If you take a close look, just right of the tree and above the glittery snow,  square figures emerge from the muted, misted background. Three rooftops, covered in snow. Just off the second and third boughs from the tree base, as if these two branches are pointing to it, is another square. Nestled against the dark green of background forest, it’s another building made by human hands. All these are too geometrically precise to be natural, and none of these are particularly impressive. But seen from this high vantage point, they show how ordinary human things are surrounded by beauty and clothed in misty mystery.

I think this is what meditation is about: seeing how our ordinary dwelling places, our ordinary lives, are part of something extraordinary and beautiful. In this God-related and God-created space, we live our lives. Unless we take the time and get some distance, we may miss the wondrousness of it all. The floor slushed by boots, the drafty cellar stairs, the walls and ceilings in need of a good scrubbing and painting. It’s so easy to believe that these are what is true and real. And they are real – just not definitive.

One does not and cannot cancel out the other. How extraordinary.