In '94, wintering on a tiny island off Alabama, I became deeply depressed and frustrated, wondering what my soul purpose was…a type of dark night of the soul, so to speak. Earlier, a friend sent me a book on 'contacting your angels', and I'd worked with the meditations all winter, not receiving a single peep out of them. I went to walk the beach. It was a wet and windy, cold and nasty day. I kept saying over and over again, "Talk to me guys. Tell me what I'm here for. Tell me what the purpose of my life is." I repeated these mantras as I trudged through the blowing sand, shivering in the patches of swirling mist. I knew I was living thru transitional times for the Earth, times of enormous change and evolutionary leaps. I always thought I existed for a reason; something to do with this emerging new existence here on earth, but it remained a vague, nebulous feeling. I hadn't discovered the actual, purposeful reason yet. When hiking, I carried a plastic bag to pick up trash with, and some days it seemed my only purpose on earth: to pick up the trash other humans left behind. Someone had built a campfire on the beach and started it with newspaper. Big, wet, nasty clumps of paper lay scattered here and there, and drier pages flew all around. I picked everything up and trudged on, disgusted with my own spiritual growth, and as I picked up dirty diapers, beer bottles and one used condom, disgusted with my fellow human beings. On my way home, (still not a peep from any angels), I spotted one small piece of newspaper flying in the wind. Determined at least to do my garbage duty well, I chased it — quite a long ways — down the beach. I finally nabbed the sorry sucker just before a wave swept it out to sea. It turned out to be a piece of newspaper, burnt all around the edges. When I turned it over, my mouth dropped open. There was a little cartoon, perfectly intact, perfectly burnt only round the edges, with the words: "You can stand by and watch it emerge, or, you can help paint it." Wow. I started to cry. To me, it meant that this new 'age' is coming regardless of me or whether I do great things with my life. It is coming. And I was invited…to help paint a new picture of this world, or, if I preferred, I could just stand by and watch it all happen. I don't know if this makes any sense at all to any one but me, but it lifted a huge weight off my shoulders... I felt calmed and comforted, and my depression blew away with the Alabama winter wind. Streaks of light appeared within my inner sky, and dawn finally began, ending my dark night.I still have the little cartoon, have carried it with me all these years, and when I become bummed at not BEing anything, for not knowing my 'soul purpose', I look at it. It hangs just to the right of my computer monitor these days and I glance there each morning before I begin my work.I'd like to thank all the heavy-hitters who are helping to paint 'it'. I'd like to thank whatever angel blew that cartoon into my path. On those days when I know the only thing I can do is stand by and watch 'it' emerge, that little message from the windy beach grants me enormous peace.
