only the present moment matters. As if a heavy curtain would have been drawn away in front of our eyes; now everything is more vivid and brighter around us. We feel that we are alive, and it is good to be alive. The Miracle of Life almost completely fills our soul. Why could not it stay that way for ever?

An Increasing Feeling of Want

After a few days pass in this undisturbed happiness, everything changes almost unnoticeably. We have read the books, seen the films we wanted to, we walked around the city and met again old friends. If we are on a trip, we begin to feel that we are fed up with strange people and food with strange tastes.

We more and more often think of being at home, in our accustomed environment, sitting comfortably in our favorite armchair, watching our favorite soap opera. We think more and more of our duties to be accomplished the following week, and we recall the unsolved problems of the past every now and then. In this way the world around us will become gray again, almost unnoticeably, and we start to function again according to our old mental patterns programmed into us.

An acute sense of want appears in us gradually, and we begin to feel that our life is incomplete for some reason. Not even the holiday is what it used to be. What happened to the world, what happened to us, what is out of place in our life? Why are we unable to enjoy the small amount of time that is left of our holiday?

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