Blissing Out on the Beach

It was a Thursday morning I remember it well.

I’d grabbed my collie Zep and headed out to the beach.

Zep loves running up and down the shore, barking at the waves.

He’s got this habit of biting at the water as it rolls in drinks a bit of seawater, sprints like mad, then ends up feeling queasy. Good boy.

I was sitting a little further back, just watching him, enjoying the moment.

He ran over and plonked down next to me. I gave him a few pats and looked out across Port Phillip Bay.

Everything felt perfect.

This moment was enough.

Then all of a sudden like a sledgehammer I was hit.

I fell into this random bliss.

It wasn’t subtle.

It was full-bodied, overwhelming, soft and electric all at once.

All this love everywhere, all over my body.

I was struggling to breathe.

I looked at Zep.

He looked at me.

What the hell is going on?

I was blissing out, randomly, on the beach.

Years later, I would feel the same sensation sitting in silence at Ramana Ashram.

But that morning?

That was the first.

I got up and walked off the beach, trying to steady myself.

It felt like I’d had 15 beers except I was completely sober and completely present.

There’s no real way to describe it.

But I had to somehow shake it off I was working the late shift, 1 to 9pm.

I got home, got ready, headed in.

Still blissing out.

As soon as I saw B at work, I told him what happened.

He just looked at me eyes wide, no words.

I started my shift and did my best to focus.

But the bliss didn’t go.

Not for a few hours, anyway.

Eventually, the feeling faded.

But something in me didn’t go back.

I still think about that day on the beach.

Zep chasing waves, me chasing nothing.

And somehow, in all that nothing, I found everything even if just for a few hours.