Encouragement

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Sitting it in the full afternoon sunlight, he looked down into the chasm that extended endlessly before him. Time didn’t matter to him any more than the price of rice in China, and he wasn’t anywhere near China. He wasn’t near anything he was familiar with or cared about for that matter. He was on the wrong side.

A raindrop fell off of a vibrant green leaf on the opposite side of the chasm and fell into the waiting void. He secretly envied it. It may be falling, but at least it was free to do so. Everything on the other side was free and wild. Everything on this side was stuck, captive to an unknown evil.
He could see a vast forest on the other side but nothing on his side except crag-ridden sandstone overhangs and dunes that reflected the sun in a most harsh manner. He wasn’t sure why he was alive, or if he was alive, or what life might be if it wasn’t what he was experiencing.
He was well acquainted with pain and fear. Misery also seemed to greatly enjoy his company.
He wore a tight pair of pants that came up near his knees and were obviously very old. What had been the knees, before he had grown too large to fit these poor pants properly, had gashes and one could tell from looking at them that he had attempted to repair them, which only caused more holes. His shirt had once been a bright blue button up collared masterpiece, but had since gone to pieces. Only one button remained attached, and only tentatively for that matter.
A stale wind caught his attention for a moment but no longer. He had felt it before, long ago, but it had turned out to be nothing then, why would anything be different this time. What could possibly change?

Still, it drifted in.

Still, it tempted him to jump.

Still, he rejected such a foolish notion.

Still, he chose life over certain death.

He didn’t want to loose what he had.
He may have been well on his way to insanity though, because he almost jumped this time. He could have sworn he heard voices in the wind telling him it was safe. What a ridiculous notion. Safe to jump!? That’s a laugh!
He looked back. There was nothing there worth living for. He had traveled for what had seemed like eternity toward this goal. Finding after all this time that he couldn’t reach the other side.
Life was on the other side of death.
Could that be it? He had to die before he lived? That’s what the sun had been whispering for so long that he had learned to ignore it.
He didn’t want to die!
But he didn’t want to live this way anymore, camping out on the side of the abyss waiting for anything more than a mirage to appear.

He jumped.

He wanted to close his eyes, but he couldn’t. He didn’t know what was happening, but he half hoped that the wind that had called to him would lift him up, up over the chasm and into the forest. Then as he fell into darkness, a beam of sunlight pierced through the darkness and told him that he was going to die.
In a harsh panicked voice, he shouted out to the sun that he didn’t need help! He would… then he stopped short. He knew that he was lying and so did the sun. He could accept help, or he could accept falling forever in the dark.
I’m sorry", he whispered, half expecting no reply.
His reply came in the form of a blistering light that caused excruciating pain in his whole body. Fire blazed inside his veins, being pumped miraculously by his heart. Everywhere the fire touched the very fiber changed, and after it changed it seemed to be able to tolerate the heat much better. He opened his mouth and fire licked out at the darkness that retreated from it as if from intense battle.
The sun forced out the darkness that was around him and he saw for the first time that you could fall up by falling down. Not only was he falling up toward the opening of the chasm now, but he was almost to the other side of the void, his destination now blissfully obvious.
It was ten times hotter when he landed in the forest than he had believed it to be from the other side, yet he didn’t think it was any less comfortable. In fact he liked it better. He set off to explore this new world of his and thanked the sun for it.

To this day he lives. To this day, he thanks the sun and wind for telling him to die.

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