KEYS TO RECOVERY - Finding Meaning

...and when He knew for certain only drowning men could see Him, He said all men shall be sailors then until the sea shall free them... Leonard Cohen, Suzanne

I "discovered" existential philosophy in the late 1960's at the tender age of 18, starting with the work of "Beat" writers Kerouac, Ginsberg and others, I followed the thread - only half comprehending, but sensing some profound truth anyway - through Sartre and Bouvier to Camus and eventually stumbling around in Nietche, and others much too heady for my comprehension at that point. I was reading on my own, out of desperation to find some explanations for the seeming meaninglessness all around me. I all seemed very important at the time. Then came Bob Dylan and then the psychedelic mystics - I found some kindred wonderers and wanderers and life unfolded as it would.

Over the ensuing years, the “key” to life’s puzzle evaded my attempts to understand or connect with a tangible "PURPOSE" - an explanation for my own (or anyone’s) existence. Nothing I tried out - or tried on - made any difference in my life. Not devouring the writings of eastern and western enlightened ones, not the elusive “soul-mate” that perhaps would make me whole, or vivid sexual and sensual explorations, not my music, not the drugs - and certainly not the relief and welcome oblivion my loyal companion, alcohol, provided day and night . . . at least there was that!

What I sought in vain was "spiritual connection" - but I certainly would not have used the term then. But in 1978, at the age of 32, I had a personal and conscious "experience" of this connection. An abiding awareness and certainty that it did, in fact, happen has remained with me these past 30 years, and yes . . . this experience has made a profound and lasting difference in my life.

It came, unexpected, when I, now completely naked and alone, faced the bottomless “pit” – a void so black and empty that I, literally, abandoned all hope. As I leapt, hopeless and desperate, into nothingness, I knew it was all over . . . At that instant, “the void" became everything . . . connecting to me, trembling and awestruck - like an unplugged electrical appliance whose cord had somehow found and connected with a live socket! It was as if I was, literally, drowning (the great “waterboarding” known as “Surrender”!?!) and reflexively clawing for something, anything . . . to save . . . me . . . The Unknowable . . . found . . . Me . . .

"...and when He knew for certain only drowning men could see Him, He said all men shall be sailors then until the sea shall free them... "

Leonard Cohen, Suzanne