JASON ARTHUR BOWMAN
I spent last weekend in Leadville, CO spectating one of the world’s most insane events, the Leadville Trail 100 Mile Ultra-Marathon. That’s right, 100 miles of running…in the highest incorporated town in the United States at over 10,000 feet above sea level. Starting at 4:00 AM in the chilling pre-dawn rocky mountains, the Leadville Trail 100 boasts one of the highest drop out rates of any race in the world. Over the course’s 100 miles and 18,591 feet of elevation gain, almost half of the race’s 650+ starters pull the plug and seek solace away from the sun drenched pounding handed down by Leadville’s unforgiving course…
Difficulty plays an important role in life on Earth. It is many things to us. Most often it is something to be avoided. At work, at home and in personal relationships it is a fragile glass teetering on the edge of an abyss. We as humans are extremely talented at avoiding discomfort. It seems as though a major motivation behind many day to day actions is to minimize the amount of difficulty we experience. At the same time though we are inescapably fascinated by it. Challenge becomes something to voyeuristically observe in the experience of others. We sit on the edge of the couch enraptured by the trials and tribulation of athletes in combat, ordinary people in the news and fictional characters in story. It is the most organic and interesting source of drama. For some reason we are both attracted and repulsed by it…
‘Please hold the handle down for a count of four.’ Thus read the sign above the toilet at The Rocky Mountain Vipassana Meditation Retreat in Elbert, Colorado. Upon first glance I had little idea what gravity I would associate with such a sign. For as it turned out, these short words were some of the very few external distractions I would have for the following ten days. More so, they slowly engrained their way into a metaphorical understanding of the most extremely intense, rewarding and earth shattering experience of my life…
The veins of a green leaf look strikingly similar to the natural forks and bends of the rivers of Earth. These observable similarities in physical systems appear to solidify the postulate that the division of space happens congruently for the infinitely small as it does for the infinitely big. In other words, all matter takes form based upon an infinite fractal scale. Interestingly, it seems as though the unseen world of consciousness mirrors this phenomenon and behaves in a similar scalar fashion. The mind can operate in a number of different perspectives and relational rubrics running the gamut from highly contracted small picture viewing to highly expanded big picture viewing. Awareness can take the shape of the leaf and the river and everything in between and beyond…