JUMPING OUT (April 11, 2012)

I dreamt that I was participating in the celebration of the work of a very successful engineer who decided to retire surprisingly early. He worked on the architectural and even urban scale. Coming from a wealthy family, he was fabulously wealthy on account of his many projects. I was among his teachers and mentors. I remember finding my name on many pages of an illustrated book that was prepared for the celebration. He was not present at the event, though. It took place in an open space crowded with people. At some point I was asked to say a few words to all the assembled. I remember making circles through the crowd and speaking at the top of my voice. I started by defending his decision to retire early. There were things even more important than work. Although I did not mention the path of yoga, I was hinting at it. And then I turned to his good fortune to retire wealthy. But wealth was not needed for such a decision. Jumping out is everyone’s option, I argued as persuasively as I could. I was close to the end of my speech when I woke up. For some reason, Peter Diamandis of the X Prize Foundation fame immediately came to my mind. He would fit the engineer from my dream pretty well. In addition, we were quite close while he was studying at MIT. He took part in several of my workshops on space colonization. However, I just could not imagine him ever jumping out.