7. Start with a Seed...

a contemplation on growth

Start with a seed, perhaps the closest living thing to a one dimensional point that the cosmos has ever created, a singular point awaiting expansion. But in this case, consider a seed still growing within or upon its parental tree, waiting, until the time is right.

And then it falls, however it falls, until it meets the earth.

The earth upon which it lands has much say in what becomes of it. Enough (good) soil, enough (not too much) light, enough (not too much) water, and what is within the seed recognizes a frequency that tells it: “You can open now.”

So it opens, and it does so downward at first, extending a tentative and hungry root, seeking both stability and nourishment for the hard and joyful work ahead. The root extends, other roots stretch out from it. A foundation is laid.

Once the roots have taken their rightful place within the earth, the seed generates a small single upwards sprout, its whole future self, and sends it questing towards the light.

If all goes well, the process continues, downwards and upwards. Outwards expansion in a sustainable way. An inbreath, the roots dig down. An outbreath, the sprout grows upwards. Soon enough, the seed itself is gone, unrecognizable, destroyed.

Yet, what else is this sapling, stretching upwards before us, if it is not that very same seed, now expanded?

Over time, the sapling unfolds itself into space. Its awareness turns towards the sun. Its branches grow in a delicate and balanced pattern, hardening into a sturdy yet flexible form, swaying in the wind, dancing with time, stripped bare by the cold only to slowly reclothe itself in its own creations when the light returns.

More time passes. The skinny sapling widens into the sturdy supporting trunk of a mature tree. I have seen trees part-way through this change; the upper trunk thin and spindly, the lower, wide and rotund. How is it that a tiny shoot has become strong enough to support all this growth?

Each new bud mimics the pattern of that first sprout peeking out of the soil.

Each branch serving as root to the new bud…

So it continues, reaching down, spreading up, a conjunction of opposites in perfect, unforced harmony.

We too are trees. We too began as something unimaginably small, planted in the earth of our mothers, in conditions just right for our own unfolding. Our roots grow through time; we, the sprouting buds upon the branches of our ancestors.

In our minds, patterns and stories, social morays and personal eccentricities, all cluster upon one another. Can one of these upper limbs reach down and move a deeply delving root? Can a sprouting twig grown too big for its branch suddenly demand the branch be different?

Of course not. And neither can we.

It is, instead, the duty of the new growth (which comes into being already perfectly balanced on the living edge of now, between echoing past and foggy future) to stay attuned to the whole of the tree, to balance itself along with the other parts into one harmonious whole. Breakage and collapse only occur when sprout does not listen to root, when trunk is ignored, when twig forgets the branch from which it springs. If the system communicates, the system grows in health.

And yet, if the branch does not feed, support, and encourage the bud, where else can it turn? The new growth may wither and die, bereft of its birthright of belonging. Both sides owe consideration to the other, for they are not truly opposed nor “other,” each to each. All is, in fact, one tree, the new growth and the old from which it grows.

We all grow like this, trees through time, but nothing grows perfectly. What imperfections have you met?

Did your roots dig in and meet a rock, stopping further growth? If so, are you able to encompass that blockage, push past it, make it a part of your ongoing quest for your ever expanding expression of harmony and wholeness? Can you make it a weight which you can grasp for support, instead of a mere “no” keeping you back?

Or, perhaps, early on, a small branch of yours was broken away mindlessly by a child, a young boy seeking something upon which to project his own sense of power, taking too soon a part of your newly forming wholeness for his sword, his knife, his gun. Has this loss, this early imbalance, been absorbed in your later growth? Or is the pain of that wound too fresh, too intense, for loss of limb to be admitted to as an experience and digested?

Because it is only after it is admitted and digested that it can be incorporated into the ongoing harmonious expression of your very life. Otherwise, the root does not support the branch for fear of the wound it holds, and the bud withers.

If you are lucky enough to grow into the light and air, do not forget your roots. They hold you sturdy and keep you upright. Without them, everything topples. And if you are lucky enough to be the place where a new bud forms, do not deny it its own belonging; do not wither it with lack.

This process of growth only loses harmony when communication is blocked, when feedback cycles are not allowed to complete their expression. Some feedback cycles may be painful. And if so, we are allowed, nay encouraged, to take the time we need with them. But though we can slow them, we should not unmindfully block them, not run from them, not wither them with our fear. We must not send them away. Instead, we can open to the feedback of pain, one small morsel at a time. And allow our growth to adjust accordingly, as it will.

Once that pain is incorporated in your soul, once it is fully seen by the living eye of your embodied experience, the feedback carried within the pain can be incorporated as well. The imbalance, the numbness, the corruption that the pain was holding will be washed away and the balance of the system will be restored, even more harmonious than before.

For pain is, at its beginning, simply a signal that attention is needed. Attend to the pain as you would a wounded child on the street. It, and you, deserve no less than that. It needs to whisper its full secrets to your heart. You may never know the whole story that the pain carried, but as you sit with it and listen, the burden it brings to you is lessened for it and for you. The message the pain was brought into existence to carry begins to fade. And then, as that message goes, so too can the pain fade with it.

In its absence, a quiet space vibrates harmoniously.

Rest there.

Amen.

Hallelujah to the ever-present vibrations! All praise to the great and unstainable tree of which our mind is but the smallest expression! Thanks and gratitude to that which is already whole and which seeks still further wholeness through us! We are blessed to be a part of this, one of its many expressions, here upon this earth!