Searching For Infinity
When the snow gets slushy in the afternoon it will catch on my skis as I start gaining speed. The whistle of wind rushing by my helmet is another reminder of the potential to accelerate or even jump, as well as the presence of danger.
Thinking back to some of my earliest childhood memories, I realize that I learned to live like I learned to ski: informed by the sensations more than the experiences themselves. I vividly recollect the exhilaration of building speed down a hill and taking off from the snow to get air. It is just as easy to remember the blood-draining anticipation of missing a turn and losing all control. I have noticed that these same extreme but undefinable feelings are the same reactions I have to other extraordinary experiences in my life. Being suspended in midair, I forget not only about the windburn on my face and the numbness in my hands but almost everything about who I am. I am in the face of something so strikingly vast in time, scope, and power.
Most people, regardless of their stated religion, will tell you that their spirituality is defined by a belief in “something greater” or the pursuit of enlightenment. Many of these people spend their entire lives discovering and practicing whatever induces awe. In my own endeavor to uncover the “higher meaning” of my existence, I have realized that the experience of awe is brief and fleeting; so brief in fact, that it may be over before I know it even happened. I sometimes feel that I am without value or purpose when I cannot find anything to be inspired by in life. Now I think that this inspiration cannot be searched for and instead is usually stumbled upon. In the midst of college applications and the introspection required to complete them, I have been trying to pinpoint what in day to day life will produce the sense of awe I have felt so briefly in skiing and what would extend it to other parts of my life. This, I believe, could very well be described as “my calling”.
After recognizing this sensation skiing as a child, I cherish the feeling of oneness when I can find it. When I am truly in awe of something, I get to dwell on that point of singularity for a bit longer than my moment of being suspended in mid-air. The problem is getting to that jump. Maybe one day I will “discover my passion” and my own sense of wonder. Until then I will keep learning new paths to ski down the mountain and find the jump and that is itself my spirituality.
