Whenever I watch the sunrise or Sunset, I know that I have at least done one good thing with my day. More so with sunrises because they are at the very beginning. If the rest of the day goes to sticks I know that at least I watched the sunrise.
The Sunrise is a celebration of the birth of the day. The animals, the sky, our environment all gets revealed for the start of a new day. Natures celebrations are always open for visitors.
One winter, my cousin Jaina Bee and I watched the sunrise from our lanai every morning for several weeks. We would sit, drink tea and coffee, talk not talk, I would snap lots of photos, documenting every change of light, every change of red, orange and yellow.
At the time, this wasn't an easy thing for me. I wasn't fond of getting up earlier than I absolutely had to, yet and at the same time my spirit didn't want to sleep, even if my body did.
Later on in life I would arrange my bed to face the east. I heard from someone that east was the directions yogi's faced when they slept. At the time I don't think I knew what a yogi was but it sounded smart and so I did the same thing. A couple of years later, I would open my blinds so that I would purposely be awoken early to the bright ball of fire rising up through the sky. Sometimes I would wake up for just a moment, look at a pink cloud or the glaring fire ball, breath out a feeling of beauty and peace and then go back to sleep, other times it would be the beginning of the day. An early start to witnessing beauty.
Lately, I've been waking up at extremely irrational times of the morning. 3am, 1am, stuff like that. One day, I was so frustrated that I found myself walking in the wet grass to the car and then getting in it and driving to the nearest beach even though I wasn't sure how to get there. My mind and body were stressed from lack of sleep and my soul knew that I needed to witness something beautiful to lift my heavy spirits towards the light. The sky was black and for the 2 minute stretch of highway I saw only 1 other car. I found my way down a hill and to a secluded bay.
Watching the Sunrise is a meditation of sorts, it is a process that takes much longer than the time that it actually takes to happen. For starters the sky turns from a dark to a twilight color to a lighter blue, more details of the environment then come to life, then the clouds start to change color, a peak of sun begins to appear spreading a bit of orange light across the horizon, then more bright fire, the sky turns red, highlights are cast around the edges of clouds, and its light casts everything in a warm glow. I found myself sitting there knowing that I was witnessing something absolutely amazing and at the same time witnessing something very simple. Something that happens EVERY day.
Even though the sun rises every day, to me, witnessing it is a celebration and a source of healing. It casted away the anxiousness in my heart from nightmares and I walked away knowing that the rest of the day could go to hell, and yet, because I got to attend this magnificent occasion, today was already beautiful.
