The soaring call

As I sit here, in this land dotted with mosques, every few hours, I hear the muezzin call. It begins low at first and then like an ocean swell that rises from somewhere deep, it quickly gains momentum and rises, a wall of sound fuelled by devotion, embodied with worship, and driven by longing.

And then a pause, dramatic in its abruptness, as if the wave was stopping to rally its forces. And then the call rising again, meandering through the pathways of the heart, wiping them clear of vestiges of doubt, filling them with love. Sweeping me along, climbing higher and higher, like as if it wanted to bridge the gap between earth and heaven, to dissolve the veil that seperates the two.

The final crescendo, knocking on those golden gates where the Spirit dwells, and then they open, those diaphanous doors, transporting me for some glorious moments into the presence of everything luminous, awe-inspiring, blessed.

Leaving me deeply and joyously grateful.

THE BEGINNING

Today is the Chinese New Year and I thought, what a propitious time to start a blog, that too one on a subject that is so close to my heart.

At the start, I must admit that this has been inspired by the TED talk by Neil Pasricha -  http://www.ted.com/talks/neil_pasricha_the_3_a_s_of_awesome.html  and by his website http://1000awesomethings.com/

 Actually the motivation was something deeper. On a particularly depressing day when all was going badly and I was kind of thrashing impotently in frustration, a small inner voice whispered, ‘count your blessings’. That made me stop in my track of spiraling gloom and cast my mind around and pick out the positives. They were like shards of light that I caught and held on to, one at a time, that pierced the darkness and which quickly blossomed into this light-filled bubble and which effortlessly lifted me out of the darkness.

So, on this blog I shall attempt to count my blessings, which as I quickly realized is countless, so I am hoping to keep counting as long as Blogger is standing and doesn’t fall over.

GOD

Since this is the beginning and since everything began with God and in the mind of God, it is but natural that I begin with God. Actually, the whole blog can be encapsulated into just this one entry. For, isn’t God in everything? So I shall start my gratitude journal with being grateful to God.

But I’m grateful for a little something extra…

Every time I think of God, a quiet peace descends, the tensions my body holds dissolves, my heartbeat slows down, my mind almost ceases its endless scurrying and my heart fills with so much joy that it brims over and spreads to fill my entire being with rapture… I willingly and wholly surrender to God’s loving  presence, wrapped in a bliss that cannot be described, wanting it to never end …