SOUL SEARCH

SOUL SEARCH

I sighed, looking around my dreary apartment. A half-empty pizza box lay on the floor. The walls were stained and full of holes from the previous tenant, and the landlord had never invested the money to fix these issues. I shouldn’t complain, though; the location was ideal and I could never afford a “good” apartment on my minimum wage catering job anyway. Still, it wasn’t easy to make ends meet, and my long-term, long-failing relationship had finally ended, adding to my ever-increasing woes. I sighed again, pondering the miseries of my life, but my flow of thought was interrupted by a splash on my face. The ceiling had begun to leak a few days ago, and I didn’t have the know-how nor money to fix it. I stood up and stretched. Enough was enough. I needed to find a way out of this mess. Life couldn’t go on like this.

****

“Invest $20, 000 and see returns of ten times that number within a year,” A new enterprise advertising campaign promised. It sounded too good to be true. I had followed this marketing scheme for a few years though, and it actually seemed legitimate. There had been no reports of hoaxes, scams, or otherwise. The project was started by a group of financial investors who were marketing “go green” products—getting people who were environmentally aware to pool their resources together to create an entirely new industry where green products would replace mainstream ones. All investors had so far made mind-boggling profits. No one had made under the promised amount. The $20, 000 investment price tag was meant for serious people who would really commit themselves to this goal, to deter the uncommitted. You couldn’t invest lower than that sum because they wanted only people who would be zealous and care about this project on a fundamental level. After all, if you invested $20, 000 into something, you’d care far more about it than if you had invested only a dollar. Now, I had always been a greenie, so “selling” me on the idea wasn’t the issue. The near-impossible initial investment was. Where the hell was I going to find such a sum? Even worse, the endeavour seemed to be an eternal commitment to the project afterwards as well. Every investor was also expected to pull their weight for the ever-increasing workload and responsibility to keep it all going. From the hundreds of testimonies I had read, it seemed to take over one’s life because there was always more and more to do for it. Sure, the profits were good, but was it worth dedicating your life to? I was a creative person, delighting in the joys of art, literature, and developing my own ideas. This venture had none of that. It meant committing myself to a lifetime of investments and numbers, profit margins and advertising campaigns. Yet I desperately needed to find material comforts to sustain myself. I wanted a comfortable life. Was that too much to ask? Was I selling out by going down this path? This ate at me time and again, a recurring internal struggle between the practical and the ideal.

I angrily closed my laptop, the same repeating conversation ringing around my head as it had many times before, when I received a phone call. Sarah. My bestie. She was the most supportive and loving person you could ever hope to meet. She had a sixth sense of some kind, always seeming to know when I was in despair.

“Hi honey,” she beamed through the phone. “Want to come out for a coffee?” I smiled. A coffee with Sarah was the perfect antidote to my troubles. It was just what I needed. I picked up my bag and left my leaky apartment, jumping on the next bus to meet her downtown.

“HEY!” she yelled at me once I got there an hour later, giving me her standard all-enveloping hug. “Hi” I retorted, delighted, smiling back at her warmly. “I already took the liberty of ordering your usual,” she smiled, pointing to the cappuccino on the table. I sat down, thanking her, and we got to talking. I regaled her with the torments of my life. She attentively listened to everything before growing serious; a strange divergence from her usual chirpy demeanour. “Honey, you sound like you need spiritual guidance.” I almost broke out laughing. Spiritual? I had long ceased believing in such things. I was far too worried about how I was going to survive week to week to worry about the “spiritual” aspects of existence. I groaned internally. Sarah continued; “There’s this old woman who lives just outside of the city. She’s “weird,” and kind of creepy, but she knows things… I visited her at my lowest and she really gave me some valuable insights as to how I should reflect on my life. Your birthday is coming up, and I’d be happy to pay for the consultation for you as a present.”

“Sarah—really?” I said. “That’s very kind, but you know I don’t believe in that stuff anymore. I can—”

“Shush,” said Sarah, uncharacteristically cutting me off. “This will be good for you. I’ll call to make an appointment. I promise, it’s going to be a life changing experience.”

****

A week later, I stood outside the dilapidated little gate that led to the house of this strange old woman. It was such a grim and overcast day, matching my feelings perfectly. I felt so stupid. My friend had paid hundreds of dollars for this, though, and it felt like a betrayal if I didn’t go, so I worked up my courage and stepped through the gate, walking up the little path and boldly knocking on the door. To my surprise, it swung open.

“Enter,” a croaky old voice rang out from the darkness. It smelled pleasant in here, of fresh herbs and flowers, but the sweet fragrances served only to mask the feeling of absolute anxiety I felt. Old animal skulls stared silently at me from the various countertops of this unusual woman’s home. An aura of dread was practically palpable in the air. “Sit,” the same croaky voice demanded. I didn’t dare disobey. I sat in the chair closest to me, which was positioned next to a small table with another chair on the opposite end. Before I had a chance to gather my thoughts, an old hunched lady walked out of the darkness, slowly shambling towards the empty chair. She stared at me blankly. One of her eyes was milky white, adding to her disconcerting appearance. The other eye was a piercing blue.

“You’re here because you seek answers. You are lost,” the old lady said, in a matter-of-fact way.

“I, uh-” I started, but was cut off.

“Silence, young one,” she retorted. “You speak when it would better serve to listen. Your life has hit a wall. You’re lost, as many are, but the worst thing about you is that you are lost and not seeking. All you are doing is placing a band-aid over your wounds. You are not looking to stop the bleeding, to halt the corruption.”

I gulped. How did this woman know all this? I couldn’t deny what she was saying was true. I had believed in things, once upon a time, but that all seemed so far away now as to basically describe another life, another me. “Corruption?” I asked slowly, as if tasting the word.

“Aye, corruption,” she replied softly. “The corruption of simply seeking to fit in, to never step outside the bounds of the mundane, the normal. Many people die young spiritually, and are merely buried when they are old physically. Only at the end of their physical life are they pronounced “dead,” though in truth, they died long ago. Are you one of these walking dead?”

Suddenly, I grew angry. “That’s easy for you to say!” I said, louder than I would’ve liked. “You’re an old woman, and from the looks of things, your affairs are all in order. You’ve got a comfortable home and you don’t seem to be struggling to survive week in, week out.”

The old lady laughed at me, which was a further blow to my already wounded pride. “My time is nearing its end. It won’t be long before I cross the boundary between this world and the next. I’ve lived long and seen much, endured even more, and never balked at any challenge presented before me. I have lived life on my own terms. Can you say the same?”

I paused. I never had the opportunity to live life on my own terms. It always felt like I was side-tracked by things that needed to be done, and so I had little or no time for my passion projects.

“You don’t wait for opportunities to come to you,” the old woman continued, her sentence broken midway by a hacking cough. “You make them.”

“How can I make opportunities when I barely have enough food to eat? You are making this all sound so easy, when life is a lot more complex,” I said coldly.

She laughed at me once more in that derisive, mocking tone. It sounded like nails rattling across a metal sheet. “As I said, I am not long for this world. And you are a person like no other that I’ve encountered. A teacher must always find a student, a master must always find an apprentice. I shall give you my life savings. Twenty thousand dollars. You may do with it what you will.”

“Uh—what?” I said without blinking. “You’re just going to give me all this money, despite not even knowing me?”

She nodded calmly. “What is there to know? With most people, you can know all there is to fundamentally know about them within five minutes of conversation. They don’t struggle with internal demons. They only react to events in their environment. Certain people, like yourself, are akin to stars in the night sky. They stand out. They’re different. You don’t need to know their hobbies or favourite colour—all you need to know is their soul. And I’ve seen yours. It has much potential.”

I was stunned. I didn’t know what to say.

She reached into her desk drawer and pulled out a little black notebook. “Here,” she said, sliding the book across the smooth top of the table. “Within its pages are great teachings, and you’ll also find a cheque for $20, 000. With that money, you can invest in your financial future… or follow the instructions in the book, which will lead you on a great journey. The $20, 000 will cover the costs of finding a higher truth. Who knows where you’ll end up? You may end up homeless. You may end up as I have done, living alone at the edge of a city… or something else entirely. Happiness isn’t guaranteed, but that’s not what’s written within those pages. A journey is laid out. Those pages are imbued with meaning. Is meaning worth $20, 000?”

The question lingered uncomfortably in the air around us. I simply didn’t know what to say. She stood up and led me to the door. “Before you is a choice—a crossroads. What you do from here is up to you. Life is merely a construct of choices, and the consequences of those choices.”

****

An hour later, as I was sitting on the bus taking me home, clutching the little black notebook, frightened to even open it, I pondered my choice. I could be financially set up forever, though it would throw me into a world I wasn’t made for… or I could follow the teachings in the mysterious black book and find meaning, though there was no guarantee of any stability, security, or happiness. In fact, the journey could lead to the exact opposite of that.

What was I going to do?