Surrendering to Ki Energy for Peace (Part 2)

After my 100 days of training with ki energy, I still felt empty even though I had built up a lot of energy and had amazing experiences. I was empty because I was still unable to answer the simple question, “Why was I born?” Without an answer, I was just a person capable of playing with energy, nothing more than a technician. What good was it to know that I could survive in freezing temperatures using the power of ki energy if I lacked the answer I had been looking for all my life?

Trying Again
Bemoaning my own ignorance, I returned to Moak Mountain and vowed not to come down until I had an answer to my question. I decided to test my physical and mental endurance by not sleeping for twenty-one days, with only water for sustenance.

I tried everything to stay awake, including sitting at the edge of a sharp cliff, my arms wrapped around the thick branch of a tree, so that the fear of falling would keep me awake. I rolled down the steep mountainside several times as I sat on the edge of a rock in an effort to keep myself from falling asleep.

Growing Pains
Towards the end of the first week without sleep, I developed a severe headache of a magnitude I had never experienced. The pain in my eye sockets and my ears was so severe that I could not see or hear. As time went on, my brain seemed to shrivel and begin to deteriorate. My head seemed always on the verge of exploding.

After about two weeks, I knew that I would soon die. I felt a fleeting temptation to sleep, drink, and eat something in order to prolong my life a bit. I would have succumbed to temptation had I not survived the ordeal of freezing in the snow-covered field.

The pain became so severe, that I knew I was beyond saving. I tried to stand on my head and scream with all my might in order to relieve it. Eventually, I gave up.

Bursting Free
Once again, I decided to fully offer myself to the heavens above. As this thought crossed my mind, I felt the world open up before me with a loud boom in my brain. A soothing and refreshing feeling of cool warmth enveloped me. I was beyond my body, free of pain with a mind fully clear.

With an incredible expansion of feeling, I heard a voice cry out from deep within me, “Who am I?!”

The answer came, “I am cosmic energy (chunjikiun in Korean).” My tongue began moving of its own accord, mouthing the phrase, “My energy is cosmic energy, and my mind is the cosmic mind (chunjimaeum in Korean).”

At that moment, with profoundness I cannot describe, I heard the sound of the universe breathing, and it was the sound of my own breathing. I realized that the universe and I are not separate, but one! I knew that I am the stars, the moon, and the sun! When I see other people, I see myself. I became conscious that we are all sharing the same cosmic awareness. This was peace in the ultimate sense of the word, realizing that we are one with all existence.

New Purpose
I soon realized that this illumination, or “enlightenment” for lack of a better word, carries a heavy responsibility. I felt the responsibility of sharing my experience with others. If enlightenment benefits just one individual, what good is it? If Truth revealed to one individual ends there, what good is that Truth? If the power of enlightenment does not change the world, it is without value, not even worth the price of a loaf of bread.

So I decided to test the Truth I’d discovered by attempting to share it with the world. If my enlightenment was real, I could communicate it to others and it would affect them the way it affected me. Thus I had found a way to express my true purpose for this life . . . to help others to experience the spiritual awakening of inner peace. For enlightenment is peace.

Since then, all of my work—my writing, my speaking, my teaching and training—have all been for this purpose.