That spaced out feeling

Mukul Sharma

Being in outer space can do funny things to people. During their stay in the International Space Station, for instance, various astronauts have reported feeling what’s called the “overview effect”: they are filled with wonder and awe about the universe and experience spiritual epiphanies such as unity with nature, transcendence and universal brotherhood.

Apparently, space affords some incredible experiences not usually encountered on Earth.

In Starstruck: Cosmic Visions in Science, Religion and Folklore, author Albert Harrison writes that looking down from the moon, spacefarers see a beautiful blue sphere, unmarred by political boundaries and feel an immediate urge for protecting their planet, its ecology and people. The problems of everyday life also become insignificant in comparison to the sense of an overwhelming grandeur.

It’s almost like a nearmystical experiences where humanistic thinking can overpower a worldview forged in science and the military.

Nevertheless, one might still wonder why a similar sense of awe doesn’t affect or permeate the earthbound when they look over their head at night and see so many other worlds scattered across the sky. The reason can’t just be boredom.

For, when the thief broke into the Zen Master’s house one night, he stole everything he could lay his hands on, including the clothes the Master was wearing. In the stillness that was left behind, the Master sat in his room looking out of the window at space for a long time. “Poor fellow,” he said, “he forgot to take this beautiful moon too.”