Wide Moments

For you, what is the most natural trigger of reverence or awe?

What I mean is that when looking up at a sky full of stars, my mind hushes and melts into that expansiveness without my doing anything, a reminder of how grand it is to be alive and aware of it.

Coming home from Beijing I will no longer take that for granted; for sure the lack of stars in my life for the past seven months is the reason I noticed this. The stars and being surrounded by the smell of foliage at night bring me great peace.

On my birthday I woke up early and went to watch the sunrise on the seashore. It was overcast, so you couldn't see the sun over the horizon, but all of a sudden over clouds far away the sun came up a brilliant magenta color I'd never seen before, off the periwinkle of the clouds and the slate of the ocean, it was magnificent.

Also while hiking recently some friends and I were perched on the peak of a mountain in New Jersey watching the sun settle over mountains west, and the silence.

Again, for me, the stars are the most powerful, but all three of these recently have stuck in my mind. What, if anything, does it for you?