One of last summer’s posts for the fine folks at Nourishing Storm

There is a rhythm to life. A divine order to all the movement in the universe. We share these rhythms with the universe and we each have our own. We find our heart’s song when we find our flow within these rhythms.

The way of our world doesn’t always go with this flow. This world wants to move forward on warp speed and has us thinking that is how our journey should look as well. But when we look to the natural rhythm we see we don’t move on a linear path. Nature and our souls flow on a spiral. Circling around while still on the path of evolution.

We experience these ebbs and flows much like our natural world. The waves and tides rolling like our breath. The waxing and waning of the moon, the rising and setting of the sun, the choreography of the stars across the night sky like the phases, cycles and seasons of our own lives.

Unlike our natural world, we try to control our ebbs and flows. We usually pay more attention to the ebbs. Where we feel like our progress is halted or reversed. That downward spin of the spiral, we resist. We resist the waning period of our lives. We resist the the dark times. We don’t swim in the low tides.

The cycles and spirals are the way of life. Always moving towards adapting and evolving with the new energies at play. The universe, the galaxy, the Earth all constantly contracting and expanding like our lungs, like our pulse, like all our vital signs of life. It is no coincidence that we share these rhythms and no coincidence that being in nature can call us back into rhythm. Yet still we resist the ebbs. We forget that even as they pull upon our hearts, we are still moving within a greater flow. That is the flow we must connect with. That is the flow that carries us through to a greater awareness and sense of purpose and order in our lives. It is subtle. It is almost imperceptible, especially in the midst of what feels like a spiritual recession. That there still could be a stream of abundance found in the waning periods and new moons of life seems impossible. And it probably is if we only look for a linear path to self actualization or if our progress is only measured against fixed, external mile markers that we had no hand in making.

But that is not how life works. And we know this. There must be an up for every down and a give for every take. When we resist our contraction, we limit our expansion. We can move through the downs with grace when we allow our soul to be unbound from the rigid limits of a linear path. When we remember we don’t move that way. When we dance along the infinite spiral, we see there is always a flow.

“Dreaming, dreaming, sleeping, awakening –
Rhythms of darkness and light.
Day and night, night and day, wondering . . .
Who am I? Who AM I?

Who is morphing through this
Ever-shifting flow?
Beloved, wake up!
Dance in your true body before time,
Shimmering energy without end.”
Radiance Sutras – Lorin Roche