Imprints & Pathways
(A series )
By Sophie Rouméas

III. The Mountain

I do not know
whether, upon coming into the world,
your singularity will be recognized,
encouraged, celebrated.
I do not know
whether your family, your school,
your community, or the chances of life,
will know how to see what makes you unique.
Nor do I know
how long the universe will take
to send you signs,
or how long you
will take to receive them.
Sometimes, to survive—
physically, emotionally,
spiritually, intellectually—
one must first be accepted.
So singularity retreats,
becomes secondary, held in waiting.
Until the day
when, by other paths,
you rediscover your original singularity.

There is no bad part within you,
nor one that is right or less worthy.
There is what is,
and what helps you navigate
the ocean we call life.
Some say that evolution
resembles the ascent of a mountain.

This mountain may seem to you
arduous or gentle,
steep, varied,
at times luminous.
You will encounter the seasons there—
yours,
and those of others.

There will be slippery leaves or stones,
steps to begin again,
others to lose further on.

At times, your mountain will be solitary.
At other times you will cross paths
with beings who walk alongside you for a while,
or who descend.
There will be plateaus
to catch your breath,
and perhaps also to grow bored.
Boredom is never a loss.
In modern cosmology,
time does not exist.
It is perception in motion:
a face that changes,
a body that grows
and then diminishes—
if that is how one chooses
to look at the thread of life.

As you walk your mountain,
you will encounter beliefs.
Some will have allowed you to love life,
others to drift away from it.
You will then be able to choose:
which values,
which beliefs,
allow you to live in inner harmony
and with the world—
human, animal, vegetal, mineral.
You will sometimes find
markers left by others.
They may suggest a direction.
It is up to you to assess,
with your senses and your instinct,
whether these markers are right for you.
No one walks the same mountain.

There will be days of thirst
and days of abundance.
You will look for rivers to drink from,
fields in which to rest.
If you stop,
if you listen to the silence
as thoughts grow quiet,
you may hear
an inner light
whispering words,
of comfort—or of growth.
At the summit,
the wind may be strong.
You may feel tempted
to descend a little,
to integrate the path you have traveled.

Uprooted trees will sometimes block your way,
forcing you to take
a detour, for a time only.
You will pass hills, ravines,
a hidden valley,
sunsets
and dawns.
There will even be
days without reflection.
Each day,
you train your breath,
your body, your presence,
to persevere; beyond perfection,
life seeks a stable resonance.
Even if you do not yet see
the fruits of the effort,
you are rhythm in the making.

There will be beings
whose closeness you choose
out of love or loyalty—
or sometimes both.
And others
from whom you will step away
for the sovereignty of your being,
for your safety, for your integrity.
There will be days
when you will want to turn back
to return to the familiar.
The familiar is sometimes more reassuring
than the unknown,
even before knowing
whether it is better.

You cannot change where you come from.
Yet what has shaped you is not what defines you.
But each day, you can choose
how you walk,
how you rest,
what meaning you give
to your actions,
your thoughts,
your relationships,
your silences,
and even the turmoil of the world.
Each step taken today
naturally reshapes the past.
Ask yourself sometimes:
What am I feeling right now—
does it belong to me?
In learning to answer that question
lie
serenity
and detachment.
You are not asked, so early,
to detach from love,
nor even from suffering.
Only
to detach
from what does not belong to you,
to change what you can,
and to accept what you cannot change.

Perhaps you will ask yourself:
What is found at the summit?
Each step can bring you closer to yourself,
where all winds converge,
where the infinity of being
and of beings,
of realms,
of circumstances,
gathers into a vision
of three hundred and sixty degrees.

And then:
What comes after?
There is also
the art of descending,
of sometimes slipping, falling,
getting back up, doubting.
Why descend?
One never makes the journey for oneself alone;
one always descends for the living.

So, dear soul,
live with presence,
fully and rightly.
May you honor
the path you have walked,
the light recognized, given and received,
and the zones of shadow
you dared to explore,
within yourself
and in meeting others.
And then let us continue.
What comes next will reveal itself
at the rhythm of your steps.