Once upon a time, there was a young man who lived in a forest. It was a huge forest with all types of climates and grounds. There was a swampy part of the forest, and there was a very dry part of the forest, with cactus and plants that didn't need water. You could find every season and kind of soil—swamps and deserts, tangled jungles, cold northern woods. He learned each one by heart and called them home.

He lived there and had always considered that to be the world. However, one day, while walking in the forest, he met a man. This man was not young, but he was not old. Mike looked into his eyes and felt he could trust him. He wanted to ask the newcomer who he was and from what part of the forest he had come, but something forbade him to ask.

And the man spoke: “Why are you in this forest? Why are you always here?”

Then Mike, the young man, answered, “Where could I be? Is there any place else besides this?” Then he managed to force out the question: “And who are you?”

The man answered, “I am the lord of everything here. I'm the owner of this forest, but I also have many more lands. Would you like to come and see them?”

Mike looked at him, at this new person who had drifted into his life, and said, “Are you sure there's another place? I mean, everything I have known all my life is this forest.”

The man nodded with a soft smile. “Come with me, and I'll show you. Do you want to be my friend?”

And Mike said, “Yeah, sure. Why not?”

They started walking through the forest, and soon they reached a little path that led them toward the thinning of the forest. Through that thinning, he could see open spaces very far away. He saw something that he didn't know what it was, but it was definitely not the forest. He was able to see the sky and things floating in the sky. In those few minutes, he got a glimpse of that place.

While he was staring, the man asked him, “Come with me, and I will show you more and tell you secrets of the world.”

But Mike was reluctant. He feared leaving his forest—the places he knew, the comfort of what was already known. He didn’t want to go to a place he didn’t understand. What strange dangers could he face there? He didn’t know.

So Mike said, “No, no, wait, wait. I can't. I have some stuff over there where I live that I need to take care of, and I need to bring some other things with me. I cannot leave that behind.”

The man looked at him and said, “Well, whenever you want, I am here.”

Mike went back for his stuff, and he got entangled in what was there—what he needed to do—and he totally forgot about his new friend and that new land. He stayed in the forest, entangled in the forest, until one day a memory came to him—a sudden glimpse of what he had seen that day when he had almost walked out of the forest with his new friend.

He pondered: “What is that? Why did I forget? I was going to go and see that new place, that new land with this man, and this man seemed so good and so friendly. Why didn’t I go? I never went back!”

He started searching and searching. He searched for a long time, and one day he found the little path. The forest was thinning again; there were not so many trees. However, there were lots of flowers—lots of flowers among the trees—and the land in front of him, free from trees, was full of flowers.

He went a little bit out into this open space, very scared, because this was not what he was accustomed to. Then, looking to the right, he saw a bench—and on that bench sat the man who had told him to be his friend and who had shown him this beautiful expanse. He was sitting there, unchanged, even though Mike was now old.

The man smiled at him and beckoned, “Come, come sit by my side.”

Mike was hesitant, but he approached the man and sat on the bench beside him. He felt this peace and this cleanliness. He was looking at everything, and he couldn't understand.

So the man explained: “Those are mountains. Those are clouds. That's a stream of water. That's a lake.” And he pointed to all the features of nature.

While Mike listened, he was at the same time recognizing them—even though he had never seen a mountain, a stream, or a lake. He was recognizing everything as if he had been there before.

He turned to look at the man and asked, “How is it that once you tell me what they are, I recognize them as if I had been here before? How can this be?”

The man turned to him and spoke softly, yet his voice carried through all creation. “Because you came from here. This is your home. The forest was only the forgetting.”

And Mike asked, “And all this is yours?”

The man said, “I am everything here—all that you see, I am. I am this forest, and I am this lake. I am this river and this mountain. I am the clouds in the sky and the rain that falls.”

Mike was amazed, and he knew—the man was telling the truth.

Tears fell like first rain. “Then why was I sent there, among thorns and shadows? If you are all this, why do you own the forest where we got entangled in so many things, not really good things? Couldn’t you turn it all into this beautiful expanse?”

He was moved, and tears kept coming to his eyes. Like a little child arguing with his father, he exclaimed, “If you are all this—because you are all this—why were we all in the forest where we got entangled in so many things, not really good things, and we couldn't live in this beautiful other place?”

The man looked toward the horizon, where light met earth.

“Because had I placed you in beauty from the first, you would have walked past it blind. Now you have tasted exile. Now you will never mistake the forest for the truth. You now know what it is to live in the dark forest, without love. And now you know ME.”

And Mike, with a sigh, exclaimed, “And I will never lose YOU again.”