After hearing the voice over and over again, the boy – who experienced life outside the rain cloud as a young child, but who has long since stopped believing in sunny day – begins to believe the rain is his lot in life.

So he passes his life with a rain cloud following him. And feeling sad. Because nobody wants to join him underneath the rain cloud. Until a funny looking old man walks up to him and says, “Would you like to step out of the rain?”

On any other day, the boy would have said no. Because he’s believed he deserves the rain. Because he’s learned to take pride in the rain cloud. And because he doesn’t trust people who don’t get rained on.

In fact, there had been many people before the funny looking old man who asked if he wanted to step out of the rain. But he said no. Because he was surviving just fine. And because who were they to think they could help.

But it has rained particularly hard for years. And the boy who is now a young man has feared that he might even drown. And while he likes to believe that he isn’t afraid of death. He doesn’t want to die. Not under a rain cloud.

Which is why he had lately spent so much time sitting in a puddle and asking – Why me? And each time he asked, a thundering voice replied, “Because you deserve it.” And the boy believed the voice. Over and over again. Until today.

When he swallows his pride. Swallows his belief that the rain is his lot in life. And looks at the funny looking old man who seemed to have nothing in common with him. And says, “I’ve been ready to step out of the rain my whole life.”

One moment. Begins the boy’s journey out of the rain. And toward sunshine. Until many years later. When the boy realizes that one moment wasn’t the beginning. His journey toward sunshine had begun long before.

With a raincloud. And a thundering voice that told him that life rained on him because he deserved it. One too many times. Which was exactly the number of times that the thundering voice needed to yell.

Before the boy was finally ready to look up. And see the miracle in front of him. Waiting to lead him toward sunshine. Which came in the form of a funny looking old man. But which could have come in any form at all.

He runs and runs. And finds himself in the middle of a pedestrian walk in which there are famous statues that have been reproduced from various ages. Most of them Greek. But some from other parts of the world. And he glides past the statues.

Various expressions of the human body. Of its subtlety and beauty. In the eyes of an artist who could see something others couldn’t. And the young man keeps moving. As he passes statue after statue. Frozen in time. Or perhaps frozen for a time.

Eventually there are no more statues. So he turns his head toward the road ahead. A straight path lined with palm trees that seems to lead to a building that looks like a church. Or is it a lighthouse? He can’t tell really. He just keeps running.

Not in the way that he once did. There are no fantasies of beautiful women watching his amazing stride. Or of Boston Marathons being won. Instead there are just two feet hitting the pavement below him in a rhythm that soothes his mind.

The young man is thankful for so many things. He is thankful for the love he feels. But also for the pain and suffering he has felt. Because it is the compassion he learned through the pain and suffering that helped him to know love. And patience.

He approaches the building in front of him. He still doesn’t know what it is. But it is the only thing that separates him from the ocean. An ocean on the other side of the world. But still. An ocean that he knows well. Because it’s all connected.

He runs around the structure. And he sees the cannon pointed toward the water. Protecting the world from anything dangerous that might emerge from the ocean. And he notices the fog covering the horizon. Covering everything.

He can’t see but a few yards in front of him. Which has probably been the one thing that has scared him most in life. Not being able to see. But something is different now. And he doesn’t take long to figure it out. His spirit tells him.

“This is just fog,” his spirit says. “Not your fog.”

The young man hops on top of the cannon and looks out as far as he can see. Barely far enough to see waves breaking a few feet in front of him. And he smiles. And thanks the universe. And his mother and father. And Carolina. And others who are important to him.

Then he jumps down from the cannon and onto the sand. And walks on the beach through a fog in which it is impossible to see a sunrise or sunset. But it is still possible to see trash on the beach. And decaying beach huts. And a homeless man sleeping beside the decay.

This isn’t at all what he imagined he’d see when he finally arrived here. He imagined a warm, sunny beach where he could plop down in the sand and watch a sunrise. And then a sunset. And contemplate beauty and other stuff. And say, “fuck… what a journey.”

But here he is. On the other side of the world. Standing on a beach filled with fog and trash and decay. And smiling. Because he understands that we have a lot of work to do in this world. But that work can only be done if we choose first. To work on ourselves.

He laughs. And decides that this couldn’t be a more perfect ending. An ending that he understands is just another beginning. Because even on the other side of the world, there’s fog. And a beach that needs cleaning. And needs imagination. And love.

But it’s different over here. Because he realizes, now, that the fog isn’t his. It’s just fog. And that beaches will always need cleaning. And imagination. And love. And that he now has the strength to begin to clean. And offer his imagination. And love.

He picks up a piece of trash and puts it in a can.

And starts running again. Away from the beach.

Back to wherever he came from.

An energy that needed things to be the way that he’d grown used to. For instance he was used to nice places to sleep. So when he went on his journey he found nice places to sleep. And he was used to certain foods. So when he went on his journey, he found those foods.

And he was used to certain types of exercises. So when he went on his journey he did those types of exercises. And even. He was used to falling in love with women who looked in a certain way. So when he went on his journey he found a woman who looked in that way.

When the young man realized that the journey he had taken to abandon everything and find a new way had really been a journey in which he’d reacquired so much he’d abandoned, his first thought was to drop it all. But then he got scared. Because he’d dropped so much already.

He needed something. To hold onto.

So in the same way he had slowly dropped other things to prepare him for the journey. Including attachments that didn’t work, a woman that didn’t work, a job that didn’t work, and – even – a belief in impossible-to-climb mountains that didn’t work. He began to work on himself.

And one by one he looked at everything he had carried with him. First he dropped the crazy exercising. Then the crazy coffee drinking. Then the girl dropped him – which was helpful. Then he had no more money left. So he had to drop the nice place too. And he traveled to Barcelona.

Where in a rented room with a pink bed and nothing at all that reminded him of his old life, the young man looked all around him. And realized that he was scared. Because he had nothing familiar to hold onto. It was all. Gone. But as his eyes adjusted, he saw something beautiful.

Perhaps the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen.

It was a picture of him. In a little room. Looking around at nothing familiar. Yet everything that mattered still seemed to be there. In that room. He was there. His mother was there. His father. The woman he loved. His brothers and sisters and friends. The earth. The sky. And love.

He continues his walk and wonders what God’s plan could be. For months he’s been opening his heart. Trusting in whatever direction God has told him to go. Trusting a voice that directed him to Spain, Scotland, all over the US, Guatemala, Argentina, and now Chile.

A voice that hasn’t directed him toward happiness. Hasn’t directed him toward contentment. But instead has directed him to experience physical pain. And then to experience a world of people that liked him. But didn’t really care for him. And sometimes. Turned on him.

His faith kept him going. Even when he has felt forsaken. Because sometimes people must feel forsaken to know the truth. Which the young man feels is love. And he really believes in love. But sometimes he wonders how many other people do.

When he arrived in Argentina he ran out of money. And the young woman who he loved left him because, she said, she was scared. And a man tried to kill a man sitting beside him. And all of the spiritual people who seemed so spiritual. Smiled empty smiles.

Yet he continued to surrounded himself with people. More and more people. Who God directed him toward. And who had good hearts – the boy saw that. But whose hearts didn’t see him. Nor did they connect with him. Instead they yawned when he came. And yawned when he left.

And he finds himself on a walk in Santiago wondering why he’s even here. Understanding that perhaps he wasn’t meant for this forgetful world. A world in which people care as much as they are able. But they aren’t very able. At least not yet.

As he nears the apartment where he is staying – with painters who smile at him but rarely have anything to say [to him] – he sees a church. And he wants to go in the church. To pray or something. But the doors to the cathedral are locked.

Instead he sits outside the church and looks at a painting of Jesus. And at the massive cathedral structure towering over him. He tells God that if it was up to him he wouldn’t be here. If it was up to him he would disappear into the ether and go back to wherever he came from.

That he continues on only because he believes that God has a will for each of us. And that it is not his job to question that will. But to continue to ask. So that eventually it can be known. And then he gets quiet for a time. Before asking God one little favor.

I am open to whatever your will is. Just please let me know soon. So that I may serve you. I have listened to you faithfully. As I’ve traveled around the world. And suffered. Not understanding. But trusting. And now I ask you to let me know. Why am I here?

In that moment, he felt God enter his body. He felt God become one with his body. And he felt that whatever answer that God might have had to say didn’t matter nearly as much as the energy that he felt inside. Energy that was complete. And was love.

He stood up after a time. And walked back to the apartment holding this energy. And climbed up to the stairs and into the little room in which he was staying. And lied down. And felt the energy strengthen him. And love him. And it was there, on the bed, that God began to speak.

And in God’s words he found his answer.

Because in God’s energy he found his peace.

And because in God’s trials he found his faith. The faith he would need.

To look for answers and peace.

She wanted so badly to imagine a world in which everything was lovely. A world in which she could dream whatever she chose to dream. And those dreams would come true. But she knew that world wasn’t possible. Because people who were much older and “wiser” than her said so.

One day that girl went to a yoga class and met a boy who was eight years older than her and appeared to have lots of experience. He had traveled around the world and had seen many things. And while other boys liked to talk to her about the last goal they scored in soccer. Or whatever.

This boy wanted to talk with her about a love that he was connecting with. Not a love to another woman. But rather a love for others and the world and most importantly. Himself. It was a love that had just begun to change his life. It wasn’t done changing yet. But man oh man…

The girl thought the boy was weird. He didn’t belong to a particular religion. He wasn’t trying to sell her anything. And he didn’t seem to have plans to pour alcohol down her throat. Yet he still wanted to talk with her. To know everything about her. And to talk about love.

She asked him why. Her. Why not talk with any of the other girls at the yoga class. And he was very clear with her. It was her eyes first. Then her energy. And then a voice that spoke to him. But none of that mattered really. At least not now. Because he had to know her.

She walked to his house after yoga class – only because it was on the way to her university class. And they spoke for six hours. And the girl told the him that she had dreams too. That she wanted to know her heart. And help people and stuff. But she didn’t know if it was possible.

Because in this world life is hard. And dreams don’t come true. And all you can do really is keep fighting. Even when everything sucks. And most likely everything will suck. Often. Thanks to capitalism. And globalization. And stuff. And that’s just how it is.

The girl didn’t kiss the boy when she finally left his house – after missing her university class. In fact, she didn’t even think about whether she wanted to kiss the boy. Or whether he wanted to kiss her. Because why would he want to kiss. Her. When he the whole world is open to him.

When she went home, she tried to focus on her studies. To ignore whatever had gone on between her and the boy. And ignore her father. Who was screaming at her for something she did. She couldn’t ignore her father. She had to scream back. Tell him that he is an awful man. Just awful.

When she went to sleep that first night, the last thing she thought about was the boy. She’d have preferred for it to be what she studied about the pineal gland. Or what she watched on the television. Because those thoughts would have been grounded in a reality she knew.

But instead, she thought about the boy. About the way he talked. In a language that wasn’t his own. A language that he’d rarely spoken in his life. Searching for words. And always seeming to find the words to say what he wanted to say. While looking into her eyes. Like that.

Her last thought was a question that she didn’t want to ask. That she did everything to avoid. But that stuck in her head nonetheless. The question was this: “Should I risk letting this boy into my life… or should I keep him as far away as possible so that I don’t have to. Dream?”

This story goes on. And there are many other lessons that we can glean from it. But I want to stop here because this is the crux of it all. How do we dream… when we’ve been taught that dreams don’t come true? How do we take a risk… when we’ve been taught that risks don’t pay off?

I’ve been obsessed with these questions for the past few months. As I’ve traveled through countries where people have been taught not to dream. Because it isn’t worth it. Their dreams don’t come true. And it makes me so sad. But it also fills me with hope.

Because if we’ve created this world on the backs of people who didn’t know how to dream. Imagine what we can do when we decide to give up our attachments to the shadows of ourselves that are afraid to dream. And instead, open ourselves up. To beauty. And learning. And love.

I want to tell you how the story ends – it doesn’t end really. To this day, the girl has stayed indecisive. Straddling two worlds. One in which dreams don’t come true and one in which perhaps they do. And she is unable to make a choice. And it’s been killing her. For months now.

If two lives continue on together – after happily ever after, then the love story becomes about how the love develops or doesn’t. If two lives are star-crossed and never get the chance, then the story becomes about what those lives do afterward.

Even after we die, our loves stories don’t end. They continue on in the people we’ve touched and the world we’ve influenced as a result of the love we held or didn’t hold in our hearts. And the story unfolds from there. Ever and ever wider.

We live in a culture that believes that love is containable. That even if we don’t understand it, we can act it out by abiding by certain cultural norms. Fall in love, get married, have kids, grow old together, spoil grandchildren with candy, and then eventually die with a family intact.

For those of us lucky enough to experience a destiny that asked for this plan all along, we may never understand why it’s so difficult for others to follow it too. Because this is most widespread and culturally acceptable love story that we know. Anything else is a compromise.

Which is why so many of us try to tell ourselves that this must be how love goes. And why so many of us try to fit ourselves into a cultural box. Oftentimes despite the pain of a heart that tells us that it’s not working. Despite every worldly sign telling us it’s not working.

Perhaps our first lover who we married doesn’t work out. We aren’t right for each other. We grew together for a while, but now we are different people with different stories and different needs. What then? Do we continue to keep trying to make the story fit – even though it doesn’t fit anymore?

Or do we split up, and in splitting up go against the story we’ve had in our heads for so long. A story that our parents told us – even when it didn’t work out for them. A story their grandparents told to them – even though they haven’t smiled at each other in years.

There are so many points in our lives in which we have to confront the GRAND CONFLICT – the one in which the story in our heads is different from the story in our hearts. So many points in which we have to choose whether to do what we think is right… or what we know is right.

Perhaps the biggest source of suffering today is that most of us believe that what we think is more important than what we know. More important than what our hearts tell us. What our guts tell us. Or even what our parents told us with their hearts. If they couldn’t say it in words.

Luckily, our suffering never goes to waste. The world uses it to show a generation that lives beside us or a generation that comes after us what doesn’t work. Because they can see the sadness on our faces. Or because they can feel the pain in our hearts.

We will leave the work – and the rewards – to those who see our suffering. Those who choose to live a life abiding by what they know to be true. Not for others – we can’t know what others need. But rather for themselves. Those who move in the direction their hearts tell them to move.

And we will content ourselves with whatever world we’ve created out of lack of awareness. Or – if we are aware of our choice to ignore our hearts – then we will content ourselves with the knowledge that we sacrificed ourselves. So that others may use us as an example of what doesn’t work.

Ours is a noble role to play. But it isn’t fun. So I hope we choose differently.

So this man went on a journey to find out what this something was all about. On his journey, he ran into a monster who was big and green and had two foreheads. And the monster decided to kill the man.

The man didn’t like to fight. So he had never practiced fighting on people – let alone big, green monsters. So instead of fighting, he looked into the monster’s eyes, and said, “What do you want, Mr. Monster?”

The monster was startled. Because he had never been asked what he wants by a person who was about to be his dinner. So the monster told the man the truth. “I want to eat you.”

“Why me?” the man asked. “There is so much food in the world. Why do you want to eat me. I am just finding my path, and I can be useful to the world in so many ways.”

The monster looked down at the man, and wondered why he preferred to eat people. If he could eat anything in the world, why eat a man with dreams and a conscience and stuff.

“I don’t know why,” the monster said. “Probably because you look like everyone else I’ve called food.”

“What do you call food?” the little man asked.

“Why do you ask so many questions?” the monster responded.

“I don’t know,” the man said. “I’ve always been that way.”

“Food is what I eat,” the monster said.

“That’s interesting,” the man said. He put his hand on his chin and appeared deep in thought. “Very interesting!”

“Why is it interesting?” the monster asked.

“Because if food is what you eat, you can eat anything and call it food.”

“So…”

“So why eat me?”

“Because I know what you taste like,” the monster said.

“But what if something else tastes better?” the man asked.

“I don’t know,” the monster said. “And I don’t care.”

“But if you ate corn, for instance, you’d spare me,” the man said.

“So,” the monster said, as he picked the little man up and dangled him over his mouth.

“So,” the man screamed, as he dangled over the monster’s mouth. “I can help you. I really can. I can do whatever you need. Cook. Clean. Find sheep. Or other men. Just please. Don’t. Eat. Me!”

In that moment another little man was transformed into a monster. Which is why when we look out at the world, we see so many monsters. They didn’t start out that way. They became monsters because they thought they were saving their lives.

But they weren’t saving their lives.

They were sacrificing their lives. So that we could know their story. The story of men who thought they had no other choice but to become monsters. But really, they just had to open their eyes and notice that what they thought was a monster. Was really just a…

It was whatever they were ready to see.

So…

When you are confronted with one monster or another, please remember two things. The first is that if you become a monster to save yourself, you haven’t saved yourself. The second is that monsters are real only for as long as you believe in them.

So…

You can stop believing in monsters and continue your journey. You have lots of interesting people and things and wisdom to discover. And it’s not just for your benefit. It’s for the benefit of a world full of people who once thought they were monsters.

But are slowly learning that they are people again.

The young man has always believed in God – in an abstract sense. He’s believed that God is a universal power that exists somewhere beyond him, but one that he respects. Because it is the source of something he doesn’t understand and is always out of reach.

And now he’s seeing… Well, he isn’t seeing anything. Rather he is feeling a strange energy. As he sits up and watches a world opening in front of him. And around him. And he hears a voice that seems to come from… weird… it seems to come from his heart.

The young man never spent much time imagining what God would say if he ever heard God’s voice. But he is surprised by the words he’s hearing. Because if God were to come to him, the young man imagined that he would at least deliver a top secret message. Or whatever.

“You are loved,” the voice says. “Just trust in love. And me. And your direction. And understand that you are not alone.”

The young man doesn’t know what to do. He’s believed for so long that he is alone in this world. That if he is to survive, he will have to do so on his own. And so he has walked a straight line. Away from a world he doesn’t believe in, and into his own loneliness.

When the voice stops talking, the young man does the only thing he knows. He ignores the voice. Pretends that it doesn’t exist. Goes back to the world of hardship and survival that he he believes in. And he spends the rest of his life in that world.

This man’s life is a sad story. But luckily it doesn’t end here. No matter how many times our lives end here, they never really end. Here. Not even yesterday. When the young man – who had since become an old man – closed his eyes for the last time.

The story doesn’t end here for the same reason that all stories like it don’t end here. Because we live in a universe that is connected. A universe that has its own time. A universe that allows us to pass on the work. If we choose not to do it for ourselves.

Sometimes we pass the work to our children who come after us. Sometimes to our neighbors who live beside us. Sometimes to our brothers who live on the other side of the world. Brothers we may not even know. And sometimes to the trees that sway in the wind around us.

In the case of this young man who turned old, he passed the work on to a daughter who he raised. Who he loved so dearly. But who he ultimately disowned because one day she heard a voice and he told her it wasn’t real. But she listened to the voice anyway.

The old man was so sad to see his daughter believe in something that wasn’t real. Even as she skipped in a field. Planting seeds. Watering them. Watching them grow. And feeling the sun on her back. As she participated in a world. In which she danced.

When the old man died, yesterday, his daughter was on the other side of the world. Painting a picture of a young man who she understood that she had to paint. A young man who is speaking with God as he paints a picture. Of a world in which he listens. To the words he hears.

The girl will tell her children – in a few years – that while she didn’t find out for days that her father had died, a voice had woken her up on the day of his death. “You are loved,” the voice had said. “Just trust in love. And me. And your direction. And understand that you are not alone.”

It was her father. She knew it was her father. His voice was unmistakable.

Then he packs a suitcase. It doesn’t matter what he takes really. Because it too will fade away. If not in a few days or years then soon after that. Because nothing in this life lasts long, he’s learned. Nothing except whatever he wants to find now.

He leaves his house and walks down the road. As he walks, the sun rises and sets. And rises and sets again. And the leaves fall off the trees. Until they are bare. And then leaves begin to grow again. On the trees that looked so. Bare. And the man looks on with awe. As he keeps walking.

The man stops sometimes. For days, weeks, even months. And he wonders – when he stops – whether what he is looking for is here. Or there. Or maybe just over there. So he keeps his eyes open. And asks people along the way. And people are helpful in directing him.

But they can’t help him find whatever it is. So he stands again. Over and over he stands again. So he can walk again. Down the road. From town to town. With a suitcase in hand. Looking for something that seems so easy to find. But that he can’t seem to find.

Until one day he falls down. In the middle of the road. He stays there until a woman carrying a basket of fruits sees the man. Crumbled. In the middle of the road. And asks him what’s wrong. He opens his eyes, looks at her face, and doesn’t want to say. But he takes a breath.

“I can’t find her,” the man says.

“Who?” the woman asks.

“Her!” the man says.

“What does she look like?” the woman asks.

“I don’t know.”

“What do you mean you don’t know.”

“I don’t know.”

“If you don’t know, then how do you know I’m not her,” the woman asks.

“I don’t,” the man says.

The woman puts the basket down. Rearranges her dress. And holds her hand out to the man. Who grabs her hand. Stands. And says something that she will keep with her for the rest of her life. Then he disappears for long enough for her to understand that he is gone.

The woman picks up the basket and continues walking. As she walks, she thinks about the man. Who walked on the road. Until he found whoever she was. Then he became the road that the woman walked. As she looked. For whatever she was looking for. She wasn’t quite sure.

They broke up a few days later for reasons that the boy doesn’t remember. It was the boy’s first relationship. Heartbreak. He was only twelve years old. But in the aftermath, his heart felt so heavy that he imagined he was really old. Like maybe thirty or something. Practically dead.

The boy woke up the next day and he was thirty. And while he’d spent a lifetime imagining that the next girl would be The One, she never was. Instead, she was one. Along a path. Of lots of learning. Happiness for sure. But also sadness. On a path so unlike the one he imagined for himself.

On the day he woke up, he took a walk. And on that walk, he saw a girl. She had brown hair and angel eyes, and he knew – the moment he saw her – that he loved her. He wished he didn’t know it. He wished that he could learn his lesson. Pretend his feelings weren’t real. Be numb. Or at least more numb.

But despite all of the lessons he’d learned – despite a world of experience telling him that love doesn’t happen at first sight – his heart didn’t listen. It told him that what he felt was love. And that what he needed to do was say hello to the girl. And say hello to his heart. Again.

He said hello. And she said hello. And he was so nervous that he mumbled as he spoke. He tried to think of a joke to say. Or at least something interesting. But instead he asked her about the usual things. School. Life. Parents. “Oh,” he thought, “I am so boring.”

She didn’t flirt with him. She didn’t given him any indication at all that she liked him before she told him she had to go. To catch a bus. She just said goodbye. And he said goodbye too. And closed his eyes. And wondered why his heart had fallen again. For a girl who was just passing by.

That night, he lay in his bed afraid to close his eyes. He imagined that if he went to sleep he might wake up older. Perhaps eighty-two. A lifetime having passed him by. A lifetime that looked nothing like the life he imagined when he was a little boy. That he fell into. Asleep.

As he lay in his bed, not sleeping, he closed his eyes and asked his heart why the girl came into his life. The one on the street. Who had to leave to catch a bus. The one who passed. Like a gust of wind that touches the earth and the sky. Before saying goodbye. And his heart said this to him:

“She is the girl you have been looking for. Just trust and don’t ask for anything more. Not the rest of the story. Nor the chapter. Let her come into your life. As sand moves in a desert. In gusts. And with magic. And a sense of destination. A chaotic organization. Called love. And trust.”

The boy opened his eyes and sat up in his bed. He wished that he was different. That he could live without dreams or purpose or a heart that talks to him like he imagined a brother would. Or maybe a father. He touched his heart. Like he imagined a mother would. And shook his head.

Because he had learned a few things in his thirty years. And one of those things is that we are who we are. And at some point we must stop running from ourselves. And instead embrace ourselves. And trust that in our knowing we will also know the love that never passed us on the street.

It was already here all along.