When you look at the world | What is it that you see | People find all kinds of things
| That bring them to their knees.
─U2, “When I Look at the World.”
I recently read an interview with Bono of the rock group U2, which was like reading a spiritual adventure story. Packed with ferocity, philosophy, and immense love for his wife, Ali, Bono rows toward heaven by day, all the while pursuing social justice causes and the perfect song. Speaking about his music and the band, Bono asserts: “We’re religious people even when we are not. We find ritual and ceremony powerful. We were always interested in the ecstatic, and I think our music reflects that.” I began immersion into the word ecstatic, in hopes it may hold insight into the trajectory of my adult life: the choices I’ve made, and the peace and stillness I now seek.
From Merriam-Webster.com, Ecstatic has been used in language since the late 16th century and the noun ecstasy is even older, dating from the 1300s. Both derive from the Greek verb existanai ("to put out of place"), which was used in a Greek phrase meaning "to drive someone out of his or her mind." This seems an appropriate history for words that can describe someone who is nearly out of their mind with intense emotion. [This explains why Bono is a mystic-shaman-mega-performer on the concert stage!] In early use, ecstatic was sometimes linked to mystic trances, out-of-body experiences, and temporary madness. Today, however, it typically implies a state of enthusiastic excitement or intense happiness.
My early days of ecstatic took shape in pleasure seeking. Gathering in a friend’s psychedelic basement (adorned with blacklights, posters, and mind-altering substances), grieving over the loss of rock icon Jimi Hendrix while celebrating his music. Midnight skinny-dipping with friends and water-touching for no reason other than to prove our boldness. Leaping off high rock quarry ledges into the cool waters below. Making out with my best friend and her cousin on a dingy forgotten couch. Listening to Led Zeppelin’s “Going to California” loudly and repeatedly on a ridge in Appalachia. Dancing the night away to Elvis Costello, Steely Dan, and Pure Prairie League at a favorite Mission Beach hangout with far too much time on our hands. Reaching nirvana with my boyfriend in the Feather River Canyon hot springs of northern California.
Later, with help from the inevitable mechanics of time, my interests drifted toward life and nature in a different way. With magnificent, omnipresent mountains outside my doorstep, I began a more grown-up and less hedonistic day-to-day, that still met an ongoing need for ecstatic. I developed a relationship with the outdoors. John Muir, famed naturalist and “father” of the National Park Service, once said, “I only went out for a walk, and finally concluded to stay out until sundown, for going out, I found, was really going in.” Once I had dipped my toes in high Sierra and Cascade lakes, navigated granite boulders and footholds, and enjoyed the easy trail-hiking banter of like-minded companions, I understood what Muir meant by “going in.” For me, there was no attainable level of spirituality possible in a flatland existence. My awe, my ecstatic, was only accessible at high elevations. To this day, there’s truth for me in these words.
Rocked by the arrival of two children, my smitten heart took an ecstatic turn toward motherhood. There was little else on this earth that could have possibly been better than the raising of our girl and boy. While I was celebrating new humans in the universe, their personalities unfolded like an origami Chatterbox. One cute little person shared her curiosities and creativity by the bucketsful, while her brother sprinkled each day with humor and compassion. There are simply no words to describe the ecstasy I felt; it’s magnitude equal only to the addition of child-raising responsibilities.
Now with two grown children well into their solo no-parent-around lives, I’ve settled with a new partner into a more predictable and peaceful life. The reliability of living with someone who consistently loves and likes and supports has been a kind of ecstatic I never knew I needed. My domestic pleasures come from the giving and receiving of devotion, the quiet of early mornings, books, the always-grand outdoors, and our dogs. Building a home in a northwest nook, a project we’ve embarked on together, is igniting creativity, curiosity, and hope that I will once again find peace away from cities and closer to topography that speaks soft ecstatic volumes. And lately, I have renewed connections with old friends who have in return welcomed my gestures with unconditional gestures of kindness..
I will always be searching outside myself for the ecstatic unknowable, but all searching that has come before, looking outward and from within, has yielded beacons of truths about where I ultimately hope to land. I can’t say that life thus far has been a spiritual adventure story, but it has thankfully brought ecstatic variability. While Bono’s soul is perpetually aflame, which clearly drives him forward and nurtures growth, heavenly aspirations, and musical odysseys, my own pursuits reflect aspirations of a different sort. Since I have finally figured out where beauty lies, and the ecstatic stillness it requires is well within my grasp, I aspire to wait patiently for what comes next.
Mary Daniel is a Certified Integrative Nutrition and Health Coach dedicated to the pursuit of good health for everyone. Through her business, Your One Precious Life, she partners with clients and communities and in the spirit of collaboration, paves the way for health transformations.
Interested in a free health consultation? Visit: www.youronepreciouslife.com or email mary@youronepreciouslife.com.
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