The human was disappointed that God hadn't taken better care of her, and God was disappointed that the human hadn't shown more response-ability for herself. When they met, the human complained, talking constantly for several thousand years. This she called "prayer." God listened patiently to the prayer, but did not reply. Finally the human ran out of words, sighed deeply, and said, "OK, God, now I guess you can speak."
The human waited uncomfortably for centuries in silence, but God said nothing. Finally the truth dawned on the human, who exclaimed, "My God, you are mute! All this time we made up stories about your Word, your Gospel, your Good News. But you don't speak at all."
God just smiled and gazed into the human's heart. The human liked that. It felt good. She called it "meditation." For two thousand years she relaxed into this quietness, until she began to hear a kind of voice. Or was it music? Or just the still quiet murmur of a subterranean stream in the wilderness. Or a lullaby at the breast. Then she realized it was the sound of her own breathing. Yet the sound was so beautiful, it drew her into even deeper silence, into a radiant blue sky of pure Presence... The sound was like a note struck in the empty bell of darkness before creation, or a note never struck at all, just chiming in the wind of eternity. This immaculate sound lured her effortlessly toward a place inside where silence was no longer silent, emptiness was no longer empty, but a wellspring of joy, overflowing with inexpressible light.
"This is your voice, isn't it?" she finally asked God. "And it is you who breathe in me!" But God did not need to answer. God just kept filling her with the astonishing gift of inhalation, and she kept offering it back as an exhalation of gratitude. And so there was inside her own intimate body a never-ending Eucharist, a ceremony of gift and gratitude, recreation and return. It was a miracle, yet it was merely breathing.
"From now on," the human whispered, "This is how I pray. I breathe, I listen, I surrender to the gaze of silence."
The disappointment was over. The human no longer waited for angels of God to solve her problems for her. With the gift of divine breath, she could heal herself, and heal the earth. Rejoicing in her own breath as the very Spirit of creation, she felt sure-hearted, strong and generous, able to respond to any challenge. And her independence pleased God deeply.
She tried to say, "Thank you." But she found that she couldn't speak any more than her creator could. They were both mute with wonder at each others beauty. How could gratitude be contained in words? After all, the two sounds "thank you" are just the out-breath and in-breath. Do they need to be spoken? We breathe out our thanks. And when we breathe in, we receive God's "You" as our own Being. What could be simpler?
And here is the greatest wonder of all. In the empty space between the words, where out-breath offers itself to in-breath, there is a secret, silent, divine, dimensionless point - the Ayin Soph in Hebrew, the Bindu in Sanskrit - infinitesimally small yet containing all galaxies, all past and future worlds. Here the Lover merges with the Beloved. We carry this place wherever we are. It is called the Heart.
"Now, just to breathe is my worship," whispered the human. And God smiled.
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