For most of my life I believed that what made me feel alive was the experience I was having, my past and its memories, my hopes and dreams for the future. Very quickly I discovered that being alive involved pain, sadness, sorrow and loss. I became acutely aware of cruelty, competition, comparison, criticism and of course the complete denial of death and dying.

I have been inspired, seen and witnessed nature in all her spectacular glory; in Zimbabwe, elephants at sunset on Lake Kariba, the mighty Victoria Falls with its veil of mist that rains gently down on visitors, the thundering of the water as it gushes down the gorge far below. The majestic mountains and their waterfalls of the Cape Province in South Africa after winter rain and snowfall. The night sky with the Milky Way clearly visible above Lake Taupo on the North Island of New Zealand and Australia seen from the air, vast deserts and spectacular coastlines.

Family, children and friends, interaction with people and activities that nurture, entertain and provide relaxation, knowledge and learning, occupations and professions, possessions and collections, titles and accolades, the latest phone, Bluetooth wireless gadget, music and theatre, art and creative expression, health and international cuisine, holidays, getaways and escapes!

Rewind, rewind, rewind, it seems that life has masqueraded in a thousand different things and experiences and I know I am very much alive but there is a quiet discontent. What of war, famine, child and slave labour, sexual abuse, habitat destruction, poverty and hunger, waste, pollution, climate change, political madness, loss of sovereignty, gender inequality and discrimination, religious intolerance, consumerism, mass production, farm factories, soil deterioration, weather manipulation, seed control and destruction, bee deaths, genetically modified organisms, propaganda and misinformation, what about all this?

I am most alive when I contemplate the Universe, when I realise that the truth of who I am resides inside my being. I can only get to this aliveness when I am quiet, in silence I discover stillness and in this moment I am truly alive! I am alive and I am all my potential and glory in this realisation and it is this state of being, my very life essence and the recognition of it that changes who I am, my words and my actions. I am already everything I need to be and by that self-discovery start to impact everything positively, it is by grace that the madness, dysfunction, the need, the desire and disharmony starts to crumble.

I am most alive when I witness it all, when I allow it all to be as it is but I choose with every moment to be fully present in a reality that is not temporary or fleeting, shallow or mind made, it is beyond form, words or explanations, it is you and I and all that is manifest and un-manifest in all possible existences across time and space and probably in multi-universes!