I existed in an ocean of soft amber light. I was one with that ocean. Endless and at peace. Pulsating and alive with love and harmony and an effulgent joy. Bliss in being.
Then in the depths there was a stirring, a low grumbling discord, that broke out in a mad shrieking cacophony of unbelievable, unrelenting proportions and in what seemed like the blink of an eye, all light was gone and only darkness and terror remained.
And then I woke up panicked, stressed and on the verge of screaming from what was one of my main repetitive nightmares as a kid. I had that dream once more in my adult life, shortly after I started doing breathwork.
It had just been a dream. Or was it, ‘just a dream’? Was it a ‘memory’ of birth – the emergence from the womb into the world? Or was it a ‘memory’ of conception – from the world of spirit beyond mind and body into the physical world? That sense of coming from the light of consciousness into the body? And anyway, how would you know and what does it really matter?
What did matter for me is that experience of the light felt as real as my body, and the world we live in, feels now. And part of me has continuously sought to bring that experience of light and love and joy and harmony into my everyday living. Wondering how life on earth, what we do for money and work, and how we interact with our families and each other, could reflect that better.
For a long time I thought the journey was to ‘get back’ to the light and it was only recently, while sharing my story on a leadership panel, that I was able to hear something in a new way. That revelation for me was that there is no ‘going back’ there is only going forward. I’m sure that sense of needing to go back to sort something out is not unique to me but I had it pretty bad. For the first time the realization that there was no going back was a visceral sensation that brought to light, pun intended, how I’d been perceiving on a deep level, my relationship to the ‘light’. I could see that my relationship to the light had been about being separate and needing to get back to it. And, in that moment, I understood that all along it has always really been about me needing to acknowledge, appreciate and trust the presence of the light in me and in my life – now. So that in living from that place I could help to extend it.
It was a paradigm shifting moment for me. You may have heard this analogy used to describe what a paradigm shift is – A battlecruiser in a stormy ocean at 
night was faced with a blinking light on a collision course with it. The captain radio’d the source of the light and commanded it to change course. The light responded back with the exact same command. ‘I am not moving, I suggest you change course.’ Not being used to having it’s authority challenged the captain radio’d back, ‘I am the biggest battlecruiser on the ocean and lord of the seven seas and I command you to turn aside.’ The light replied with elegant simplicity, ‘I am a lighthouse. So I suggest you choose a different course soon.’ It’s my favourite analogy for describing a paradigm shift. Often we may experience a puffed up sense of importance of an idea we have, only to experience a ‘lighthouse’ moment and completely change tack, to hopefully a more life supportive one like that captain would have needed to.
I was prompted to share my story when I read this article of a renowned neuroscientist, Eben Alexander MD, who had his own lighthouse moment during a profound brain dead coma of his own: http://www.thedailybeast.
Here’s a video clip of him sharing his story : [youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZN8bsq2Ic-4[/youtube]
And you can read more on his website: http://www.lifebeyonddeath.
Could it be that society as a whole may be on the verge of it’s own ‘lighthouse’ moment about life?
What about you?
Have you had any lighthouse moments with the light? I’d love you to share them below and what they have meant for you.