Achieving Serenity

Keep Your Heart Open

Faithful feelings

My name is Kos and I am the god of a universe I created. My universe is almost identical to the Earth you live in, but I wanted to do something interesting with mine.

Anyone and everyone can have whatever their minds can imagine, which I call their "prize", but there is a catch. I will not simply hand over a prize to my people; instead, they are given tools they must use to gain access to their prize. The amount of tools they must collect depends on the magnitude of the prize.

For every positive thought a soul has, they are awarded 5 poz-points. For every negative thought the person has, they are awarded 1 neg-point. If a soul goes three days in a row with more poz-points than neg-points, they will be given a tool they need to use to receive their prize. There are certain events that can happen or things people can say or hear that will cause a boost in points. This is designed to create a level of randomness in the universe but was also created with the concept of karma in mind.

For every possible action a soul can take, an additional dimension is created. I'm able to observe alternate dimensions to see how various actions would have impacted a soul's life.

I want to share a story that I believe the people on your Earth could relate to. It's a tragic tale of a dimension I don't enjoy visiting, however, I believe the experiences of the individuals involved create useful lessons for you, the reader.

This is the story of Andrew, who, like many people, wanted vast amounts of money as their prize. Financial greed seems to be an instinctual journey that most souls journey down at least once, however, I am pleased to say that more often than not my people learn the value of love can never undermine the value of currency. For Andrew, the number of dollars was locked in- one million. He didn't care how he was going to get it, but he was determined to become a millionaire no matter what path he had to take.

As a result, he would embark on many different paths. Andrew was a talented kid, and in his adulthood, he proved to be higher than average on the intelligence scale. He played instruments such as piano and the guitar, as well as sports- baseball being his favorite though he was very athletic and performed well in all sports. He enjoyed writing songs and stories. For a while, Andrew was convinced that hip-hop was his future. He saved up money to buy all the studio gear he needed to begin recording, but like his other attempts, Andrew inevitably put the music down. He thought he was going to be the next Stephen King at one point, and even drafted an entire novel. He sent it into a few publishers, all of which told him his story was too hokey. Andrew wanted to get into acting, and would search online for auditions, but never actually showing up out of fear.

To say Andrew liked feedback was a tremendous understatement. He was obsessed with people being impressed by his work, and he was avid to get any kind of response from any person. When it truly came to down to the basics- Andrew wanted attention; more specifically, he wanted to be famous. He saw people on television that he wanted to be like, mostly because he saw how much the crowds loved them. Andrew wanted to get as rich as he possibly could from whatever it is people wanted from him. He believed he could do anything, and he wasn't wrong.

Andrew eventually discovered poker when he was twenty-one years old, and decided that this was the exact path he was looking for. He felt so emotionally comfortable at the tables and loved playing the big tournaments, dreaming for the first place prize. Poker proved to be the one thing that Andrew didn't drop. He kept at it for ten years until his poz-points were beginning to plummet. Andrew wasn't a winning player, and the evidence of his stats was making him feel insecure about his financial stability.

There was a poker tournament in Malaysia that some of Andrew's heroes were going to be playing in, but the buy-in was $5,000 USD, plus it was like another $2,000 just to fly down there. Andrew came to the conclusion that he was going to play this tournament, and if he lost, he would quit poker forever. He had about $5,000 to his name right now but didn't have enough for the plane ticket. Andrew decides since he is going big or going home, he might as well sell some possessions to give him enough money to enter the tournament.

After pawning off everything except for his furniture, Andrew takes the plane trip to the tournament which was scheduled to begin at 12:00 pm the next day. He is lonely but brimming with hope, as he giddily waits to see the poker players he was seen on TV so many times. If he's lucky, he'll be able to play some hands with them. Andrew wasn't so lucky, because a disaster happened the day he boarded the plane. His flight had several engine failures and the pilot was forced to make a crash landing on a small island made of rock.

He was extremely scratched up, but he survived. Andrew crawled out of the smoke-filled cabin and coughed a lung out before taking gaze upon the plane debris. There were no other people around, and it took Andrew about twenty minutes before he had realized he was the only survivor.

All communication equipment in the cockpit appeared to be in flames, and Andrew wouldn't even know where to begin to call for help. His cell phone was not getting any bars, and Andrew realized he needed resources from the plane in order to survive. He was living in way too modern of an age to not be rescued, so it would only be a few hours before he'd be seeing helicopters overhead.

While going through everybody's luggage, Andrew comes across a black briefcase inside a duffel bag. When he unlocks the briefcase, his eyes almost bulge out of his skull as he sees what he has been dreaming for all his life: cash. And a lot of it. He dug through the whole briefcase to confirm it was completely filled with hundred dollar bills, and it was. Andrew quickly closed the briefcase and put it in his own luggage bag of stuff he was collecting. This was to be his money for when he is rescued.

Meanwhile, an aspiring journalist named Dennis is struggling with a pornography problem. He is tired of using his computer to look up filth and makes a decision to purchase another computer that shall only be used for work. When going through the computer for the first time, Dennis finds files already on the computer. He was certain that pawn shops always factory-reset their electronic devices, but it appeared there were still some files on the one he picked up.

Dennis finds a manuscript and submits it to 50 different publishers. It is proudly accepted to be a newly published work, and Dennis is given much praise for his literary genius. He feels guilt for being a fraud but is mostly just happy that he finally feels in control of his porn addiction. When all is said and done, Dennis makes $10 million dollars from the manuscript.

Andrew was never be seen from or heard from again. I couldn't rescue him, because he didn't want to be rescued. He cursed himself and all his failures, playing the familiar "of course this would happen to me" tape. He asked the universe to be able to come home, and I gave him that option. The briefcase with a million dollars in it had a GPS tracker that only worked if the briefcase was open for more than one minute. His neg-point count continued to thrive over his poz-point count and so the tools he needed to acquire to be saved kept increasing and increasing.

I can only show my people the door, but I cannot make them open it.