“So, what do you think of the human experience in general on Planet Earth? A success, or a failure,” the voice of the silence asked me as I drove through the mountains of the Laurentians on my way south to Montreal.

I thought about it for a moment.

“It depends,” I responded silently, objectively, like I was simply an observer. “If we have but one life to live with nothing afterward, then the human experience — or is it an experiment? — is a terrible tragedy. So many people suffer, indeed, everybody suffers at some points in their lives, some more so than others. If it is all ultimately for naught, then Earth is nothing but some perverse freak, if not the devious contrivance of some supernatural entity, that has resulted in the torture of billions upon billions of sentient beings, human and otherwise. That humans have been raised up to the point of reflecting upon their mortality, with only a glimmer of hope for something beyond, is the greatest tragedy of all if their reflections are delusions and their hopes in vain.”

The voice of the silence may or may not have requested it . . . but I felt the need to go on.

“On the other hand,” I continued, “if this life is but one role in our eternal adventures in the many dimensions and playgrounds of myriad universes, then the human experience/experiment on Planet Earth is a grand success, for a what a magnificent stage it is, so full of drama and adventure and karma — and love, the greatest of all.

The voice of the silence asked me: “Which do you think it is?”

I replied, silently:  “Of course, I prefer the latter option. I’d like to think that we are eternal entities that take on various cloaks to dwell in different realms, and that every tragedy and every triumph in every life are but roles being played by actors. I’d like to think that we are gods incarnating in myriad playgrounds on different stages, and that we all meet at times off-stage in the in-between states to share some beverages and herbs and recount our adventures in the different theatres of the Father’s house. I’d like to think that we are, ultimately and forever, each and all incarnations of one Eternal source, and that our experiences are Its experiences.”

The voice of the silence asked me: “So, that is your belief?”

“I don’t know,” I replied silently. “I feel it is so, in my heart. But I just don’t know for sure?”

The voice of the silence asked me: “Better to have lived and died, then, than never to have lived at all?”

“A bit of a superfluous question,” I responded silently. “Obviously, if this life is but one adventure in an eternity of incarnations, then, yes, better to have lived. But if there is only one brief existence, then it would have been better to have not lived at all, and that the Earth would have remained barren of all forms of life.

“Such is my objective report.”

The voice of the silence did not respond.

— Jillian