28) New Beginnings                     27) The End

            Peel the sensation away from your brain.
            Feel the liberation as you break the chain.
            Take back what's yours, don't give it away.
            It's easy to do, so do it today.
 
            Spread out your wings and look to the sky.
            Leap off the ledge, have faith you will fly.
            All your weight's gone, it won't hold you down.
            You've got your power, now you make the sound.
 
            Break through the clouds, feel the sun on your face.
            Soar with the wind, in mysterious grace.
            Feel the sensation, you've made it today.
            Enjoy your new view. Don't give it away.

                                                                                                Malcolm Mohil
                                                                                                "Don’t Give It Away"

            If he could have spoken with Becky, he would have found out she wasn't feeling much better. She missed Malcolm and was tempted to call him. She decided not to. He wouldn't have wanted to speak with her either because he would've found out she spent the night with her new lover. That would've been too much to hear.
            He laid in bed for a while. He wasn't hungry and he had nothing to do so he stayed in bed, wallowing in his misery. All he wanted was for Becky to come home.
            This went on for several days. He would lay in bed until he had to get up for work. Whatever he did, though, it was hard for him to concentrate. He wasn't getting enough sleep and he wasn't eating well, so his body was beginning to feel the effects of his neglect.
            He didn't realize how much of a downward spiral he was on until one night walking home from work. He began to fall apart, physically and mentally. He was having a nervous breakdown. As he walked home, he was crying hysterically while his body was shaking. He walked into his house and fell on the ground, feeling like he was going insane.
            He needed help, so he called Jason and told him what was happening between sobs. Jason came over and comforted him. Jason suggested Malcolm see a therapist, someone who knew how to handle his psychological problems. Malcolm was reluctant. He wanted to see a medical doctor instead. He knew his body was in disrepair. It felt like it was dying to him and he began to panic he actually might die. His heart was racing. He felt extreme anxiety. He asked Jason to take him to the hospital.
            They arrived at the hospital shortly after. The doctor saw Malcolm and diagnosed him as having a panic attack. The doctor said this was relatively common, particularly for people who were having an emotional crisis. He sedated Malcolm and recommended he see a therapist.
            Jason took Malcolm home to sleep. He stayed at Malcolm's house for a while before needing to leave. When Malcolm woke up, he was alone and petrified. He had another panic attack. He called Jason again, who came over to help. They realized Malcolm needed immediate professional care. Malcolm decided to check himself into the local mental health clinic. Even though this seemed dramatic, at least he would have people around who would keep him company and make sure he didn't die.
            The doctors were very understanding. They led him into a room, sedated him and left him to sleep. They assured him he wasn't alone and if he needed help, all he had to do was call. This made Malcolm feel better and being away from the house that reminded him of Becky calmed his nerves. He slept soundly, catching up on much needed sleep.
            He awoke feeling much better, though he still wasn't motivated to do anything. He laid in bed for a while, thinking he was going to survive, when all of a sudden, the panic hit him again. He felt like he was falling. He was terrified, but didn't want to be drugged up again.
            He decided he would just fall into the hole that was opening in his heart. He didn't care anymore. If he needed to, he would die. He was tired of fighting this anxiety and tired of feeling alone. So, he fell.
            In the midst of his surrender to this depression, he felt love ignite in his chest, emanating through his body. He felt a presence surround him, holding on to him in the tenderest embrace he ever felt. It was the most intense feeling of love he could imagine.
            He itched his face and realized everyone's itching to discover the truth. He heard pounding on a door inside his mind and realized everyone's knocking on this door of discovery. He heard birds sing and felt them flying above his head. He realized everyone's a bird desiring to soar freely to sing love songs. He realized nature's a reflection of God offering so many levels of teaching for understanding.
            He felt this love to be God and accepted and blessed this feeling and knew through this love everyone was connected. He knew he wasn't alone. He knew no matter where he was, he was safe. No matter where he was, he was at home.
            He started crying in joy until he fell asleep. In his sleep, he dreamt he was on a plateau. There were apes all around, foraging about. He was with a woman who was studying the apes. She said the apes came from space. They were brought here long ago and adapted to life on the planet. She was curious to find out just how much they changed. She and Malcolm began to climb a huge, magnificent tree branching in many directions. They climbed the tree because they knew the apes would climb the tree as well. They wanted to observe the apes in their progress of climbing. They reached the top of the tree and the apes followed. They then climbed down the tree, forcing the apes to retreat. They felt confident in their actions as they stood at the base of the tree, marveling at its beauty.
            When Malcolm woke up this time, he was glowing. He felt passion and inspiration motivate him again. He walked out of his room to check himself out of the clinic. A doctor approached him and asked how he was doing. Malcolm smiled his first smile in days and said he was great. The doctor was surprised and asked if he would like to talk. Malcolm agreed. He had a lot he wanted to share with the psychiatrist.
            The doctor led him to his office and offered him a seat.
            "So, why such a sudden change in mood, Malcolm," the doctor began, suspecting Malcolm was manic-depressive.
            "I had a revelation last night about depression that makes complete sense to me. I had a breakthrough that completely restored my love for life."

            "I'd like to hear about it."

            "Last night, I felt another panic attack come on. This time, though, I let it take me. I didn't care anymore. I was prepared to die. I fell and landed in the arms of what I felt was pure love. I was embraced with warmth and compassion. If there's a God, that's who caught me."

            Malcolm was getting excited voicing his opinion and felt the warmth in his chest grow more intense. He told the doctor his thoughts about resonation, love and God. He explained why he felt love was essential to life. He described when people love, they develop bonds, they share themselves, they grow, and they gain wisdom and thus learn about life. He spoke about how resonation is the underlying principle of sharing information and about how ultimately God, the creator of all things, is the prime resonator of love, this feeling inspiring everybody to connect with the world.

            "Now, I understand why when we lose love, when the connections we've developed have been severed, we get depressed. I believe depression, the disconnection of self from the world, is the ultimate immersion into God. It's the sacrifice of the self, the ego. It's the willingness to give our self up. It's the crucifixion, the surrendering of our self to something greater.

            "Emptiness occurs when something we love is taken away. We're no longer filled with what we loved. This emptiness is pure God, the original unknown potential. It provides us with the opportunity to find new potentials and to live a new dream. It's God asking, 'Who am I?' and providing us with an opportunity to engage the world with a new outlook.

            "Fall and winter can be a depressing times of year. Sun, this great resonator of love, shows its face briefly. Things get colder. Plants go to sleep. Life slows down. So many connections are broken. We feel sad, lost and lonely. This is part of the cycle, though.

            "Parts of Earth depress back to God. In this depression, energies are released and this information is resonated back to God. All the wisdom life learned is given back to God.

            "In this depression, life's dreaming of Spring. In this dream, life's resonating to Earth its desire to reconnect. These desires will manifest as experience. Experience to gain understanding so life can evolve into something greater.

            "We feel depression because we're a resonant response of Earth. We feel depression because God's calling us home to God's depressed state of being. We're connected so we need to depress.

            "The sinking into nothing we feel is the expansion into God. It's scary and we don't like it because we don't understand it. It's hard to let go of who we are. We've been taught we're our physical bodies and what we have in our environment makes us important. When a connection is broken, we feel sad, lost and lonely because the bond's no longer held together. This bonding energy is now free and manifests itself in many ways, depending on the intent of the depressed person.

            "Society looks at depressed people with pity. 'These poor, lost souls.' society says. 'Let’s give them drugs to reconnect them and make them feel better.'

            "The confusion we feel is because society wants us to keep busy. We have to maintain connections or else society will fall apart. If society falls apart, the power structure is destroyed. The 'ones who fear' must maintain their power structure in order to feel important and keep their identity. 

            "We have the free will to either resonate with God or society. Ideally, we're God creating society by dreaming potentials into the unknown emptiness and then those seeds sprout and grow. We know we need to depress, but we think we must impress the world constantly with our connections. It's the great war between Heaven and Earth. The story of 'Armageddon' is a resonant response of this. It's everybody's internal struggle to discover who we really are.

            "Sinking into nothing is returning to God, the source, the void, point zero, the unknown emptiness, an undefined Heaven. It's scary to fall. It feels like hell, but it's a blessing. We travel there internally because God is within. The path is hard because we have to get through all the barriers we’ve put up.

            "Depression into self is our returning to the God who’s within us. By going back to God, we release all our energies tying us down, and we bring back to God the wisdom we've learned. It's through us, his children, that God knows who he is.

            "When we're loving, we're expressing God. When we're depressed, we're being God. God is depressed because God isn't attached to Universe. God is the unknown emptiness and the potential everything.

            "When you're loving, you're resonating, you're bonding, you're exchanging information, and you're gaining wisdom. When you're depressing, you're resonating, you let go of yourself and you bring back to God the wisdom you learned. You've fulfilled your destiny of making known the unknown emptiness.

            "When we're depressed, we're like the caterpillar who has satiated herself. We slow down, build a cocoon, dissolve ourselves, let ourselves go, depress into God, and dream the dream of the butterfly. Come spring, we'll emerge from our cocoon and spread our wings to begin a grand new flight.

            "When the battle is fought and the victory is won, we will all shout together for we have overcome. We'll talk to our father, this God, and become One."

            Malcolm smiled to the perplexed doctor. The doctor could follow what Malcolm was saying. He could understand Malcolm's reasoning, but he couldn't accept his theory. Depression was a seriously debilitating illness that needed to be cured. He spent his life studying how to treat people of this affliction and wasn't about to have a patient change his perception on the disease.

            "You probably think I'm crazy for believing all this. I realize it sounds far out. But it's my truth and it works for me. At least I'm not depressed anymore," Malcolm said.

            The doctor couldn't argue with that. That was why he was confused. His patient seemed to cure himself without his psychological advice.

            "I'm happy you're feeling better, Malcolm. I'm just concerned you may be suppressing your feelings behind your megalomaniacal philosophy. I don't want you to have a relapse, so I'm going to prescribe an anti-depressive for you, in case you have another episode. I also would like to see you again, perhaps in a couple of days. If you would like, we can schedule an appointment."

            Malcolm thought about this. He knew the doctor was skeptical of Malcolm's cure. He, on the other hand, had never felt so sure of himself. He decided he would come back not for himself, but for the doctor. He wanted the doctor to understand him so maybe the doctor could help other patients using this new perspective. So, he scheduled an appointment to see the doctor in three days.

            The first thing Malcolm did after leaving the hospital was to go visit Becky. He wanted to face her in order to see if he truly would be able to rise above the sadness he felt from losing her. He thought she might be with Bruce, but that didn't bother him. In fact, he hoped to see her with him for that surely would bring out bad feelings in him. Therefore, when confronted with this, it would be a great test for him.

            He arrived at her house instantly. He couldn't remember the time it took to go from the hospital to where he now stood, but that didn't seem unusual to him. He was where he wanted to be.

            He knocked on the door. Bruce answered. Malcolm's face lit up in a smile, contrasting the frightened look on Bruce's face.

            "Hi, Bruce. How's it going?" Malcolm asked.

            "Pretty good," Bruce said suspectingly. "How are you doing?"

            Bruce knew what had happened to Malcolm. Bruce felt sympathy for him and wondered why he looked so happy.

            "I'm doing great! It's an awesome day, isn't it?"

            Becky came to the door just then.

            Her face grew alarmed when she saw Malcolm.

            "Hi, Becky!"

            She walked up to him and gave him a huge hug. Bruce went inside to let them have their privacy.

            "What are you doing here, Malcolm?"

            "I came to see you. I wanted to know how you're doing."

            "Well, I'm doing OK. Better than I heard you were doing," she teased him. "Oh, Malcolm. I feel so bad. I didn't know you were going to lose it. I wish this could be easier."

            "It can be, Becky. I wish I could let you know what happened to me. I had a tremendous breakthrough last night. I found God, I think."

            "Malcolm, you are always finding God," she teased again.

            "No, I'm serious. I died last night. I wanted to die. I let me die. I was dead. The moment I let go of my life, I was enveloped with the most peaceful and compassionate feeling I've ever felt. I think it was God. It had to be. If it wasn't, then whatever it was still showed me something about love that I hadn't understood."

            "I've realized what depression is. It's the counterpart to love. Depression is the letting go of that which you love. It's giving back what you embraced. It's the realization the connections you make aren't necessary to define who you are. It's the discovery who you really are is the nothing, the unknown emptiness. It's going back to that place where you came from. It is God. I believe this so much that there's no way I will let the psychological affects of depression control me any longer. I know who I am now. It isn't you. It isn't any of my relationships. It isn't my personality. It is God. It is everything. I am connected to Universe, so I can never be alone except when I let it go."

            He smiled at her. She didn't understand, but smiled back through her tears.

            "You are an inspiring person, Malcolm. I wish I could see through your eyes for just one moment and know where you’re coming from. I could use a breakthrough like you've had."

            "How are you feeling, Becky?"

            "Confused. I miss you sooo much. I still have a lot of love for you I want to express to you. There are times when I feel like I'm going crazy knowing I can't be with you anymore. I didn't want to contact you because I was afraid I'd make you feel worse, and also me."

            "Becky, you can see me anytime you want. I still love you and want to support you as best I can. I don't want to just abandon our friendship. I think I’ll be OK with our change in relationship, as long as you are."

            "I still want to be friends, too."

            They hugged each other deeply, feeling their love for one another intensify.

            "I have something for you."

            "You do?" she said, smiling. "What is it?"

            "It's a special gift. I've never given this to anyone before."

            He closed his eyes, reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out seven thornless red roses, which were in perfect condition, one at a time. He took a big sniff to smell them, smiled and handed them to her. Becky stared in awe.

            "How did you fit all those in there? How come they're in such good shape?"

            Malcolm just smiled and said, "Love."

            He gave her a kiss on the forehead, cheeks and lips. She felt an energy enter her head with each kiss, something she had never felt before.

            "Who are you, Malcolm?"

            "You already know that. Just remember."

            He bowed to her, turned around and walked away. To Becky, it appeared he glided away. She would have sworn his feet didn't touch the ground.

            Malcolm let his burning chest guide him through his town. He had no particular place to go. He just wanted to be where he was, in love.