Spring Emergenc(y)

I've been struck by the idea of emergence lately...perhaps triggered by the extraordinary, delayed spring here in Minnesota, and my longing for the emergence of the warm sun and some green-ness and flowers. However, I'm thinking it's more about an inner process I’ve been going through over the course of this past year or so. I’ve been deep into figuring out how to express myself from the authentic core of my being (this, apparently, is what can happen when one enters her fifties). Whatever the cause, emergence is up for me. I find myself turning it around and around in my mind and heart, noticing all kinds of ways emergence emerges in each day.

What I'm aware of is the challenge of allowing that comes with emergence. Allowing often means slowing down, listening carefully. Even...gasp...waiting! We (and I mean the collective "we" here) don't like to wait! In our society, it's much more common - and in many ways, more comfortable - to treat everything as if it were an emergenc-y! We want it right now, as soon as we're aware of the desire.

Okay, if I'm going to be honest here, I can replace the "we" in the preceding paragraph with "I." Historically, I've been the one making things happen. Make the plan, work the plan. And what I've seen happen over and over in my life is that I find myself exactly where the plan led me, but realize that it's not really where I want to be at all! So how do I figure out where I want to be??

Recently my friend Molly shared a recording on the topic with me, and it has been turning in me for weeks. The speaker was Derek Rydall, and he did an interview with Kristin Howe from the Manifest Everything Now program. His take on manifestation really spoke to me, and is very much in alignment with what I've learned from my teachers over the years about the flow of energy in this universe. Rydall makes the bold statement that self-improvement is an oxymoron, and that the obsessive drive we have to improve ourselves actually takes us further from true fulfillment and covers up our original perfection - and often leaves us feeling more broken than we were when we began our quest for self-improvement! He claims we are already the thing we're seeking - that we have it all within us, all potential just waiting to be activated by our attention and intention.

Wow. Pretty heady stuff. But is it?

The ancient wisdom traditions I've studied also speak of emergence, although the languaging is somewhat different. Both the Mayan and the Egyptian Huna traditions I've studied teach of the perfection of the human spirit - that we are born with our full potential intact, like a blueprint in the genetic code of our cells. In fact, the word Huna means hidden treasure - that divine kernel of perfection that resides in each of us. In each cell of each one of us. Like the genetic blueprint that makes an acorn into an enormous oak tree, we are programmed to become exactly what and who we are. We don’t find the oak tree taking courses on self improvement, striving to have branches that are as beautiful as all of the other oak trees. In nature, original perfection is simply expressed.

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So if it's all right there inside of me, why can't I just express it already?

Could it be because I, like so many, treat expression like an emergenc-y? Try to make it happen, rather than let it happen? Or because I’ve been on a 25+ year journey of self improvement? Striving to be a better, more slender, more beautiful version of the absolutely amazing, perfect human being that was born 52 years ago?

I am learning to allow life to unfold. And what I'm discovering is that it makes for real, true living. It's much, much easier than forcing things. I have a level of contentment that I have never had before. All of the striving and pushing I used to do left me feeling as if I'd never "get there." What a revelation to see that I'm already there! Every day, I'm already there. 

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 I gotta say, I love my fifties. If that’s what it takes – age, experience, wisdom – to move out of that constant striving for something better, then I’m grateful for this phase of my life.

What is trying to emerge from your genetic blueprint, the soul of your being? How would it feel to just allow life to happen? To know the perfection that is in each day? These are questions worth pondering...