When I was much younger I attended a Boy Scout camping trip into the mountains with my fellow ward/troop members. I did not enjoy the outdoors a whole lot, but I was optimistic that this would be a good trip. I had my friends and even my father attended as one of the adult leaders. On the mountain, my troop got caught in a terrible storm that was both heavy and cold. I had not brought all the proper rain gear I should have, and as such I got hypothermia and had to be carried off of the mountain by my comrades and some of the medical team that was at the base camp. While we waited for the medical team, I realized that in some ways, man is completely helpless to nature. That is what was irrational to me, why would we go out in such conditions? How was I so fragile?
Something Broken: Mental Health
Members of my extended family and several people close to me personally, including myself in some degree, struggle with issues of mental health. Since early childhood, I had always believed that everyone could simply be happy if they did the right things in life and followed God's laws, and while that may be true for the next life, there is no way to ever guarantee happiness in this life. The idea that many of us are afflicted by real diseases and conditions that prevent the simple states of happiness or calmness breaks my heart and puzzles me to this day.
Something Artistic or Man-made: The Lamb
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h-mSmEfLmZc
John Tavener's choral adaptation of the famous William Blake poem, The Lamb is bewilderingly beautiful. The way that John composed the notes for the different parts is far from conventional. Instead of writing simple counter-melodies and harmonies, Tavener inverted the notes of the melody with seemingly complete disregard for the key of music it would end up resembling. The link above includes a professional recording of it, but the time I best resonated with this song is when I had the opportunity to perform it in my high school choir. I had never before experienced so much beauty from something that, from a theoretical standpoint, made no sense at all to me.
Something Mysterious: The Immensity of Space
In one of my classes here at BYU, my professor stopped his regular lecture to show us a video of some of the deep space images produced from the Hubble Telescope. The video included music that inspired wonder, but the music seemed like nothing in comparison to the images displayed.
Earth was lost to the size of our galaxy, and then the galaxy lost amidst a wash of other galaxies in such a manner that perplexed me more than I can describe with words. What was out there? If space really is infinite then is there no end to what could be out there? When I watched this video I felt like I was having an out of body experience viewing places and spaces that I would never, ever be able to visit, and seeing so many planets and stars that mankind may never be capable of reaching or really learning about.
Image Credit
https://www.google.com/url?sa=i&source=images&cd=&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=2ahUKEwirw_6V5cXeAhUI2oMKHSCfApIQjRx6BAgBEAU&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.space.com%2F25303-how-many-galaxies-are-in-the-universe.html&psig=AOvVaw0JHHhbD32kucBq3mRZ3bxv&ust=1541800656385252
I find it interesting how you contrast the romanticism of John Tavener's adaption of The Lamb, and that of your observations of space. Both conjure a feeling of awe or the sublime (if the choir performs it well). I too have found that music in conjunction with deep thoughts on the size of the universe can create a sense of wonder and awe. My experience was based off visiting my families cabin as a child and hearing a song called "A Child of Light" for the first time.
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