A couple of weeks ago, I climbed to the top of Bell Rock for the first time in a very long time. Sometimes I went more than once a day when I was first getting settled in Sedona, but in recent years I haven’t had many opportunities to climb up Bell Rock. That day, Bell Rock was as welcoming as ever in the warm afternoon sunlight. I had almost reached the top, when I looked up between the tall red rocks and saw the spotless blue sky between them, and my heart leapt as though it were the first time I’d ever seen such a sight.

Standing next to Bell Rock, Courthouse Butte glowed golden as the sun started to make its way down, and the branches of the pine trees stirred gently in the evening wind. That day, as I meditated for quite some time at the top of Bell Rock, I thought of all the people who visit Sedona, said to number in the millions.

It suddenly occurred to me that the people who come to Sedona are like salmon returning to their natal stream during the spawning season. Salmon hatch in a river and go to the ocean; then, when they have matured and it’s time for them to lay their eggs, they return to the stream where they were born. At times, the journey is so difficult that their whole body is beaten to a pulp as they give all their effort to swim upriver. Salmon that have come back to their natal stream in search of the origin of their life lay their eggs and either return to the ocean or die there.

Many people come from neighboring cities such as Phoenix, Tucson, or Los Angeles, but a far greater number of people come to Sedona from all over North America, or even as far away as Asia or Europe. What is it that calls people to Sedona?

There must be a vast diversity of superficial reasons why each person comes here, but I think there’s a certain something—a yearning, perhaps—that makes them head for Sedona like salmon returning to their natal stream. People don’t come to Sedona just to enjoy the view. They want to have a new experience—something that stirs them, a new adventure, or fresh inspiration. I believe that the yearning for something new to breathe vitality into a lackluster life is an inherently spiritual pursuit.

After I came down from Bell Rock that day, I put a label on that certain new something that people are looking for when they come to Sedona: “the Sedona spirit.” And then, I put some more pieces of my own story together as I realized that the force that first drew me to Sedona, the essence of everything I have experienced here over the last 15 years, was this spirit of Sedona.

When you get used to the hustle and bustle of city life, it’s hard to feel the bottom of your feet even once during the day. Oftentimes, we have fewer opportunities to walk, or even if we do get to walk, our thoughts tend to be more heavily weighted up in our head and our attention is unable to reach our feet. Then we grow increasingly distant from the ground, and our concern for other life forms nurtured by the earth keeps decreasing.

Try standing up straight on both feet right now. If possible, remove your shoes and socks, and stand in your bare feet. Adjust your position so that you can feel the sensation of your feet sticking to the floor, without leaving any space. If you stand this way and focus carefully on the soles of your feet, at a certain point, you’ll be able to feel the weight of your entire body resting on the bottom of your feet. Try to find that sense of your body weight being distributed evenly to your soles, without obstruction. You can also feel the weight of your body being conveyed to the earth through your soles, as well as the strength of the earth as it supports that weight.

This sensation isn’t merely a sense of physical weight or pressure. It’s a vivid feeling of life. You can feel that fresh sense of being-ness, that sense of “I’m here and I’m alive,” arising naturally from a place deep in your heart, along with gratitude and humility toward the earth that supports you.

The stronger the sensation in your soles becomes, the stronger the sensation at the top of your head, directed toward heaven, will be. Beneath you, the earth gives you solid support. Above you, infinite space is open to you. As you stand with your feet firmly planted, feel your body connect heaven and earth. Below, you can feel your sturdy legs and a lower belly that’s full of energy. Above, feel the refreshing openness of your heart in your chest and the cool clarity of your head.

With your feet firmly planted like this, walk the path of the human, under heaven and upon the earth.

Before I visited Sedona, I had been crossing the United States from the east coast to the west coast in search of a land where I could establish a meditation center. The moment that I saw Sedona, I felt a strong intuition that this could be that very place.  However, although I looked around the famous vortex areas, including Bell Rock and Cathedral Rock, and the downtown area while I stayed in Sedona for three days, I was still unable to make a final decision during that first visit.

One of the reasons I hesitated was that Sedona was a desert.  According to the Eastern practice of feng shui, a harmony of the five energies—wood, fire, earth, metal, and water—is essential. Sedona had wood, fire, earth, and metal energy, but since it was a desert terrain where water was scarce, the thought that water energy might be insufficient kept bothering me.

I went back to LA, but returned to Sedona after a few days. That’s when I saw something that blew away all my concerns. That was Oak Creek Canyon, where the creek flowed right alongside the highway going up from Sedona to Flagstaff.  During my first visit, I couldn’t see it closely, but there was clear water flowing abundantly through the canyon. I realized then that Sedona had the necessary amount of water energy, too. I found passion and hope for making a new start in Sedona, where, although it was desert terrain, the energy of the five elements was harmonized so well. And I started to feel certain that in a place like this, I could establish the meditation center that I had dreamed of. On my second visit to Sedona, I decided to move there.

As I drove back to Los Angeles to make preparations for my move, I had a premonition that something good was going to happen, and I felt a nervous excitement. I kept repeating the name of the land, “Sedona,” over and over in my mind. Se-do-na. Se-do-na. Se…do…na… Then, all of a sudden, a thought came to my mind. Se-do-na… If you look at the syllables of “Sedona” broken up into Korean sounds, it means “the land where a new Tao will emerge.”

From that point onward, every time I pronounced Sedona’s name, every time I told other people about Sedona, and every time I practiced meditation as I went everywhere in Sedona, I started to believe that a new enlightenment would indeed arise from this place. That was my belief and it was also my profound hope.

In early 1996, I was reading a newspaper in LA when I saw a photo that immediately grabbed my attention. The red rocks were so real they felt like they might jump out of the paper at me. I read the caption beneath the photo and learned it was a place called Sedona, in the state of Arizona.

I couldn’t get there fast enough; I wanted to see those red rocks. So I asked an acquaintance to come with me.  We cruised along by car from Los Angeles, driving through Flagstaff. It was the middle of the night when we arrived in uptown Sedona, so we settled into a motel that hugged Oak Creek Canyon.

The night was dark and there was little chance to see the scenery aside from the sparkling stars that filled the night sky with their refreshing twinkling. As I filled my lungs with clean, crisp air, I went to sleep with excitement and anticipation in my heart.

As soon as I opened my eyes the next morning, I threw back the curtains. My first view of Sedona’s landscape entailed a mountain of blended red and white rock, standing tall above a verdant forest. At the top of the mountain were large and small rocks shaped like various animals. Then I saw one that caught my attention. At the top of the mountain, there was a modest rock that looked just like a person seated in a lotus posture, meditating!

I thought to myself, Wow, even the rocks in Sedona meditate.

After a simple breakfast, I wandered about Sedona, here and there, wherever I felt like going. It seemed like the entire city was embraced by arms of red rock. The green of the junipers and cacti that dotted the red turf proffered a dramatic contrast of color. The sky of Sedona, wrapped around the burnt red earth, seemed more clear and blue than any sky I’d seen. A sanctity circulated in the air between earth and heaven there. Though it was winter, warm sunlight was shining down through the clear air. As I looked at the dazzling beauty of Sedona’s earth and sky awash with the morning sun, my heart skipped a beat, and it occurred to me that this just might be the very place that I had been seeking for so long.

Do you see the meditating rock?

The following text is used in the LifeParticles Energy Meditation and Self-Healing Kit, which will be available soon, to explain LifeParticles and the MindScreen.

All mental activity takes place in an infinite internal space within the self. Creative potential is absolutely unrestricted by time and space, existing in a field of the mind where the seeds of dreams are sown. I call this the MindScreen, the illuminated, wide-open plane of awakened consciousness. This is the primary space in which we become the drivers of our destinies.

Within every living being, kernels of ki (life energy) vibrate at infinitely varied frequencies and form the universe as we know it. I call these LifeParticles, the smallest unit of life. LifeParticles move through space and time to transmit consciousness and energy which give rise to the diverse phenomena of life.

Using our MindScreens, we can move LifeParticles wherever we want them to go, manifesting our intentions in the physical world and realizing our complete human potential to become the authors of our lives.

Through the MindScreen and LifeParticles, we can change ourselves and the world, and we can create a culture that is in harmony with the Earth. Working together to create this is potentially the greatest and most important miracle of all.