What a wonderful feeling to be bowled over by the world. To look at all the madness, the beauty and the depth and think: this has come about. This exists. This is a world so full of potential for beauty and laughter, despair and torture and all the shades of gray between. It is a feeling almost too great to face. It sometimes seems, when there is so much we do not understand, such vastness we will never chart, so many people we will never meet, and so much power that we do not have, that we must be crushed under the weight. Crushed under the weight of such an awesome scale as dwarfs us and our small achievements. Of course we may feel overwhelmed, yet, if we can muster the strength of character, we can learn to look into the face of this vastness. Then perhaps we can stand in the shadow of nature and feel like we belong.

Imagine the moment at which you have been most in awe of nature. Take that intensity of feeling, of humility, of wonder and powerlessness and imagine a cave dweller in the same position ten thousand years previous. There are myriad human beings who have sat in stunned silence as they witnessed the world around them, and we can only imagine the magnification of the feeling of wonder in a cave dweller with hardly an inkling of what was going on round him. For the vast majority of the conscious human beings who have ever thought such things, the feeling was too great. The cave dweller could not ride the crest of the wave, and was unable to face the might of nature without the aid of the gods. The cave dweller was doubtless a great deal more fearless than we could ever be, but we live in a different time. Such is the knowledge and control the human can call upon that it can face up to nature with humble pride, and live its days in awe of its existence, not fear.

Even in these days many shield their eyes from the awesome nature of the universe. There are a great many blankets to cover ourselves with, but we can only truly face up to the world with pride if we cast off each and every one. We only have to look around to see such blankets. Television is one. Watch the world through a small box, and it will never look big enough to harm you. Religion is another. Treat the world as an overture, and all its pain will pale when compared to the main event. The cult of celebrity is a third. Watch the world as a puppet show, and you'll imagine someone's pulling the strings. These things are not wrong, but a true feeling of unity with the world surrounding you cannot derive from them. They are sunglasses to shield the eyes from pain, but they hide more than that.

We should take strength from the fact that, if the existence of the world is too incredible to believe, then anything we use to explain it must be at least as incredible. This should give us the resolve to face up to our fears at the first opportunity, namely accepting that the universe exists as it is, and that it doesn't need a reason. Such a realisation gives us the opportunity to stand on the crest of the wave, in the knowledge that we are here in this amazing place and soon won't be, drinking that fact in with purpose. Cast off the blankets one by one, and we are left with our existence. And what a spectacular thing that is.

Giles Hayter
London
March 2009