The annunciation

I was in Kobe, delivered a lecture at an academic conference. After the sessions, I found myself near the Rokko mountains. The spring was finally in the air. I was admiring the gentle variation of natural tints and shades of the forest that covered the rocky slopes, painted on the phenomenology of my mind by the nature's everlasting process of life.
Subconsciously, I think I was pondering the origin of human creativity, a subject of my recent investigations. Suddenly, I realized a beautiful metaphor for the conception of a new idea.

The annunciation.

When a new idea visits us, the archangel Gabriel kneels before us, telling us that a new idea has been conceived. The idea does not stand still. Once conceived, it keeps growing, matures, until finally a fruit is borne.
Life is a vast ocean of change in which the annunciation might visit us at any moment. The miracle is to be found in the most subtle symptoms. We thus breathe on earth forever enthralled.


The Annunciation by Leonardo da Vinci