Pizzinat_042Twenty years ago, I went through an incredibly cathartic spiritual awakening. For weeks I was walking around completely blissed out in the energy of unfathomable and infinite love. My whole reality had shifted.

I was loved, protected, and a part of an infinitely caring intelligence. I felt it in every cell of my body. I knew that where I was every single moment, and who I was in that moment, was incredibly perfect and loved.

Looking back, I can perhaps best describe this experience as somewhat similar to individuals’ near-death experiences, where they speak of coming face-to-face with God, Christ, or whatever that loving light represents for them, and they feel the majesty of it. That experience alters us forever; it rocks our world in the most incredible kind of way. With that unexplainably awesome union with sacredness, all answers to all questions come generously and instantly.

One experiences a “knowing” and a feeling of absolute wholeness.

This energy coursed through my body and felt sublime… powerful, yet incredibly gentle and loving. I understand why the sages sometimes speak about it as “tasting the nectar of God” and how, with a soulful yearning, individuals seek to return to it again and again.

Things that seemed insignificant before, such as the incredible detail of a tiny flower, could easily move me to tearful joy and gratitude. There are no words to properly describe the depth of the beauty I felt during this time. Perhaps “infinite reverence for all of life” touches into and attempts to convey the experience.

One afternoon, a few weeks after this wonderful awakening, a friend of mine gave me a hug. With me being 6′ 3″, her head nestled comfortably under my chin, her cheek to my chest. Within a few seconds, she suddenly broke contact, and looked at me with a startled expression. She asked, “What’s that noise?” She looked around the room for a few seconds, teasing her ear in different directions, eventually ending up back at my chest. “You’re making a noise!! She protested. What the f#@%?!?!”

I had to smile. I knew I was vibrating like a maniac. The sensation was enthralling. I was literally feeling like one of the small strings on a harp, plucked by a master musician.

The instrument was my consciousness and the note was complete and infinite love. I always knew this note, it felt like HOME, yet I had never actually been able to play it before, not like this. Not with such artistry. It was as if every cell in my body, every atom, inside was singing.

This artist played me with such beauty and depth that when I finally slowed down, weeks later, I yearned and pleaded with her to pick me up and play me again with such love!

“Now it’s your turn,” the artist told me. “Time to practice and hone your skills. You will learn to play yourself, for I am you and you are me.”

Although the strength of this experience lessened over the next 4-6 weeks, the door remained open—the portal to our true selves . . . lovingly beckoning us in at all times.  And through desire and practice we get to return again and again, mastering the ability to anchor ourselves there.

My mission is to live more and more from this place inside, while serving others on their journey to do the same.