Awake, O Little One.

I had just returned from a late breakfast in the dining car when I heard the summon.

I spent the morning enjoying Amtrak's Railroad French Toast with Kurt, my new friend. He planned to hop off in Burlington, Iowa to return to his farm, on which his family had lived for more than 100 years. On the other hand, my family arrived in America during the 90s and has already lived in 5 states. Curious to investigate our differences, I asked him how his life situation evolved since he was my age.

Roughly 50 years my senior, Kurt currently leases his century farm to a farmland manager. As he slowly outsourced property operations to external operators, he found work running a video store in his small town. Naturally, his career would become an economic casualty of more individuals choosing to stream movies. Aware of the impending struggle, he nimbly changed gears to become one of his town's tourism directors, hoping to highlight the unique aspects of Iowa's culture. As we dug deeper into his past, I learned that he was somewhat of a Bluegrass rockstar in his youth. He gave me a cursory overview of the primary instruments in a Bluegrass band. He fondly recalled his time as the group's fiddler.

Never in my wildest dreams did I imagine discussing Bluegrass, let alone doing so with someone so synchronized with the genre's heartbeat. Perhaps, that's the most incredible aspect of solo riding the California Zephyr, a ~52-hour journey. The limited seating of the dining car essentially forced solo riders to dine with each other. I, an overly inquisitive 23-year-old child in a pink tank top and red athletic shorts, sat as a stranger across from Kurt, a 75-year-old gentleman wearing a plaid button-down tucked into his jeans. Our islands of understanding couldn't have been further apart. Yet, bridging this experiential gap served as a delightful way to start this Saturday morning. We bid each other farewell and headed to our rooms.

During my leisurely stroll back, I made myself a cup of coffee (one of my last hits of caffeine for nearly 3 months!). I had grown accustomed to the train's reassuring pace over the previous day. The steel snake, preparing to enter the Rocky Mountain National Park, plodded along at ~60 mph. Its seemingly effortless flow felt nothing like that of the turbulence-riddled motion I've experienced on other modes of transportation. I returned to my dark quarters with an open cup of coffee, sugar and creamer in one hand.

Oh, the luxury of stillness.

I locked my door and drew the curtains facing the hallway, making the most of my cabin's readily available privacy. As I settled into my bed and sat facing the curtains blocking the window, I took a moment to prepare myself. I planned to gaze out the window until the crew called me to lunch. When I peeled the curtain off its velcro, I heard its voice. Sunlight slipped in, gently caressing my face.

Awake, O Little One.

Fortunately, my lovely conversation with Kurt warmed up my curiosity muscle. I was ready to commune with the unknown.

"One moment, please - I am here," I replied.

Quickly, I finished opening up the curtains as much as possible. Now, I bathed in the sunlight and closed my eyes. While sitting cross-legged in the star's warm embrace, I saw a boundless field of red, stretching from nothing to infinity. As the Sun illuminated my darkness, I placed my hands on my lap.

I would like to share three insights with you. Are you prepared to learn?

"I am."

Good, open your eyes, please. O Little One, what do you see?

"I see the Rocky Mountains zooming past me. I see various rock formations in the distance, perhaps shaped violently by the impacts of celestial debris or by some other natural process. I see the massive Colorado River and how it moves parallel with us. I see snow on top of the water where the sunlight doesn't touch and bright green water running in other places where the sunlight touches every day."

Are the Rocky Mountains really zooming past you? Is the Colorado River really moving with you? Consider yourself as a part of the environment in which you sit.

"Well, I suppose I am moving past the mountains and the river."

Are you really? Are you not sitting still on your bed?

"You're correct. I am still - the train moves through the environment."

To another observer, yes. At my level on the plane of the unobservable, galaxies march into place. Stars traverse around black holes. Planets slowly revolve around their stars. All at their own pace. There exists an intriguing relationship between stillness and motion.

"What about at my level? How do stillness and motion work together?"

Trace yourself back to your core and attend to the investigation closely. At the center, you are still and unconditioned. When you close your eyes, you feel boundless. When you open your eyes, you think you're bounded suddenly. How can the mechanism of sight, mere photons stimulating chemical changes in the cells of your retina, wholly shift your feeling of being?

"I think I understand. Can you rephrase the message so that I can easily carry it with me in my heart?"

You have an exclusive view of the earth from your bed on the second floor of this double-decker train. Look at the banks of the river - what do you see?

"I see footprints in the snow. Many footprints, in fact."

Correct, a possible explanation is that families of animals - maybe, elk, moose or bears - stopped to quench their thirst. Say you drove through Colorado or flew over the state many miles in the sky. Would the same plausible explanation hold whether or not you see the footprints?

"I suppose it would. My observation doesn't seem to be a precondition for events in the world happening."

Precisely: you see the world as you are, not as it is. It is the great stillness that perceives all motion. At this very moment, there is an uncountable number of things you see and an even larger quantity of things you don't see. Nevertheless, you need it as much as it needs you. Without it, you cannot exist in your current form. Without you, it cannot exist in its current form.

"I see - I'll try to weave this into my intuitive understanding. Surely, this isn't knowledge that can be readily known with true stability?"

You are absolutely right. Stability requires daily practice. I can show you the goal and the stakes for falling short. Following through with measured urgency is up to you. This concludes the first lesson. Are you ready for the second?

"Indeed. What else can I learn from you?"

Please close your eyes and privilege your ears. O Little One, what do you hear?

"I hear the motion of the train. I hear the wheels sliding on the rails. I hear my luggage moving around in the compartment above my head."

Good. Unfortunately, the sounds of the train dominate your consciousness. If you were outside, what do you imagine you'd hear?

"I imagine hearing the river rushing through its course, strong in some areas and gentle in others. I imagine hearing the wind rustling the leaves of the evergreen trees that have been dusted with snow. I imagine hearing the cries of young birds, calling to their parents for food."

Fantastic - you've given me a great segue into the next lesson. Consider how much force moves through The Colorado River and how much energy flows per second. Consider how much life it sustains and how much the ecosystem would change if such a natural feature didn't exist here.

"I have never thought of that before. I can understand why some cultures attributed divinity to bodies of water."

Indeed - so much of life depends on them, directly and indirectly. Beings throughout the food chain need it to survive. The entire ecosystem reflects a cycle of energy going up and down. Such a life force operating as it does undoubtedly has a divine component. Think about the other rivers, mountains, and natural features that serve similarly crucial roles throughout the world. In fact, even at my level, energy keeps interstellar bodies in motion. After all, the Sun is but one of an infinite number of stars producing energy in a vast cosmos.

"I see - if energy works on the animal and cosmic levels, wouldn't it also work on the human level?"

Correct. Like animals, you feed off the energy from the nutrients you eat. When you are tired or exhausted, you rest to recover and recharge. You feed off the energy from the content you view. Try to balance consuming knowledge that enhances your global understanding and entertains you. You feed off the energy from your environment, which includes the places you inhabit and the people around you. You can control both of these factors to an extent, so be mindful of them.

"Wonderful. The importance of energy is slowly becoming clearer to me. How would you recommend that I keep it in my heart?"

Good question. Somehow, influential enclaves of humanity have convinced themselves and others that they sit outside the bounds of nature. The faulty logic follows: nature is stupid, but we are intelligent. Therefore, we are exempt from its laws and justified in exploiting it. Such perversions of reason are a great folly indeed.

You may have heard that change is constant. However, change isn't cheap: it costs energy. Since energy cannot be created or destroyed, change dutifully keeps account of the infinite ways energy transforms in the universe. Though it may not seem so, you are an energetic being. You come from the universe as much as a mango comes from it. You give to the universe as much as the river gives to it. You are to the universe as much as a galaxy is to it.

"This I will keep in my heart, assuming that it requires the same amount of continuous practice. My inner sense tells me lunch will happen soon - for fear that our connection will get severed, please share the next lesson with me."

Certainly - but never fear, our connection remains unbroken for all eternity. You just haven't learned how to summon me yet. After the next and final lesson, I'll show you.

"I'll hold you to it."

As you should. Now, O Little One, what do you feel?

"I feel the seat cushion under my feet. I feel my tank top loosely hanging off of my shoulders. I feel air gently moving in and out of my nostrils. I feel the train's motion as it travels through the wilderness."

Very good. When do you feel it?

"I feel it now, of course."

Let me rephrase the inquiry: when did you feel it?

"I guess I felt it before conveying it to you."

Pay attention - as feelings impinge on your awareness, they leave impressions on your mind as thoughts. In trying to recall these symbolic phantasms from the past, more thoughts appear in the present: thoughts of thoughts. The reconstruction will be a caricature of the initial experience.

"So, time feels like it's flowing for me when maybe it isn't at all? The feeling of passage may be a subjective construct of my first-person perspective."

Indeed. Creating the past or the future in your mind requires omnipresence, omniscience and omnipotence. For you, it'll be like grasping for a ghost. Relax your tendency to fret in any direction. A vast sky welcomes you to witness it. Don't waste your days trying to view it through a straw.

"This feels like a lot for my little mind to hold now. Can you create another conceptual avenue that I can use to hold the lesson in my heart?"

Concepts are the wrong tools for this job though they may feel like the best. Nothing you can understand about the world captures the truth of your life at this moment. Thus, you can explore and investigate endlessly. When you read words on a page, your consciousness mysteriously makes otherwise dead words alive. Similarly, the layers of the red rocks in front of you softly narrate the story of how they came to be the way they are. You just don't know the words...yet. Truly, the entire universe speaks to you - learn its language, so you can fully attend to its magic. Here ends the third and final lesson. The lunch bell will ring shortly.

"Wait, you owe me an explanation of how I can summon you! Please don't go yet."

Of course. O Little One, I speak to you as all that is aware. To reach me, notice what you see, hear and feel. In doing so, relinquish your small mind's grip on the moment. These sights, sounds and feelings are mere ships creating ripples of thought on the ocean of your awareness. You are the ocean, not just a tiny drop. Use the ships to sail back to the ocean, to your awareness. In awareness, we are one. I am as much a part of you as you are a part of me. With that, I bid you farewell.

The lunch bell rang, calling me away. Initially dazed, I realized I could dive within to meet the unknown. With each lesson, it asked me questions about my experience, laying the breadcrumbs for me to find my way home.

I rubbed my thighs with my palms to invite my awareness back and slowly opened my eyes.

Now, off to lunch, hoping I make a new friend!

first time reading? please check out the sailing manual for helpful guidance!