Step 3 : The Horse Rotunda and the Choice of Routes

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You are now deep in the heart of the Garden of Uncertainties. All around you, everything is curved. In this rotunda, you will find many entrances and many exits. You can choose to go right or left. It is your choice. You are free to choose. We are always free in our choices.

Allow yourself to wander and lose yourself along these paths of uncertainty. Getting lost is part of the journey. Getting lost is important, for to get lost is also to give oneself the chance to discover unexpected things, unforeseen answers, unexplored territories. And sometimes to get lost is to find oneself; often one must lose oneself in order to find oneself again. This is the whole paradoxical challenge of life’s journey, of philosophical reflection and of inner work: to dare to lose oneself, to dare to face the fear of getting lost, to give up the pride of one’s certainties in order to find inner truth and to open one’s mind to the world.

Shaping our inner Rough Stone often brings unexpected, unhoped-for results, revealing to us options we had not imagined at the outset but which we discover by chance and which are generously offered to us. So we must walk the path of life telling ourselves that there are no good or bad choices. We travel through life via different routes, with choices that lift us up and sometimes choices that weaken us. But through each of these choices, we can always learn something about life, something about ourselves.

The sculpture in the middle of the rotunda is that of a rearing horse, refusing to have choices imposed upon it. The horse yearns for freedom. It expresses the fiery spirit of living beings born to be free. It is an allegory of human beings who wish to act and think freely, without submission to God, to other Men, or to their own inner constraints.

We now invite you to wander freely through the maze of the Garden of Uncertainties, to follow the route that only you will create, guided by your curiosity and your desires, along marked paths or off them.

The most adventurous among you may turn left and follow the line of the medieval terraces marked with red dashes on the map. There you will discover a lovely viewpoint overlooking the pond. For those who wish to reach the next stage more quickly, take the shortcut on your right.

Let us now continue straight ahead towards the oval lawn; on the right you will discover a statue of a Bather set against a stone wall…