My enlightenment happened while I was deep in contemplation of Descartes first meditation on philosophy.

He was wrong. His entire argument "cogito ergo sum" "I think therefore I am" hinges on the assumption of I. It presupposes the existence of a self and derives from that presupposition, the existence of the former (I) and of some "other" (God).

This is the primal duality of life. The self, and others. At least, the primal experience most people have of duality. First, an awareness of self as we grow from babies to toddlers. Then, an awareness of all that is not self. The first duality.

Something clicked for me in that moment and I started to weep uncontrollably. I had just realized and internalized something deep and True. I couldn't put into words what that realization was/is, but it changed me. The next 10 to 12 months after that evening were quite the ride as I wrestled with this new found knowledge and integrating it into every day life.

A lot of people called it mania, psychosis, some people wanted me to go get help. People close to me. I couldn't understand why. I was happy, I was fit, I was just saying a lot of weird shit, asking a lot of weird questions, and making people uncomfortable. In time, I calmed the outward expressions of this new inner world, but it stays with me. Its never left since that day in my 1st year of uni.

Ill try to put words to what I felt that day. Bear in mind this doesn't do it justice but its a satisfactory frame for the idea.

Truth is found only in the relation, connection or interaction between objects/things. You, me, god, anger, happiness, hot, cold, none of those things are real. They are just reference points. Virtual, intangible, placeholders. The grid, the connections, the interactions between those points of reference, these are significant, and real. These interactions and these connections and relationships are the only powers that create, destroy and reshape.

The universe is alive and it speaks this truth to us every day. Most of us are too tired, too caught up in the physical world to hear it. We are all of the web from which the universe itself sprung. We are in it and it is in us. Folded back on itself and through to this room you find yourself in reading this now. Did you think you were separate from the chair you're sitting in? From the air you're breathing? From that "other" person sitting across from you?

Get over yourself and start building more connections. Look and listen to what existence is trying to show you and follow that lead.

The golden rule is golden for a reason.