The Walls Disappear: Seeing Reality As It Is

Sometimes, I use fiction to make my point. (This is one of those times.)

The jungle was thick outside the retreat center, and Miriam was having trouble deciding where the walls ended and the jungle began. Literally. It was as though she could see through the walls and yet actually see them at the same time.

She was fully aware of what was on the other side of each wall, even though technically a solid surface separated her from the outside. Nothing about what she saw or felt was familiar, and she had never felt so vulnerable or out of sorts.

Two days ago, her conception of the world had shifted dramatically, and she was trying to regain some semblance of balance. She might have suspected someone had slipped her a powerful hallucinogenic, except there was no such plant medicine that behaved this consistently or lasted this long.

Ben, the center’s founder, sat across from her. Both of them were on yoga cushions, and they had just concluded a breathwork session that Ben had hoped would offer Miriam a tool to calm herself. Her breathing was approaching normal, and that panicked look was no longer in her eyes, so he proceeded.

“Are you ready for me to suggest a possibility?” he asked.

Miriam nodded. “Yes, of course. Say anything you think might help me sort this out.”

Ben smiled warmly and began.

“You told me that years ago you took an aptitude test that revealed you have very strong structural visualization abilities. Basically, you can turn things upside-down and backwards in your mind.”

Miriam nodded.

“But you also say that you don’t literally picture things in your mind—that when asked to visualize something, your experience is more like using words and logic to manipulate a theoretical possibility.”

Miriam nodded again. “I seldom see things in my mind’s eye. I have almost no visual memory; I can’t look at an object, then look away and sketch it. For years, I thought I couldn’t picture objects at all, except that occasionally, in a dream, I’d realize I was visualizing a scene in remarkable detail.”

“So… when you are asked to turn an object over in your mind…” Ben prompted.

“I figure out how the shape would manifest turned 180 degrees. It’s more like a calculation—or perhaps a wireframe—than an actual object.”

“Did you ever think that was… unusual?” asked Ben. “That you test high on this skill and yet don’t actually have the basic skill one would assume underlies it?”

Miriam smiled for the first time in two days. “Hell, yes! It’s crazy.”

“Perfect. Now let’s go back to your transformative moment. Tell me again what happened.”

Miriam hesitated. “You mean, before the floor fell out from under me?”

Ben smiled. “Yes. Do you remember what happened right before that moment?”

“I do,” Miriam said quietly.

She began. “I was lying on the cushions in front of the fire, and it seemed like the flames were burning in slow motion. My eyes kept getting drawn to the intricate metal symbol mounted above the fire. The combination of the flickering light and the interwoven metal shapes entranced me. Different parts of the symbol would illuminate as the fire slowly shifted shapes.

“The thought manifested in my mind that we’re always filtering reality—that what we see is just a fraction of what we are capable of seeing."

“Almost immediately, I actually saw space and time differently. I had this super-cosmic view of reality in which I was sitting there looking at the room, and then the room spun partially into another dimension. It got sliced in time, and I could see all the atoms that made up the structures, as well as those inside the other people in the room. Everything.”

“How beautiful,” said Ben.

“It was beautiful at first,” agreed Miriam. “Miraculous. But it hasn’t gone away. I still see everything and everyone in the context of the galaxy, with the sun moving through space and the planet revolving around it. I still see that we’re just a bunch of loosely allocated atoms, flailing through space at tens of thousands of miles an hour relative to the context we’re in. It’s not an idea or concept; it’s literally what I see every minute of every day.”

She put her hands to her face. “It’s overwhelming. Disorienting. Too much for me to take in.”

Ben reached forward and gently touched her knee. “Let me tell you what I think is happening.”

Miriam shuddered, then took a deep breath, and then another. “Okay,” she said.

“You have the ability to see an aspect of reality that most of us have forgotten how to see. For the entirety of your life so far, you weren’t developmentally ready to handle this ability, so your mind, body, or soul screened it from you.

“The big clue is that you tested so high for structural visualization but couldn’t picture common objects in your mind’s eye. That’s your protective instinct at work.”

“Hell of a job it’s doing this week,” Miriam said with a sharp tone in her voice.

“That’s because you are growing and evolving. You’ve spent years learning how to sit in stillness, to be fully present, and to connect with nature. You have jettisoned outdated fears and limiting beliefs.”

He was right. She had journeyed around the world searching for answers, looking externally: this religion or that one, in the mountains or out in the desert. This was probably her 30th or 40th retreat; she had lost count. What was the common theme across so much travel? It was always a search ‘out there’ for answers. She had utterly missed the obvious clue of having an incredible visual skill while lacking the basic and essential skill underneath it.

“Miriam, look at me.”

She did.

“You’re ready for this. That’s not my judgment. That’s the judgment of a much clearer and more perceptive intelligence. You’re not hallucinating or disoriented. To the contrary, you have never seen reality more clearly,” Ben explained.

This caught her attention. For nearly 50 hours, she had felt like she was spinning out of control. That feeling lessened. She started to settle—not fully, but to a healthy degree.

“You think this is a blessing? A door that’s opening for me?” she asked.

“I do,” said Ben.

She looked around. She could see the loving energy pouring out of Ben and surrounding her. Looking at the walls and floor, she understood where the structures were weak or strong. Without any thought whatsoever, she knew where the sun and each planet were at this precise moment. In a similar manner, she knew where each of the 12 other retreat participants were.

Miriam smiled. She looked at Ben. “You’re saying I should stop trying to blink this away, and instead play with my new abilities until I understand the best ways to use them.”

Ben had a huge smile on his face.

“Yes! Absolutely. You have been on this path for a long time, and you are starting to have wonders revealed to you. I hope this fills you with joy—to awaken in such a miraculous way.”

At long last, Miriam settled. She smiled, and her eyes smiled, too.

“One more thing, Miriam,” added Ben.

“Yes?”

“I am so incredibly curious what you are going to help us to see.”

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