Dear All,
I may be far too late to add anything of importance to your wonderful discourse, however, I wanted to express how much I enjoyed reading it.
Regarding the light - I think you two said most things that are to be said about these subjects and everyone will find something to agree with.
One tiny addition I would like to make as this insight came to me in a rather spectacular way. Therefore I thought it's too precious to keep it to myself, it's needs to be shared.
"A diamond has to be cut and shaped so that it can reflect the light and sparkle". Let's think of the hardest material we know on this planet. A diamond. It starts out as a mere pebble-like something. Not one bit spectacular. You shine a light on it and...nothing happens. No sparkle, nothing. Only when you take that stone from its earthy home, split it, cut it, shape it and cut it again a thousand times - only then will you get a stone that sparkles and reflects the light in all its brilliance. Spare a thought for the stone... it cannot lie in its earthy home and wish to become a "sparkler" without being cut. It may lose a good part of itself in this process. (Think of self-purgation...you don't come out the same as you went in...) It may well end up half the size, but many times its old brilliance :-)
Cut and shaped in the right way, it cannot only reflect the light, it can direct it as well. Given the right shape and pressure, that little stone could cut its way right into the middle of the earth, it's that hard and that sharp. There is no other material that I know that comes from the earth and reflects the heavenly light like a star. But to do this, it needs to be shaped, cut, split, cut again...
In the same way, we need to be "shaped and cut". We may well end up with half the personality we started out with...but we'll sparkle :-)
Some stones may be purer than others, yes, but then we must accept that we're all different. None of us is like the other and yet we are all of the same source. There's a diamond, there's a brilliant sparkler in all of us. Whether or not we can bring it out and let the light flow through us, whether we can reflect and direct it - that depends very much on our ability and willingness to be shaped.
This insight came to me one lovely day and it came with a medicinal dose of pain. (Just so I'd not forget the lesson...) :-)
I wanted to share this experience with you and encourage everyone not to be afraid. Yes, it will hurt and yes, the pain will go away. Before you enjoy the benefits of letting the light stream into your life, you'll have to pave the way a bit and that's never an easy task. But the rewards are simply out of this world :-)
Thank you,
best wishes,
Ichtys