by Sharon Ray
Paramahansa Yogananda said, “Drink with the hero the good wine of virtue.” I feel that my Sunburst friends, Al and Dawn, are heroes, and that hearing their report of a recent trek into the high Sierras is drinking the good wine of the virtue courage with them. This is most apropos because we have just entered the month of Scorpio where we are studying and embodying the quality of courage, and certainly admiring it in others.
Our friends can inspire us. Dawn and Al recently took a trip to the high Sierras, and brought back photographs of God’s breathtaking creation. The vistas are so majestic that one feels a sense of deep beauty, and a longing to enter the frame. I want to enter into it because I know that looking at the photographs doesn’t compare to being there. Standing on top of a mountain, almost 10,000 feet high, and looking down into a sky blue lake of pristine water with the smell of pines all around is really special.
Banner Peak (12,942 ft.) – High Eastern Sierras
Dawn and Al have had that experience because they imagined it, then worked to earn it. Their intense love of God’s oh-so-obvious presence in the high country motivates them to go and be there. They plan in detail, prepare physically, organize their lives and gear, then pack. They drive for hours just to get to the trailhead. They carry backpacks with forty or more pounds—camera gear, and everything else needed for a week on the trail—up steep mountains and down tricky descents. They sometimes even trek over rugged terrain where there is no trail. But what a sublime reward!
I don’t want to be a couch potato. The qualities I see in these friends of mine are exactly the qualities needed to attain God-union: perseverance, the willingness to work for it, courage, passionate enthusiasm, and an intense love for the journey and the goal.
Practicing the Sunburst meditation techniques out in such pristine beauty has to be an amazing experience. At the first opportunity, I will go climb such mountains; until then, I’ll continue my inner trek. My strength is renewed by the example of my friends at Sunburst.
Dawn on the worst part of the climb on day hike of day 4. Rocks are moving and it’s steeper than it looks.
