One day everything changes. Someone manages to break away from the chains, and cautiously ventures to the other side of the wall, and with great amazement begins to observe the process that creates the shadows. The person who experiences this awakening becomes free in more than one sense. This self-freed prisoner sees the fire, and also sees the objects that obscure the light and thereby create magnified shadow images of the shape of these objects. The so self-freed prisoner begins to understand that the mythology of the world of shadows the prisoners had created for themselves was not real, but was merely a construct of their deduction based on the limitations of their perception.

      The freed prisoner also soon understands the fire to be the source of their light, contrary to the myths that the prisoner's had come to believe to be real. Also, in the distance behind that fire the freed prisoner discovers that there exists an exit from this cave of shadows and delusions. Behind this exit the self-freed prisoner discovers a whole new world, a world of blinding sunlight that he soon understands to be the glorious nature of the real universe. Also, this suddenly free person discovers at this very threshold as he enters into the sunlight, that he isn't a prisoner anymore.

      "With this profound allegory Plato illustrates the challenge that we all face to resolve the great paradoxes of human existence," said Indira. "We live in a world of human thought that is defined by the limitations of what our senses are able to behold, and by the finity of the imaginary worlds that we deduce from what we thus see. We bow to those shadows that the limited senses tell us is the reality of our being and our universe. But when we, like that prisoner, break free from the chains that bind our existence; when we see the fire and the process that causes the shadows; when we begin to understand the processes of the real world and finally see the exit from that cave; then the whole cave experience becomes little more than just a shadow itself; a shadow of a bad dream.

      "This story illustrates my life," Indira concluded. "When Pete helped me to take off those chains, back then in Old Delhi, a whole new world unfolded. A great tragedy had caused me to consider suicide at the time. Suddenly, with a few perceptions changed, I stood in the sunshine, but its light wasn't blinding. It illumined my heart, and I was overjoyed by what I found there. Do you know what it is like when one steps from such a cave into the daylight? Suddenly everything became enveloped in love. Love became everything, uplifted everything, it fulfilled every need, even the most basic human needs, even those elements of it that we are taught not to acknowledge. In the light of love the most ordinary becomes extraordinary; melodies become music; a smile a symphony; an outstretched hand a commitment to enrich one another and the world. In this light, portals open for meeting our needs in the human dimension, in the most unconventional and unexpected ways."

      She paused for a moment. Perhaps she knew that I needed her to pause. It gave me time to enjoy her image of a beautiful person standing in the sunshine, talking about love. I loved that image as a gardener loves a rose, knowing well that the heart of the beauty that I saw was in myself. I had always understood this. She, too, understood it, I was sure of it, though we never talked about this in Delhi. Still, everything that happened there was a reflection of it. I was hoping she would bring at least some of it to light here in the sun-filled world of our island paradise.

      "I think it was in Old Delhi where the CSB story really began," she continued, then paused again, looking at me, waiting for me to nod.

      "Right! It began at our very first breakfast," she said, "preceded by a long scientific exploration of the necessary dynamics of universal Love reflected in our love for one another and our humanity. It was on this day, this morning, at this height of spiritual perception, that I was suddenly able to look at myself as naked as I was born and embrace myself in that state with a great and a profound joy. This joy pervaded the rest of the morning. I was able to invite Peter to take part in this joy. Yes, this great light of universal love did meet my need as the divine Principle, Love, must do by its very design; and apparently it met Peter's need also. Out of it came a morning of sunshine, tea, joy, sex, with something to eat in-between. No biscuits. But none of that would have been possible without the scientific foundation that had been established first, that opened the portal to the light of universal love.

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Stories about  Healing from novels by Rolf A. F. Witzsche