Princess, how is the maze today?

Well Prince, not is all that it seems in the maze. Sometimes I talk to people and they make me realise that the universe still exists outside of here and I so want to rejoin them again as me. I want to be a part of our universe, even if I am merely an inconsequential cog in a giant mechanism that has no true function except to function. When you are in the maze you feel tiny, insignificant, like a single dust mote floating through a vast hall. I thought this was a sanctuary, but already it’s starting to feel like a straight-jacket.

You realise now that you have much to live for Princess?

Prince, today I did feel alive! I fell over whilst I was out running through muddy ruts in an overgrown field. It was wonderful! I cut my hands and scraped my knees. The blood I let was brighter than the midsummer sun. The pain was beautiful!

I am trying to picture you running in muddy fields Princess…

Don’t be so old-fashioned Prince. A princess today can do anything she wants. Running in muddy fields puts me in touch with mother earth. However hard you wash away the mud when you finish, you can still feel it on your skin, even when you can’t see it. This contact with the earth, it grounds me at a time I want to float away into the ether, to slowly disintegrate into a billion separate particles and anonymously roam the skies with the wind.

I would prefer you to remain earthbound Princess.

But for months now I have felt numb in this earth-bound life Prince. I have had to shut down my own humanity in order to survive. My needs have been squashed down into a tiny box buried deep under my self. I have become a machine. My one goal – to make sure my children do not suffer from this experience as I once did as a child. Even though I have thrust this experience upon them, I want to save them from it.
And falling over helped you rediscover your own humanity Princess?
It just made me feel. The pain brought me back to me. The dusty taste in my mouth was bitter. It was iron. The scrape was sharp and intense, my knees stiff after. I can understand now how some people can hurt themselves purposefully just to try and feel alive. To inflict pain on themselves just to stop the nothingness. To try and stop the numbness with something. Anything.

Princess, I am getting worried about you.

Well I’m not about to start self-harming myself if that’s what you mean Prince, but don’t you see – today I understood how people may choose to do this. How sometimes the only thing that can make you feel good is pain. Without pain there is no life. We are made from love and yet we are born in pain. Maybe all these people want is to rediscover a love to light their lives that is as strong as their mother’s love; a star to shine down on them, the hand of friendship to be extended to them. Yet they are trapped in their own numbness, too. The pain brings them into contact with death, and so it enables them to live. For life without death is not life. Whereas before today I may have condemned such an action, now I can understand where it may come from.

Princess, I understand too. So running really is good for you?

Prince, during this experience I have learnt to run faster and faster and to make myself go further and further. The people I run with have become a family to me, protecting me from the world outside the maze without even realising it. I admit it is a little unconventional for a princess to spend so much time running, but it allows me to go to a place where I can be who I want to be. When you run with these people, over hills that are desperately beautiful, you then realise what true happiness can mean. No one wants anything from you, and you have nothing to give except your energy into the earth. The life force that binds us to our planet feels so strong, and you are finally truly free from the constraints that our lives slowly suffocate us with. It feels as if no one or no thing can touch you or expect from you. You become the individual you were born to be, but have forgotten.

I must try this running sometime Princess. Why do I suspect that you are now going to tell me there are some things you cannot run from?

I run more and more Prince, and it allows me a freedom that nothing else does at the moment, as when you run you can choose to not think. And even though I am tired – so weary it feels that I haven’t slept for a thousand lifetimes - I don’t want to stop running. But when you stop, your problems creep back into your mind. I think I have to learn to change the way I run. If I do this, I think I will change the way I live. Instead of being cautious, I need to run a few races with a slightly more risky strategy. Maybe if I run so hard that I could fail, it may mean I am running hard enough to succeed?

Princess, only you know how far you can push yourself.

Well that’s a sore point and I DON’T want to talk about it.

Are you sure Princess?

You know full well Prince that I haven’t pushed myself for years…