The Man With No Direction

Atop the threshold of life’s escarpment stands a man. This man watches from the zenith, he has now found, and reels back in euphoric exhaustion at how far he has come. Encouraged by the realisation of how he got there, he reflects on everything that has led him to this point. He reckons now that where he has two feet planted was handed over to him, obtained without effort. He pats himself on the back, almost apologetically, as though he soothes a self-inflicted wound. The man coos and whispers in quietened consolation.

This epiphany was instantaneous. In his brooding, he embraces this revelation and accepts it as the truth it was. Once again, the man confirms that the paradigm shift took place when he relinquished the reliance on his own strength. After all, the indicator of this was in how freely it came. It was given to him without an exacting price. The pinnacle which asks for humility and volitional servitude. This was the only role to play to remain there.

As his reflection continues, the man notes that he has found a priceless treasure. And the treasure, this boon of solitude and answers, looked like a giant sequoia tree. And this tree overlooks a flatbed of rich vegetation, which reminds him of a garden in a great forest brimming with life, whose roots have dug deep into the soil.

From this mountain, he experiences yet another blessing: the emotional undertones of harmony.

If he were to be in your line of sight, you would see that he is feeling every emotion that washed over his person. On his face is etched a smile that radiates a profound warmth of an origin that is ethereal. To describe this would be like describing the calmness found in the meditative cells of an abbey sequestered away from the din and sin. He becomes the calmness itself, and this calmness is a house that carries the full essence of rest. The transmutation of emotions to their intended form continues. Not only does lust morph back into desire, but laziness also reverts to weariness and a call to rest. Greed no longer holds his palm like it used to; it is replaced by kind generosity. Hate vanishes immediately, blown away by the impervious strength of genuine love. The man sits in this cocoon awaiting the bloom season. This is only the beginning.

There is an ongoing, never-ending transformation inside of him towards a perfection that supplants his former emotional predilections and supersedes what is perceived to be right. His new proclivities carry him towards truer and finer expressions. Inner peace flows through him unabated. He, like the Whanganui, is a navigable river with a breathtaking view. This is no longer the man with no direction. The road to this endpoint is not easily traversed. With a broken inner compass, it is a non-starter. Yet, he stands there now. Another statistical outlier, a witness with a powerful testimony.

Before this glowing change, the man with no direction was a mountaineer of challenges. He traversed many peaks full of wrangle: impossible and mild. He climbed and climbed to no avail. The blisters in his palm? A badge of false honour. The calluses were reminders of his sweat, a note of an unfounded allegiance even though he believed otherwise. He would prove empirically that he had surmounted some of them on occasion whenever questioned. He used personal experiences as the principal body of knowledge for any kind of dialectics and came to the conclusion that “yes, I can do it. I did it on my own” was substantive evidence. And this was the problem.

This was his line of thinking. It was clear that he alone kept the fire of belief, and all others knew nothing; they knew only the tune of slaves. They sang and moved to it, forever stuck in the matrix. He was the enlightened one.

“A trust in oneself is a paradoxical conundrum” is verifiably the foundation of no direction because, on what basis are you a trustworthy source for being reliable? Conversely, in order to be a reliable source for trust, you need to try and make decisions that taper to solid outcomes, ergo, evidence. This was the same for the man as it is for all of us.

The man with no direction did not see this glaring antithesis to his founded episteme. The blind spot in his belief system brought an even greater danger – close-minded ignorance. There was no recognition of this nemesis because he had been shrouded in darkness for long, fuelled by the flames of pride.

This, mixed with a disgust, a strong hate for others whom he believed to be fools, since they could not see as he saw, led him deeper into darkness. Here, he lost his way finally. He was in and walked in darkness, not knowing where he was going. because the darkness had blinded his eyes.

All the days of his life meandered along the way when he faced situations where his way could not save him. Situations that unravelled the weakness of his object of trust: himself. Through the many gates of hellish moments and the paths of darkened wonder, he persisted and believed with deception that he wielded the answer. Look at him! Such persevering power misapplied, sadly directed at death. Even in the domino-like toppling of everything he held dear, he still dug deep as a salvo at the embers of himself. He fell and fell hard, a man stuck in the rituals of his way who had finally come to the end of himself until he had an encounter with the One who rescues.

"I met light embodied. The true light that illuminated not only the beautiful world my eyes see. Ah! Even the world where my physical eyes cannot perceive. I understood everything when I came in touch with Him, the fullness of life. Not once did I sense the brokenness of this world emanating from him, though he had the tags of someone who has walked in and experienced all of it. He spoke the truth that swallowed up everything I knew as truth. He showed me a way that eclipsed the darkness. What manner of being did I behold? I asked of His name, and with a radiant smile, He said, 'You know already.'"

The man bends to caress the flower. near his foot as he recounts his exact response to the man that asked for direction in life. He was, once, a man with no direction.