I drive to work every day along the same route. It often happens that I suddenly have the feeling I don’t know where I am. Then, looking around, I realize I am exactly where I am supposed to be. What has happened? I have missed a familiar landmark. I have passed some tree or building, that I always notice, without noticing it. My habitual landmarks signal to me that a turn is coming up, but often I am barely conscious of noticing them. Still, something inside of me gets the message, until for some reason it doesn’t, and then I suddenly start seeing all sorts of things – yards and houses and stores and parks – that I never really looked at. When the landscape suddenly looks unfamailiar, like I never saw it before, that’s when I realize I might be lost.
And then I realize, almost every time, with a slight sigh of relief, that the turn is still ahead, just coming up.
The feeling of being lost and then found is often experienced with both slight apprehension and gentle relief; it is both pleasurable and unsettling. When we can do what we need to do somewhat mindlessly, like driving, it is just as if we are balanced at the center of the seesaw. The softcore sensations of going slightly out of balance are pleasurable, rather than scary, because at the center – in the comfort zone, so to speak – we are well-attuned to changes around us.
If we consciously navigate through our usual landscapes, we may go slightly out of balance on purpose. It is like looking at a painting from another angle, or listening to a symphony recording by a different conductor. We notice things we never noticed before. Not only is it pleasurable, but it can lead us down pathways into new landscapes. When we see beyond landscapes we are into ecosystems, and that is what being qualiadelic is all about!