Mystery and Mirrors

The winds were overwhelming but calming.  The periods of rain were drenching but refreshing.  The brisk air cut through your skin but awakened the very breath of life.  Standing in its midst was somehow a confrontation with truth.  

The Highlands of Scotland, with its history and mysticism, struggle for freedom, and bloodshed was one of the most peaceful places I have been.  Isolated by its barren lands yet consumed by its beauty, it was a paradox that touched me deeply.  

How could such bareness and lack of color produce such overwhelming beauty? How can a place engrossed with emptiness be overflowing with an undeniable presence?  

Standing in the Highlands felt like a moment outside of time. 

An invitation into mystery.

We all yearn for moments that transcend us into a deeper meaning of life.  These are the moments when we experience the good and beautiful in someone or something.  The moments that make us lose track of time.   

These moments seem dripping in mystery, for there is no formula for explaining beauty.  There is not an equation for understanding redemptive suffering.  There is not an explanation for those who love sacrificially.

Nevertheless, in today’s post-modern world, we seem to be losing the wonder of mystery.  The very mention of it is met with skepticism and restraint, or with great disdain and anger, or worse still, apathy.  If we can’t explain something, it simply can’t exist. 

I once heard that anxiety can be felt when we realize just how finite we are as human beings.  It comes during the spectrum of large and small moments when we face the reality of our own mortality.  In other words, we know that there is a finite time to our experiences, and it is precisely during these moments that we begin to feel anxious because we know that we don’t have control over it.  Consequently, without control, our lives can suddenly feel cold and barren…fearful and lonely—the “Highlands” of our souls.

That said, precisely at the foot of our loneliness’s barren lands, we are invited to find a transcendent presence.  When we feel the weight and bareness of our vulnerability, we are opened up to its life-breathing power.  Once we face the blistering reality of our finite being, we can look out into the beauty of the mystery of love itself.

“There is no sunlight in the poetry of exile. There is only mist, wind, rain, the cry of the curlew and the slow clouds above damp moorland. That is the real Scotland; that is the Scotland whose memory rings the withers of the far-from-home; and, in some way that is mysterious, that is the Scotland that even a stranger learns to love.

-H.V. Morton

I am grateful for the brief moments of mystery I experienced in the Highlands.  Many places such as these serve as a great reminder that mystery and the ability to lose the sense of time, that is, “heaven on earth,” surround me daily.  For example, standing in front of a masterpiece of art, or watching someone offer self-giving love towards someone else, or witnessing a beautiful sunset and/or sunrise.  

And maybe walking in front of a mirror…although that is still a work in progress.

Men go abroad to wonder at the heights of mountains, at the huge waves of the sea, at the long courses of the rivers, at the vast compass of the ocean, at the circular motions of the stars, and they pass by themselves without wondering.

-St. Augustine