numinous, adj.

All my life, I have felt a bittersweetness that is impossible to explain. Like a hum or a heartbeat at the core of my being, it is a melancholy contemplativeness that beats through my every thought and moment, keeping me tethered to a sense of greater meaning. Every train ride is a spiritual retreat, every raindrop a statement on the human condition. It’s all very meta; I know I’m not unique, but it’s a lonely feeling. How do you describe that the very thing you ponder constantly, the thing that drives your deepest passion and frustration, is the indescribability of contemplation itself?

On the surface, this looks like aestheticization: choosing the perfect song as a soundtrack to fully experience a scenic moment, constantly scanning for fleeting feelings of when the stars align, the unshakable desire to romanticize the mundane to fit an artistic vision in my mind. I don’t believe in a manmade god, but I am a spiritual being; I often have, as many do, overwhelming moments of emotion and vastness and connectedness and edge-of-the-universe experiences that I could only describe as spiritual. I feel most alive and connected to myself and the world when I feel this sense of awe which I call numinous. My life is a series of prayers to this feeling; I chase it like water in the desert.

I first saw the word on a tarot card at a local community event when I was 16. Google says it’s “having a strong religious or spiritual quality, indicating or suggesting the presence of a divinity”; my favorite meaning I’ve seen is “describing an experience that makes you fearful yet fascinated, awed yet attracted–the powerful, personal feeling of being overwhelmed and inspired”. Finally, I had a way to describe It, the Thing I’ve always been completely captivated by, the feeling I’ve spent my life chasing. It’s an arms outstretched, top-of-the-world sort of feeling, to be surrounded and embraced and at the same time liberated and infinite.

I feel it when I stargaze, when I put my hands and feet in the air and process the fact that the stars above are not “up” but outwards, imagining the way I would fall gently off the surface into the infinite abyss were gravity not holding me inward. I feel it at the edge of a stream, when I take the time to sit and close my eyes in a rare moment of presentness. I feel it when driving on an open road or highway over a city while listening to a surround-sound song that reflects the 3D, aerial experience. I feel it when I let myself be with my thoughts by a lake, running through the streets or swinging on a playground with a friend at night, and when I reconnect with poetry, art, politics, environmental justice–anything I’m passionate about that makes me feel like me again.

The events of the past few years have taken me from myself, made me feel disconnected and dissociated in ways I still don’t fully understand. This blog is a revival of the artist and dreamer inside of me–the parts I cherish most, which I understand as the core of who I am and how I experience the world. This blog is a prayer to the numinous.