Part 12: Beyond Belonging
What we call the beginning is often the end
And to make an end is to make a beginning.
The end is where we start from.
— T.S. Elliot
According to Master Linji the miracle is not to walk on water or in thin air, but to walk on Earth. Walk in such a way that you become fully alive and joy and happiness are possible. That is the miracle that everyone can perform.
— Thich Naht Hahn
I don’t aspire to be a good man.
I aspire to be a whole man.
— Carl Jung
For me to be a saint means to be myself. Therefore the problem of sanctity and salvation is in fact the problem of finding out who I am and of discovering my true self.
― Thomas Merton
The air was so thick it clung to your skin, the kind of humidity you can practically cut with a knife.
Despite it still being early, not even 9:00 am, it was already disconcertingly hot.
This enveloping warmth acted like an ominous harbinger, reminding you that the day had barely begun, so the heat would only unapologetically and somewhat unfathomably increase.
As foreign as the sheer heat and humidity felt to my body, I nevertheless found a familiar feeling in the sensation of sand in between my toes and the sound of the salty surf rhythmically crashing.
Like many times before, I stood here on the beach at the edge of an expansive body of water. This time, however, the body of water before me was one I had never laid eyes on before: the Arabian Sea.
