The Night a Cave Outside Sedona Changed My Life

By Jules McVey

I learned one of the most important lessons of my life inside a cave outside Sedona:

The world becomes much larger when we stop demanding that everything be explainable before we believe it matters.

It was 1999 or 2000 when my friends Katie, Cliff, and I drove out from Hollywood on a last-minute adventure.

The directions were essentially: Look for two trees near a particular mile marker. Turn onto the dirt road. Drive until you can’t. Then hike a few miles.

This was apparently all the planning three young adults needed before deciding to sleep inside a cave none of us had ever seen.

Katie’s car got stuck in the mud early, which meant hiking farther than expected and leaving much of the firewood we had collected alongside the trail.

But when we finally reached the cave, it was stunning.

Smooth red-rock walls. Natural windows overlooking the desert. Ancient images left behind by people who had stood in that same place generations before us.

It was also cold.

We had barely any wood, so we arranged our sleeping bags and prepared to spend the night talking until we couldn’t feel our faces anymore.

Cliff walked toward the cave’s entrance and froze. He asked Katie and me to come over and tell him whether we saw anything. We did.

“Do you see the man in the tall hat?” he asked.

We did.

One by one, we began describing the people we saw standing outside the cave, men and women who appeared to come from different periods of time.

We weren’t feeding one another a story. We were comparing what each of us could already see. Cold and shivering, we did the only thing that made sense at the time: we asked them for firewood. Said we'd be grateful.

A few minutes later, wood appeared at the cave’s entrance and it continued appearing throughout the night.

The images on the cave walls moved all night. Outside stood the figures we had seen together. Somehow, in a freezing cave in the middle of nowhere, I felt completely safe.

I cannot prove who or what stood outside that cave. But I know 3 people witnessed the same thing. I know firewood appeared after we asked for help.

Can you see the body and face formed in the fire, looking toward me?

That night was the first time I understood that we may never truly walk alone.

It also taught me something I wouldn’t have had words for then: environments change what humans are capable of perceiving.

Awe opens us.

Mystery interrupts certainty.

Shared experiences connect people in ways ordinary conversation rarely can.

Decades later, I realize I am still creating thresholds. Different spaces. Different materials. Different kinds of fire.

But the same invitation:

Step outside what you know.

Enter with good intentions. Pay attention. Ask for help. Leave room for the possibility that this world is far stranger, more beautiful, and more alive than we have been taught to believe.

Have you ever experienced something you couldn’t explain but knew changed you?

Stay wild and free,

Jules