One night I saw myself walking in an unknown direction. Everything looked extraordinary and surreal. I saw a doorway and as soon as I walked through it, I found myself in a huge arena. Right at the centre of the arena was an enormous enclosure filled with water. Stunned by the magnitude of everything in front of me I just stood there for a bit staring when suddenly I looked up and gasped.

Just a little above my head, lay scattered the whole glittering galaxy complete with the planets floating around. Where was I? This was no planetarium and anyhow how did I get here? But my questions were arrested by the grandeur of what I was witnessing. There were literally billions of stars dotting what must have been the entire space. Each star clear and sparkling like crystal. Spurts of bright orange light were exploding and releasing more stars into the galaxy. Suddenly I lifted my hand and pointed at one of the planets. I took a deep breath and as I exhaled I moved my finger. What happened after that was nothing short of stupefying…

I could move the planet that I was pointing at. It began to follow the path of my finger. I tried the same with another planet and yet another…the same thing happened. What was happening to me? I felt as if my entire breath had been squeezed out and my heart was racing with a maddening exhilaration. And yet strangely my heart was feeling very much like the vision before my eyes. A huge space within my chest where thousands of stars of joy were twinkling and exploding …I knew I had never experienced this kind of unbounded joy before.

Suddenly a dragon flew into this galactic phantasmia and landed right next to me. It stared me right in the eye and though I should have been unnerved, maybe scared and at least freaked I stood there, prisoner of my complete wonderment. Now the dragon started to speak and as I had been ordering planets to move and poking my head around in the galaxy I thought nothing strange of a talking dragon. Staring down at me from his ungainly height he said “ To pass the test you have to answer my question.” Naturally! There would be a test to this magical tale so I smiled at the Dragon and replied “Sure. Ask me your question.”

Dragon: “Explain love to me?”

I looked at the fantastical creature before me and before I could stop myself had reached out and begun to rub his mane and then with a quick movement I thrust my hand right into his mouth and said; “This is love. When you are not full of fear but full of trust.” The dragon in turn responded by gently nibbling my hand his eyes twinkling with affection and gratitude.

I then started stroking his face gently and held it close to my mine and said “ This is love. When you are not afraid to embrace all things with kindness and compassion.” The dragon snuggled closer and after a blissful embrace asked me to climb on to his back.

He flew across the sky with me on his back. As he flew I felt a rush of warmth in my heart and my whole body was engulfed in joy and laughter and as I lay snuggled on its gigantic back I realized I had entered the soaring spirit of the dragon.

Stepping down from its back I looked above me again. And there was the orange burst of light yet again, spilling thousands of stars into the galaxy. I could no longer tell whether this brilliant star-studded space was outside or inside me, for my whole being was suffused with a rush of warmth and joy, which is quite inexplicable.

Involuntarily my eyes flew open. The room was dark but the sensation was still very real. I wanted to burst into loud peals of laughter with an a-causal joy, which just bounded through my whole being. Slowly as my eyes peered into the silence of the night I realized I had just been dreaming. Or had I?

That wonderful place that I had just visited had been as much inside me as outside. It was almost like I had expanded to include the night sky and had played with its manifold frontiers at the centre of my heart. I wanted to rush out and wake up everyone. I wanted to tell them I had actually done space travel, I wanted to tell people that Infinity can be experienced and the miraculous is just a breath away. But I knew I would never find the words to translate that which my heart had just witnessed.

Then I remembered my friend the dragon. Yes I had been struggling with my heart for the last few months trying to deepen my practice to drop all fear and mistrust. And the dragon had helped me complete that journey and pass my test. Only then was I free to ride on his back and enter the space of infinitude.

Truly love is about taming the dragon. It is about overcoming fear and embracing life in all its forms. If you can do this then you can become an unbounded being like the dragon- a magnificent being who has ability to create and breathe fire, soar high in the skies with its massive wings, wander on land and in water; a symbolic figure which carries within it the essence of life.

The unbounded and expansive self that we constantly crave for is nothing but this all embracing love for all that makes up life. And so great is the power of this love that it takes us beyond being a witness to creation to the grandeur of becoming the creator.

Like many I too have wondered about the many faces of the miraculous and how and when I would experience it. I have read and heard from many their experiences of ‘oneness’ and how life transforming they have been. A year ago I did not even think any of this was possible. Today I cannot imagine how trapped I was in the illusion of my fears.

I am not even certain that my words here do justice to the grandeur of this cosmic experience. I share it here with you all, both in wonder and humility. And in the hope that others too will share there wonderous journey from fear to trust. Just so we can remind each other that it is possible and is the key to our soaring.