Life and Cycles
Life moves in cycles and in a continuum. We are part of rippling history, created by what has come before and constantly creating what will come. The universe is not created once and done, but a constant process of creation that flows through us. We create our future through our actions, and we create the futures of those around us as they create ours.
This does not mean we create everything in our reality. Some things we cannot help, because someone or something else has already made that choice. Not everything is changeable. But we are still responsible for dealing with the reality that is presented to us and for creating a future we want to live in.
We are part of a continuum, not simply individuals. And we cannot live solely as individuals, either. What we do ripples throughout time, sometimes small ripples, sometimes big ones. We are the Universe made manifest, we are the eyes and hands of the Divine. What we do, how we perceive things, these things have effects. We cannot see ourselves as an end point, our lives beginning the Universe, our deaths ending it. Life is circular and flowing, births and deaths and beginnings and endings all flowing into the greater whole, each affecting each other.
We owe it to ourselves and to the Universe to be mindful of our future as well as our past, to see the continuum and to look to a better future rather than a worse. We see this most clearly in our children, our genetic and mental replication, pieces of ourselves replicated generation after generation. How we raise our children, how we replicate ourselves, replicates for as long as our descendants continue to replicate. What we do with our thoughts and minds ripples out faster and replicates even more, in ways we can never see. We are responsible for the beginnings of both.
When we see our lives as cycles, we realize how our lives affect each other and see more clearly how our lives should be. When we are our own futures, what we do clearly affects everything we care about coming into existence. Nothing else creates our future but ourselves and those we live with. We do not create the world as it is. We create the world that is to come.
Questions:
What does the concept of creating one’s world mean to you? How do you think your previous choices have shaped your present and will shape your future?
What cycles are you enmeshed in? Did you choose them? Would you choose them now?
How are we individuals? How are we part of a greater whole? What happens when those two views get confused?
This does not mean we create everything in our reality. Some things we cannot help, because someone or something else has already made that choice. Not everything is changeable. But we are still responsible for dealing with the reality that is presented to us and for creating a future we want to live in.
We are part of a continuum, not simply individuals. And we cannot live solely as individuals, either. What we do ripples throughout time, sometimes small ripples, sometimes big ones. We are the Universe made manifest, we are the eyes and hands of the Divine. What we do, how we perceive things, these things have effects. We cannot see ourselves as an end point, our lives beginning the Universe, our deaths ending it. Life is circular and flowing, births and deaths and beginnings and endings all flowing into the greater whole, each affecting each other.
We owe it to ourselves and to the Universe to be mindful of our future as well as our past, to see the continuum and to look to a better future rather than a worse. We see this most clearly in our children, our genetic and mental replication, pieces of ourselves replicated generation after generation. How we raise our children, how we replicate ourselves, replicates for as long as our descendants continue to replicate. What we do with our thoughts and minds ripples out faster and replicates even more, in ways we can never see. We are responsible for the beginnings of both.
When we see our lives as cycles, we realize how our lives affect each other and see more clearly how our lives should be. When we are our own futures, what we do clearly affects everything we care about coming into existence. Nothing else creates our future but ourselves and those we live with. We do not create the world as it is. We create the world that is to come.
Questions:
What does the concept of creating one’s world mean to you? How do you think your previous choices have shaped your present and will shape your future?
What cycles are you enmeshed in? Did you choose them? Would you choose them now?
How are we individuals? How are we part of a greater whole? What happens when those two views get confused?
posted by Vieva @ 5:18 PM
1 Comments:
At 2:44 PM,
Star said…
>>>Some things we cannot help... But we are still responsible for dealing with the reality that is presented to us and for creating a future we want to live in.<<<
*mucho applause* And is THAT ever something I wish I could get through to some people...
Two paragraphs down from that, not sure I like the multiple uses of the word "replicate" so much... Always makes me think of Star Trek, and how when they want something they just go to the replicator--too much like human beings are some sort of thing rather than people. But maybe that's just me. :)
Questions:
1. The concept of creating one's own world... I think it's a very powerful thing, if people could understand it properly. I think that our ability to create our own world is somewhat hampered by things beyond our control, and by our limitations as human beings. We cannot, for example, see every possible consequence of every action we take. But we do have the ability to shape what is available to us, and it's something that a lot of people don't do, or don't see that they do. My choices--how have they not shaped my present, and how could they not shape my future? I can't answer this part of the question very well, because it's just so beyond my comprehension that they wouldn't. I think they will continue to do so long after they're made. For instance, when I was five I was allowed the choice of whether to finish out the school year in kindergarten or to move on to first grade. That choice still echoes, if softly, in my life now--being a year young throughout most of my school career shaped my mental and emotional development in ways that still manifest themselves in my words and actions and mindset today. It just. Keeps. Going.
2. Cycles, cycles. I am enmeshed in a lot of strictly physical cycles. Life is the big obvious one, although it is also potentially the false one; I don't really care for the idea of being buried in a traditional coffin, but if I am, my remains get taken out of the cycle. Life feeds on death, but nothing feeds on a body locked up in a titanium coffin and a big concrete vault. I don't think I chose most of these cycles; they simply are. One could say I chose menstruation, I suppose, as I (along with my hubby) have chosen not to have a child yet, i.e. chosen not to be pregnant. And I have chosen a cycle for my hair. It gets to a certain length and I cut it and let it grow again. I guess technically I have chosen my sleep cycle and work schedule, although those are limited somewhat by others' choices too.
Mentally, socially and emotionally, I think I need to reflect on this before I can really answer. The physical cycles are obvious, the more subtle ones less so.
3. We are individuals because we are individuals; I'm not sure how much more clear I can be there. I am me, you are not me (no matter how much we think alike sometimes), and that is that. We are a part of a greater whole because of the way our lives interconnect, the way our choices affect each other. When people forget that... It depends on which way, and what they're doing, and... I'm not sure, really, what happens, I suppose.
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