Okay,
So take a moment to allow your eyes to close and to begin to comfortably drift asleep.
And as you begin to comfortably drift asleep,
You can listen to me talking to you in the background.
And as you listen to me and follow along to this story,
You can just drift and float and dream and comfortably fall asleep.
And you can have a sense of somebody walking through some woodland.
And as they walk through that woodland,
They're following a wooded path.
They've got trees towering overhead,
The rustling of the leaves,
The sound of each footstep they take.
And as they take each footstep,
So they go deeper and deeper into the woods.
And while they're walking deeper and deeper into the woods,
They can hear the sounds of birds around them,
Hearing the distant sound of some pheasants.
Walking deeper and deeper into the woodland,
Hearing scurrying sound.
As they continue to walk deeper and deeper,
They notice the way that as the woodland becomes more dense,
It becomes slightly darker.
And there's just the dancing light of the sun as it manages to grab a few shards through the leaves above.
Dancing on the path as they walk.
And they feel so relaxed walking through this woodland.
Just drifting and floating in their mind,
Wandering.
Having pleasant thoughts as they walk along.
And occasionally stopping just to touch a tree or two,
To run their fingers around the bark of the tree.
Notice the different textures,
The different feelings of different bark on different trees.
How some smooth and others are rougher.
And that soft feeling of moss on trees.
And while they continue walking deeper into the woodland,
They decide to take a turning off the path,
Heading into the denser wood.
And they know there's some cliffs somewhere off in the distance.
They decide to head off towards those cliffs.
And so as they walk into that denser woodland,
They notice how the sounds change.
How with all this woodland around,
The sounds seem to at the same time become more muffled and yet some sounds seem to echo and reverberate through the woods.
And they walk deeper and deeper,
Until eventually they find their way to that cliff deep in the woodland.
And apart from the natural sounds when they're very still,
There's just silence,
A slight rustling of leaves,
As the wind blows across the tops of the trees,
But other than that just silence.
And they notice that cliff,
They notice how it appears to be made of chalk,
And they walk along the side of the cliff.
They know there's something they're looking for and they're sure they're going to find it.
And they walk along the side of that cliff until eventually they find what looks like a boulder resting against the cliff,
And that it looks like that boulder has part of it embedded in the cliff,
But they know from some research they did with some old texts about the area,
That this boulder isn't just something resting against the cliff,
Or even something that is naturally embedded in the cliff,
It's a boulder blocking an entrance into a cave.
And so,
With a tremendous amount of effort,
They push and they pull on that boulder,
Pushing on one side,
Trying to loosen one side,
Pulling on the other,
Then pushing and pulling and gradually wiggling and worming that boulder out from that cliff,
Until eventually they're able to rest their back against the cliff,
Give one last push with their feet on that boulder and move it just enough to allow themselves to notice that there's a gap behind that boulder,
And not just a gap where the boulder was,
But like a tunnel going deep into this cliff.
They get a torch out and they shine that torch into the tunnel and they carefully squeeze themselves between the boulder and the cliff and into that gap and into that tunnel,
And with excitement,
They begin to walk inside that cliff face,
Following that tunnel,
Walking deeper and deeper,
Noticing how the temperature changes slightly as they walk into the cliff,
And as they walk into that tunnel,
Noticing the darkness other than what's lit up by the torch,
And the way the torch illuminates dust particles in the air,
And the echoey sound of footsteps,
And the distant sound of dripping,
Like dripping in a cave,
As they walk deeper and deeper,
And while they walk deeper into this tunnel,
They start to have this sense of something following them,
And they don't know what,
Or even if something's following them,
They feel a little uncertain and unsure about this,
They don't feel threatened,
They just feel uncertain,
Unsure about not knowing what's following them,
Or even if something's following them,
Or whether it's just a sense that they have,
And they walk deeper and deeper,
And as they walk deeper,
So the sound seems to fade away,
Almost like all the sound is muted,
Like somehow the sides of the tunnel have perhaps changed material,
And are absorbing the sound rather than allowing sound to echo,
And they're sure they can hear the sound of footsteps behind them,
Like a padding of feet,
And they decide to stop and wait,
And face the uncertainty,
And see what might be there,
And as they stop and wait,
And shine the torch back the way they came,
So they notice something initially shadowy in the distance,
And then getting closer and closer,
Just calmly and comfortably walking towards them,
They notice it looks like a wolf,
And as it gets closer and closer they see that it is,
That it's the most beautiful white wolf,
And they feel calm around this wolf,
They don't feel threatened in any way,
Almost like somehow this was supposed to be a companion of theirs on this journey,
And they're unsure why this wolf has followed them in here,
Or why they feel like this wolf is supposed to be a companion to them,
And the wolf sits at their feet,
And then rests its head down,
Demonstrating that it's not a threat,
And then the two of them carry on the journey,
Walking further down this tunnel,
And they continue walking down this tunnel,
Until they come to a crossroads,
And there are two paths to take,
And the wolf walks down one side,
Stops a little way down,
Turns and sits down,
And the person wonders which route to take,
And decides that the wolf obviously knows best,
And so continues following the wolf,
And as they walk down that tunnel,
So the tunnel splits again,
And the wolf makes a decision,
And then splits again,
And the wolf makes another decision,
And they just continue following that wolf,
Trusting the wolf,
Deeper and deeper into this system of tunnels,
And it feels like they've been walking for hours,
Deeper and deeper underground,
Almost like they're walking through some kind of a maze underground,
But fortunately the wolf seems to know where they're going,
And after what felt like hours of walking underground,
They come across what looks like a doorway,
With a heavy solid wooden door,
And the wolf sits at the door,
And the person tries to push the door unsuccessfully,
Tries to pull on the door unsuccessfully,
And then realizes they have to solve a puzzle,
That there are bits around the room,
Bits around the outside of where they are,
That they have to move around,
And obviously there's some kind of a locking system,
And so they start looking,
And working out what the pattern must be,
And then turning things,
And pushing things in,
And pulling things out,
And moving things around in this room,
Until after a while they hear a click,
And the door naturally just slides open,
And they walk through that door,
To discover a grand cave,
Lit up by some kind of a glowing stone,
That's covering the ceiling of the cave,
And in fissures down the walls,
Creating a glow in this space,
And in the center of the cave,
Are some vast abandoned ruins of an ancient civilization,
And this was what this person came looking for,
They'd heard that there was an ancient civilization once here,
In this area,
And it was at a time that there was a lot of warring going on,
And so this civilization had decided to build their civilization underground,
And hide it from the world,
And they would rarely come out and interact with others,
But then something happened that made the civilization die out,
And only a few of the civilization survived,
And those few went out,
And spread the word,
And spread knowledge of the civilization,
Of their advanced technology for their time,
Their ability to build and keep themselves hidden from the world,
And over thousands of years,
It just drifted into legend and rumors,
And people stopped believing in this civilization,
And this person walked over to those ruins,
And they're in pretty good condition,
And they entered the ruins,
And noticed how much gold was all over the walls in the ruins,
To bounce light around the corridors,
Around to the different rooms,
There was artwork that could have been painted yesterday,
That was as beautiful as renaissance art,
Yet thousands of years earlier,
And there were contraptions in some of the artwork,
That looked unusual,
But more modern,
And definitely not things from thousands of years ago,
And they were hunting for the grand library,
They'd heard that this specific location,
And this specific building,
Would contain a grand library,
The knowledge of the civilization,
And the knowledge passed down from previous civilizations to that civilization,
Untouched for thousands of years,
And after much searching from room to room,
They discovered the grand library,
Containing thousands upon thousands of books,
Stretching up high above their head,
And rows and rows of books,
And all around the outside,
And they could see at the far end of the library,
Was a pedestal,
And on that pedestal was an ornate book,
And they went to that book,
And they couldn't read the writing,
They couldn't understand the text,
But they could understand the images on the pages,
The freshly painted images as they looked,
And they could see the tale of times gone by,
Of land beyond land,
Creating one huge land mass,
Before the last ice age ended and flooded the vast plain between this land and the rest of the land,
Of civilizations that lived and flourished within that plain,
And across the vast land,
And of how quickly that flood came,
How a wall of ice gave way,
And in an instant,
Vast quantities of water flooded and cut off one land from another,
Destroying everything in its path,
And they managed to keep their civilization going,
But with the smaller land,
New younger civilizations sprung up,
Tribes sprung up,
They grabbed what land there was,
They staked their claim,
They said,
This is mine,
And they started clinging to things as if they belonged to them,
They were no longer of the land,
They were now commanding the land and saying the land is theirs,
And yet this ancient civilization disagreed that that's the way to be,
Felt that everything should be open,
Shared,
That more is achieved through peace and collaboration than trying to compete for resources and destroy each other,
And so they hid their civilization away for thousands and thousands of years,
Letting these other civilizations come and go,
Conquering,
Receding,
Being defeated,
New conquerors would come in,
And yet they would all have the same mentality,
The mentality of ownership over the environment,
And this was always their downfall,
But this civilization remaining isolated was destined to gradually die out,
Very slowly,
Generation after generation,
And so it ended with the last of the civilization going out to spread their word of peace,
Of love,
Of kindness and compassion,
Of working together,
Bringing down barriers,
Of self-expression,
Of being who you want to be,
And of being able to have an attitude of finding solutions to problems,
Working together collaboratively,
And facilitating getting the best from each other,
And utilizing each other's strengths,
And that's how such a small civilization had survived for so long here,
And they brought down all barriers,
And wanted to share that knowledge with others,
Because they lived in peace and harmony with the world around them,
And the wolf and this person walked out of these ruins,
Out of that library,
Out of that building,
And continued walking a bit further,
Where they noticed a chamber opened up into an even more vast area that looked like an underground village,
And they could see where this entire civilization had lived,
Seeing play areas,
Seeing what the buildings looked like,
Seeing parks,
Seeing how they'd managed to capture sunlight from outside,
And funnel it down to underground,
Just using natural resources,
And what can be learned from this civilization,
And this person wondered what should they do,
Should they tell others about this civilization,
Or just record what they've discovered for future generations,
But not reveal where,
And they decided that they would take a few of the books of this civilization as something they can take back to help to educate others,
And they would just say that they found them somewhere up top,
On the surface,
And they wouldn't draw attention to where this civilization was,
And they found their way all the way back out,
The way they came,
Following that wolf all the way back to the entrance,
And once out of the entrance they sealed that cave up again,
And walked back through the woods,
And they found their way back to the path,
And the wolf remained with them,
And the wolf walked with them as they walked all the way down to a lake,
And they sat by that lake for a while,
They pitched up a tent,
Cooked some food as the sun set,
And the wolf never left them,
It became a companion,
It seemed to want to spend its time,
Almost like it was watching over them,
And they settled down for the night,
The flickering flames of the campfire as hit,
Burnt down to embers and was just a glow,
The lapping sound of water of the lake on the shore,
The sound of the breeze on the tent,
The distant sounds of nightlife,
Of birds and bats,
And other animals at night in the woods,
As they relaxed down and drifted and floated deeper,
And deeper asleep,
