Watching the Sunrise on the beach, what a spiritual experience

When things are going on in my life I like to go to the beach at 4:30 am or so and watch the entire process of the sun coming up. I am lucky, I live close to the Atlantic ocean and it affords me a wonderful place to reflect and contemplate the challenges of life. I have watched the sunrise like this in places all up and down the east coast of the United States, in Brazil, in Turkey and Italy looking over the Mediterranean sea. I have watched the Sunrise from countless Caribbean islands as well, Puerto Rico, Cuba, Jamaica, Barbados and even from Trinidad and after a tiny boat ride from Tobago as well. I have even gone to the west of Kiser lake and watched the sun rise, for those who know Kiser lake you know, for those who don’t you probably never will. The results are the same no matter the place, it is a spiritual experience for me. Not a religious experience because I am not a religious person in the traditional sense, but a spiritual experience.

When I am close to the water, especially a tidal body of water, and start from pitch black to sunrise, it reminds me how inconsequential I am, in the grand scheme (whatever that may mean to you). By making me feel insignificantly small it also tends to blend any problems I may be facing into irrelevancy. When you compare anything in this material world to the majesty of taking the 2 hours to watch the sun come up you will quickly learn no matter how big your problems might seem, they just ain’t all that. This has helped me throughout my adult life put things into perspective, from early girlfriend problems up to the recent death of my mother. I look at the sunrise everyday almost like I look at the duck billed platypus, as sure proof there is a higher purpose (God if you will) and in the platypus’s case that there is a great sense of humor there.

My profile picture on Face Book is a picture I took a couple of years ago when a friend was going through a very tough spot in his life and came from Ohio to Florida to visit, he had never seen the ocean. What better way to show someone the ocean for the first time than to start out at 4:30 in the morning and watch the sun come up. We went out there I think 5 days in a row to watch, I truly felt it helped him to put the challenges life presented him into perspective. I spent a lot of time this week at the beach watching the sun come up. The first day I was on my way and before I could get there, my jalopy broke down, now this was before 5am and I will have you know two guys came out of nowhere and helped me push it into a parking lot. I saw it as a sign, I was meant to be at the beach. I thought I will work for a couple of minutes to see what the problem was and then I was going to walk the last stretch with my lawn chair (the sand is damp and cold) and worry about my car later. Luckily it was a simple fix, a wire to the distributor shorted against the block, when one drives a 51 year old car every day he keeps tools and repair parts in the car. In a few minutes I was at the beach dragging my chair into the sand.

It is impossible to describe the event, and it happens every day no matter where you are. It is spectacular when viewed across a bean field or a tiny city back yard but over the ocean is at the top of the list for me. The week of Sunrises has allowed me to reconcile recent events in my life and come to peace with my decisions.

Since I cannot describe the experience here is but a taste of what it looked like.



How do you contemplate the issues of your life?