We go to the water to drain away our stress. We go to the water to drain away our worries. We go to the water to give it all to the great power of the universe, to be with the sublime beauty, and to know the silence within us.
That’s what my friend Jason and I did last weekend. We sailed in a steady, beautiful breeze coming to rest at the north end of Oak Island in the Apostle Islands. There we talked and ate in simple ways, with Jason in particular letting go the stress that comes with being a single dad and running an entrepreneurial business out of the home. Summer can be the most stressful time for single parents, so this renewal came in as just what Jason needed.
For me, these times act like energy renewals. They bring me back to contact with the divine energy that lives inside each of us. Indeed, these moments are the divinity. They are our chance to experience the eternal within us. And in those ways, they remind us of that same sacredness that lives in all people, but especially within ourselves. We shed the should. We shed the stress. And right there, among and within it all, the numinous god arises. That bolt of sunshine in the photo takes your breath away. You may not know with what, but you know you are one with something.
I think this is why people come to the islands and Lake Superior. Yes, there are guides and information and tours and interesting history to learn. We learn and we recite. But isn’t it true that the real reason we do this… the real reason people go to nature… is to taste what we think God might be like within ourselves? Whatever the answer may be for others, this is what it was for me this time.
Anthony Signorelli