Tired after a long day’s work, I decided to go for a run that I would forever remember and treasure.

As I played an upbeat new running playlist and ran along the Bay by my apartment, something felt radically different. “Present Moment” is tattooed on my wrist, and we have all read about the joys of being present and what No-mind should feel like. Sure, I have experienced similar magical moments, but this instance blew my mind, literally.

I caught myself smiling at strangers, but not because I tried. It just came, and I seemed to have no other expression. Smiling at a baby as he tried to sit up in the grass and fell over, at a cute dog going haywire on its owner, at a rollerblading older man who was having the time of his life, at the water and how peaceful it looked, at the song that I was listening to, at the incredibly rich and delicious little moments of life that were happening all around me.

Suddenly I felt and saw everything through heightened senses, and my mind and thoughts seemed to vanish completely. So did time and space.

I couldn’t help but reach for leaves I ran past just to touch them, as if I was feeling them for the first time.

There was only now. I was pure awareness in a body, fully present, and the droplets of bliss were so simple yet magnificently perfect, permeating one another in a constant flow of enfolding events. I was part of a play, with no interest in any particular endings or outcomes.

I was No-thing. I had no fear of the unknown or of the known, no desire to be doing anything else, or attachment to be anywhere else. It felt as if I was levitating, breathing to the rhythm of the trees and my body floating in harmony with the waves of the ocean. I marveled at the waves sinking and rising into one another. As Rumi said, “The world became too full to talk about.”

The way the sun touched my skin felt new and loving. People I passed felt like friends and a part of me. It all made sense. Love was all around me, and vibrating through my body, life was expressing itself. It was all just energy. The energy of atoms precisely organized and holding my leaping body together in the air above the pavement. The energy of all living things and elements orchestrated into forms and shapes.

With the overflow of love and joy I felt, there was no space left for anything else.

I had returned to my original state: Pure Love. Innocent, simple, humble and noticing the Love and Connectedness pulsating in Every-thing.

Everywhere I glanced, another happening revealed itself and made me smile yet again.

I felt and heard my heartbeat as every beat in the music, drinking in each moment.

Some time passed, and my thoughts returned. My mind was too small to comprehend what happened, it just wanted labels and definitions, so I laughed again.

Then cried all the way home in gratitude.

If we can let experiences like these fuel us, there will be less hate, war and separation.

Let’s build the world we want, instead of destroying the one we don’t.

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Apprentice Editor: Chrissy Tustison / Editor: Renee Picard

Photo: via Flickr