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Writer's pictureJustin Stewart

More than meets the I

As my co-creative journey across the surface of this magnificent Earth body continues, I'm always seeking to maximise the experiential value available in every now moment. In dedication to this mindful awareness, I humbly allow myself to be divinely guided by what I have discovered, to be an omnipresent power. This power is a palpable magnetic pull, an omnipotent force of nature, one that synchronously attracts me to lands, places and spaces, where insight, meaning, and purposeful experience, inevitably reveals itself.


Such was evidenced in technicolour, when my wife and I travelled to Phu Quoc, Vietnam, an idyllic, tropical island just south of the shores of Cambodia. Having completed our due diligence, which predominantly centred around earmarking the best of its beaches, we discovered that the island provided us with a unique opportunity to visit a famous landmark, that being the statuesque Quan Yin, the White Tara, perched high up on a coastal hillside.


For us, this emblematic icon that gazed nobly across the seas, was the perfect encapsulation of the lightness, the softness, and the organically nurturing signature of the Vietnamese lands, and its native people. Shortly after our arrival, we excitedly made for the southern tip, in order to make our heartfelt acquaintance with, what was for us, a dramatic representation of the divine Mother.


One windy road followed another, until some thirty minutes into our trip there she was, visible through the majestic trees lining the slopes. With sweat dripping down our brows, and emotions high, we stood, peering upward toward her ever so gentle face, and nourishing Sophianic presence. After holding solemn commune with her for some time, my ever curious partner was overcome with a compelling drive to walk around to the rear of the grandiose figure, as though something had commanded her attention.


Lạc Long Quân and Âu Cơ, a legendary couple who founded Vietnam and their descendants.
Lạc Long Quân and Âu Cơ

To our supreme surprise there was in fact something, something as equally significant as the main attraction itself. It was an immense mural, a coppery gold scene dominating the entire back wall at the foot of the Lady Buddha. It depicted a fairytale, the folklore story of the creation of the country itself. Impressive male and female counterparts, as like the expression of Mother and Father Creator, stood proud and strong as warriors, flanking what we assessed to be the sphere of creation overlaid by the outline of the land blessed with indescribable poise and beauty.


My love was utterly be swept by tears, tears that spontaneously flowed without obvious context. Something about the scene had spiritually moved her, and so did it me. We saw ourselves reflected in this depiction, as though the two mirrored the two of us in our own spiritualised union. In these unprecedented and tumultuous times, we too stand bravely wielding rod and staff, amidst the flux within the cycles of life. In togetherness we embraced, processing all of the deep feelings that arose. ‘Go, go, and touch the sun,’ she delicately instructed, and as I placed my hand upon the core of the creation, high up in the sky, the solar body responded with resplendent radiance, as though one sun was acknowledging another.


As it always does, that prominent force, once again, had lead us somewhere pertinent. What one just might have assumed to be leading to no-thing, in the blink of an eye, become profoundly touching, prolifically activating, and thoroughly illuminating — an unforgettable and unexpected encounter with the wonder that is accessible in the eternal now.









Central to the mural is the Đông Sơn drum.
Look closely, do you see what I see? Let me know in the comments.

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