Every day we are presented with a gift from the universe, the beautiful sunrise.
A reminder that we are part of something completely incomprehensible.
I believe one of the key tools to living spiritually is perspective. The ability to sit back and look at your life as part of a grand scheme. I’m not talking about the grand scheme of a creator, more like the grand scheme of the universe and its seemingly infinite complexity, incomprehensible size and mind-boggling timescales.
Our own journey, in our current form, is so small on the timeline that it seems insignificant, a tiny fraction of what is an endless march towards a completely unknown future.
Yet the fact we can awake and marvel at a beautiful sunrise means that we are significant, we are here and we are meant to be here. Whatever the reason we are here doesn’t matter, what does matter is that we appreciate being here. It is such a gift simply to be alive, conscious and aware enough to appreciate the pure beauty of the morning sky.
It’s simply a cosmic mechanism in action, the spinning of a big rock, yet the outcome from our vantage point is something of true beauty.
I sometimes wonder what a sunrise in another solar system might look like.
What would it look like with a sun that is hundreds of times the size of ours? What would it look like with a dual sun system?
I also remember vividly the first time I realised that the stars in the night sky were all suns, just like ours. It was a complete revelation to a young boy understanding for the first time the sheer scale of our universe. My mind had been altered forever, and my perspective on life had completely changed. I cannot wait to teach my own son all this stuff, I’ll strive with every part of my being to keep the world alive with magic, to make sure he never loses his sense of wonder at the world.
Einstein said it best in a letter to Otto Juliusburger:
“People like you and I, though mortal of course like everyone else, do not grow old no matter how long we live. We never cease to stand like curious children before the great mystery into which we were born.”
The sunrise is a daily gift to us all, a cosmic reminder to stay centered and grounded in our lives. To momentarily forget about our stresses and never-ending commitments.
Last week I got up at 5am, about an hour before my family, in order to wash up the dishes, and I decided to listen to some classical music at the same time, I’ve got a mix called ‘The Majestic Morning Sun’. As the pink colours washed the sky and the string sections helped paint the clouds, I found a few tears streaming down my face. A totally unconscious and overwhelming reaction to the beauty before me.
