Lightning Rebirth Vishnu cannot do his work until Shiva is finished. Many a forest depends on lightning-kindled fire for its rebirth. When ones self-image as "good parent," "decent person," and, ultimately, "sincere seeker" falls away in an augenblick, the way may well be cleared for something utterly new, something literally unimaginable. Nothing in our introspections, our careful studies, our meticulously managed lifestyles has the sheer, sudden, spontaneous power of that lightning bolt, that unexpected, unbidden immolation of all we so smugly assume is who we are.