I spend some time here & there thinking about why I fly. The trivial answer is: because I like to! Of course this begs the not trivial question: why do I like to fly?

Try this: look away and close your eyes for about 30 seconds, and before you open them take three deep & slow breaths. Exactly when you open your eyes, not a moment later, observe the object that happens to be centered in your gaze. What color is it, how is its texture? Is it old or new? Good. Now think about how you saw that object when you opened your eyes. Hopefully there was a fleeting moment, a peculiar moment, in which you saw things differently. Like a quickly fading dream or deja vu, the moment you think about it, it is gone. Dust blown into the wind.

Now. Imagine: when you closed your eyes, suddenly you popped into an other world. This is a magical world–it looks a lot like the one we live in, but also somehow looks different. There are different rules, all sorts of terrifying things that can kill you very very quickly, and  best of all, a new type of freedom you’ve never felt before. You have been well trained for the dangers and rules, and you can handle them without too much worry or panic. You can spare some time and energy to soak up the beauty and freedom of this mystic world. And when you open your eyes you are back in this world–you don’t see just one thing newly, you see it all. The whole world. The problems, the pain, the beauty, the suffering and the laughter, you see anew. You stop and smell a flower.

Just like when you closed your eyes a minute ago, this moment fades too. A bit slower, albeit. Soon, maybe ten minutes or maybe a few hours, you have re-calibrated and you function in this world just as you did before you closed your eyes. Well, almost. There is a residual after effect…you are a little bit calmer and a little bit happier. And you remember the other world. And you will be back.

That other world is the sky, and that is why I like to fly.