Clearing, The

Those were the days of a very good dream. Sanda was the daughter of a good simple man, kind and patient. In his arms—arms that stretched around the neighborhood of her life—she felt protected and safe. She spent her childhood days in a carefree manner, unspoiled and natural. She was full of humor and adventure. She imagined that she would be an adventurer one day, exploring worlds beyond her neighborhood and present imagination.

After she finished her daily tasks and her school lessons, she visited the "clearing space" on the mountain. She sat and thought about her family and mimicked their ways out of love and admiration for them. She felt a deep love and kindred spirit with her father. He understood all her feelings and showed her how to follow their wisdom. Her mother was fiery and often impatient. She could feel her mother's impatience when it took her some time to think things through before she was ready to act. Her mother amazed her. She could do many things at once, keeping track of every detail. What she liked most about her mother was her sense of humor. She could find amusement in everything, even in the mundane tasks of everyday life. Often, at mealtimes, her mother told many funny stories—telling the children that to laugh was good for the heart and digestion. Sanda kept a private book where she wrote down some of her mother's stories and added some of her own. Sometimes, she thought up a joke and practiced it at her "clearing space." She waited until her sister and brother had calmed down the cravings of their stomachs and, in between her mother's gaiety, she would spring her joke. After everyone laughed, her mother would always say, "That's another one for you." This made her feel proud and she felt that one day she would be able to tell stories with the speed and abundance that her mother did.

The days of a very good dream continued effortlessly like the harvests of plenty. Sanda always returned to the "clearing space." As her body grew and showed all the signs of young womanhood, her "clearing space" grew more precious and necessary. The changes in her were coming fast and they were often confusing to her. Some of her impulses felt strange. She looked to her father for understanding. He became uncomfortable and told her that her mother would "talk to you about all this." Her mother told her about the cycles of life and how the body changes so it can be a part of bringing forth new life. "One day," her mother told her, "you will leave this home and start your own family with a good, kind man, like I did years ago." This idea repulsed her. She wanted to be an adventurer and imagined that when she returned from her adventures for storytelling visits, her family would always be there—like the "clearing space." Her family worried about her, as she spent more and more time alone on the mountain and saw less and less of her friends.

Still, all in all, the days of the very good dream continued. Sanda's nature remained kind like her father's and her humor was refined into an art form beyond her mother's skill. She was dutiful in all her tasks but remained apart from her peer group and showed no interest in boys. One day, after a long spell at her "clearing space," she felt words being spoken into her heart. "It is time to leave. It is time to begin your adventure." With no hesitation in mind and body, she knew the heart of her—the "clearing space"—had spoken true. It was in that moment that she left her childhood behind. She did not even turn back once to hold the memory of the "clearing space" in her mind. She trusted that wherever she went she could never lose it.

She lived simply, wandering without a fixed destination. The days were hot and the shade of the night cooled her. She was content in the simplicity of walking, observing, listening. When she was hungry, she chose a piece of fruit that had fallen to the orchard floor. The only thing she ever asked for was water and it was always freely given to her. The farming country where she grew up seemed to continue endlessly into the distance and future. It was a land of bountiful nourishment. She wondered where all the people lived who ate from the thousands of trees and hundreds of square miles of vegetables. She had never seen more than thirty people congregated together, and that had been on Sundays at church.

She thought of her family from time to time, recalling a personal event from their lives together. It did not occur to her that they would be upset at her disappearance. Perhaps there was a magical protection around her that shielded her from such thoughts. Her heart embraced them, but it was also her heart that called her to this journey. She just trusted it and saw no conflict in leaving loved ones to go deeper into the heart of her adventure.

After several days, she climbed a very high hill. When she reached the peak, expecting another vista of orchards and farms, she was surprised to see thousands of buildings clustered together. She laughed to herself, thinking only trees were meant to be so close together. Her closest neighbor had been almost a mile away from her parents' house.

Approaching the city, she realized that the source of her food—the orchards—was behind her. She entered the city, hungry and alone, a young girl of fifteen years. The days of the beautiful dream of being a protected child were over.

A new dream was forming for her and she accepted it with the innocence of youth and the resolution of her adventure needs. There was so much to see, to understand, and she recorded the marvels and her adventures into the pages of experience. She was agreeable to hard work and found it working as a waitress in a coffee shop. The fast food cook liked her gentle nature and provided her with extra food. She enjoyed solitude in the nature of the city—the parks—from time to time. Sitting under a shade tree, she felt the clearing. It was the natural core of her, the sacred ritual of her life. She naively believed that everyone was intimate with the clearing. She had the intuition that all the dreams of the world were birthed from this space.

When she longed for more adventure, she moved on. She mastered many ordinary skills and always found work easily. She always worked hard and the people in her new neighborhoods thought well of her because she gave kind words to everyone. She travelled to many lands—lands where it was always hot, lands where it was always cold. She met many kinds of people, as different in appearance as in temperament. She observed all and enjoyed that the One Being had so many different faces. This was the wisdom given to her by the clearing. The days of this very good dream—of hard work, physical challenges, travel, adventure and motion—continued for many years to be the style of her life. It was inevitable that this dream too would fade and, after thousands of miles of explored territory, she came to the last place on earth.

Though this place was thousands of miles from the home of her childhood, its charms and likeness were immediately evident to her. It called to her, pulling her to rest, to experience her sweet, sweet clearing. She was exhausted from her years of travel and adventure and welcomed the clearing like the moment a dreamer falls from the world of harsh reality into the sighs of release into the inner feeling world. She had seen everything one could see and had met many natives with strange ways. She touched, became a part of everything and everyone she visited, but remained the same uncomplicated heart she had always been. "Where did all my adventures and wanderings lead me?" she asked of the rustling grasses on the slope of the mountain she laid upon. The waves of the "clearing space" rejuvenated her. The images of her family, friends she loved, places of natural beauty, smiled in her heart and floated away as the clearing went deeper into her.

A hummingbird, perched on a slender branch, watched her. He felt a longing to fly into the sleeping, aware woman and taste her sweet nectar. He did not know how to approach her, so the tiny bird fed himself with just the sight of her. Other birds felt the same allure of the sleeping, aware woman and touched earth to sing of their discovery. Melodies of rapture were composed that day, calling other creatures to come close and have their hearts filled, too.

Sanda left the world behind and cleared deeper into the origin and heart of adventure itself. Her love for all released her deeper, and the clearing covered her with its wisdom and removed the veil of its purpose. The entire world was cleansed and cleared by the purity of this woman's heart. For a moment that forever remains eternal, the world of peoples, animals, creatures, rock, sea, and sky breathed the natural breath of itSelf.

Sanda did not know how many days she passed in this way in the "clearing space," but she knew it was a matter of days, as the fresh, blossoming flowers around her were faded and the grasses were turning yellow. Her first thought was not of herself, rather it was an impulse to offer the world and all those that she loved a gift. She spoke slowly, seriously, knowing this was not a frivolous moment, but a declaration of a new adventure that would require her life to live it. "I want to give to all a very special gift, a way it can be returned to its clearing, to itself, and enjoy the marvel of diversity." The clearing will help me find a way to give this gift.

Her body called for attention. It was sore and weak from the many days without exercise and nourishment. With her remaining strength she tried to walk but collapsed, and the clearing released attention into itself once again. The "clearing space" loved her and would not let her go. Its love cleared all difference and Sanda understood her origins as her present self. The warm, summer season changed to the cool, inhaling air of the fall. The birds remained her loyal attendants and kept watch over her.

On the evening of the harvest moon, the clearing released her. It had finished its work. She was the clearing itself—the origin of all dreams—and she was also a simple heart, a woman. Her face radiated peace and sweetness but her body was close to extinction. She needed help and the clearing also provided her with it. A medicine man, searching for root medicines, found her lying on the bed of grasses with clear eyes and a smile of tenderness on her lips.

He carried her to his cottage. He fed her with rice and vegetables from his garden. He watched for signs of disease and illness but could detect none except for the sleep that called to her for almost all the hours of the day. He attended to her and wondered who she was, and where she came from. He considered that she must be having very good dreams, a smile of contentment was always on her face. The days blew into winter and Ardent saw to it that he was well supplied for the winter. After the first snow fell, Sanda was able to keep attention to her surroundings for longer periods of time. She was strong again from the food and love her attendant gave her. In the evenings, Ardent, a lover of drawing, would take to his pencils and paint and sketch her. Outwardly he knew her fine lines, coloring, form of her lips and brows well, but her inner nature was a mystery to him. She was the first person he had shared his cabin with who was quieter than he. Her quietness, he reflected, is not just the absence of activity and sound. It is a silence, a force that has the effect of silencing my own thoughts. It is clearing the debris of all my sad days. Ardent was a happy man, realizing that he had found a rare treasure in the woman Sanda.

Sanda's impulse to roam did not return. She shared the work of survival with her friend Ardent, and enjoyed his knowledge about health-producing herbs. He taught her how to draw and paint. She found a great liking for it. It helped to keep her attention focused in the world. She observed that Ardent was well liked by the local people. They came to him when their family members were ill, knowing they would receive good medicine from him. They were surprised that he had taken up with a strange foreign woman, but when they saw the love in his eyes for her, they were happy for him. It was rumored that the woman had the effect of quieting one's thoughts. Many did not know if that was a good thing or not. As the years of their very good dreams continued, they valued her medicine to soothe the mind as they valued Ardent's herbs that healed the body.

Sanda did not forget about her promise to give the world a gift. She began to see it take form in the love she felt for Ardent. Yes, it's true, mother, she thought, I will leave home and find a kind, gentle man like father. She prepared Ardent by loving him in the ways and signs of the clearing which was the expression of her own heart. He was a willing student and rarely imposed his own will on her. He was not an arrogant man and appreciated a logic more loving than his own. His love for her matured him and this love made him a special man indeed.

When Sanda saw that he was loving her in a way that one loves life itself—beyond the way an ordinary man loves a woman—she knew the fruit was ripe. She would pick it. "My dear friend Ardent," she asked of him on a hot summer eve, "would you be my husband? You have loved me and accepted me as I really am. We belong to the 'clearing space.' It is the heart of us and it calls me to bring forth a most beautiful, remarkable new life. Would you be the father of this child as you have so tenderly, with your love, cared for me?"

Ardent felt happy and blessed. He held his wife's hand and kissed her gently on the lips. "You are yourself a most remarkable and beautiful woman, so pure and innocent—any life that comes from your womb would be a gift to the world."

Yes, mother, thought Sanda. This is the natural cycle of life. My body is ready and the seed will be planted by this very ripe soul of a man.

"My husband, let us share our bodies like we have shared our food, clothes and hearts. Come, let us lay together and give ourselves to the clearing."

During Sanda's pregnancy she became firmly rooted to the earth's gravity of attending to new life. She dreamed of and watched over the child that was growing within her. The child talked to her in many ways and the strong bond between them demonstrated that the cycles of life were being honored in the sacred circle.