Like evolution, nature keeps trying everything. Yet 99% of all living things have gone extinct, so lots of things have very short periods of time to ‘be.’
This means that everything that does exist –including us– exists thanks to a series of incredibly unlikely and temporary successes.
The fact that the elements of the universe congealed into this solar system was unlikely. Our planet had to form at just the right distance from the sun, and with just the right gases to breathe.
And then trillions of atoms needed to combine into chemicals, which combined to make cells, which banded together until eventually trillions of cells formed each of one of the billions of us.
And our brains got bigger too. Our thinking got more complex as we considered even more variations on how to see ‘reality.’ And now we’ve added AI….
First it was Newton. But then Einstein said, ‘hold on, there’s more! At either end!‘ And he was right, we just proved that in 2019. And now, thanks to people like Stephen Hawking and his sort, we know there’s even more beyond that.
Even science itself (the only real shared language we all have other than silence, music and love), ends up having each answer spawn 10 new questions. Each of these are examples of how things cycle, combine and expand. The universe is infinite and yet it infinitely expands as well.
Trees grow taller, then die and fall and rot and become food for new trees that will also reach up to play their role, before they too return ‘home,’ to the soil. People learn, make mistakes, and grow. We all die wiser than we’ve ever been.
Expansion is natural. Our spirit lives to breathe. It lives to expand. And to have the ability to contract itself too. It wants the ability to simply exist, without resistance, in any direction.
It’s important for us to note that the ligatures of that resistance are made from our limiting thoughts about ourselves and the world around us.
We were meant for more, as time unfolds. We need only remember that, as we breathe in experiences, our lives expand. We are best not to impede this growth by thinking things are going ‘wrong.’ All of us are exactly where our previous thoughts and circumstances have led us.
Wherever we end up, we are having is an experience like any other. If we think we don’t want the ‘bad’ ones, I say as I always do: we should note that we don’t walk out of the sad or tragic scenes in movies. There’s even less reason to walk out of our own story.
Just like each experience causes our being to expand in size, who we are and the feelings that guide us will naturally lead the flow of our life to places we will both dislike and enjoy. Accepting that is to avoid suffering. Resisting it encourages suffering.
There is no need to pass judgment on our own lives in any meaningful way because we can always change how we feel about anything over time. We will see many things in life that we describe as either the scariest or the most beautiful. And we’ll be telling the truth every time.
Those expansions in what is funniest, or saddest, or most beautiful are other examples of how life changes by nature. It naturally expands. Only our limiting thinking can repress that expansion. We feel that as resistance and suffering in our lives.
Instead, let’s surrender the ties that bind us. Let us exhale and relax. Then let’s breathe in deeply and oxygenate our brains. Let’s clear all of those busy-minded ropes that tie us down and limit our natural capacity. Go quiet inside.
Remove the resistant thinking and everyone’s doing fine. Our ego’s just think we like less drama than we really do. Yet what stories do we tell and listen to at parties? And what experiences give us our best sources of advice for others?
We don’t want the proverbial ‘good life.’ We want an interesting life with lots of ‘good’ in it. But it won’t be interesting unless there’s some ‘bad’ in there too. So let’s let ourselves have those experiences. We need those too.
Whichever way we go forms the life we chose. And if we’ll let it be, that life can be perfect –as that life. Because any life can be successful as long as it finds that particular life’s unique rewards. So let’s each find ours today.
peace. s
I help people achieve better mental health by teaching them about reality.
