March - Unfolding Home

Look around you as you take a walk. Look closely.  Tightly bound leaves are unfolding on tree branches, daffodil flowers are unfolding as they push out of the soil, reaching for the nourishment of air and light, magnolia buds are unfolding by the hundreds on trees, sending their scent to our nostrils, and fern fronds are spiraling out into the waiting season.  All is part of the great unfolding that is springtime.

Why this unfolding in springtime?  More than thirteen billion years ago it all began and continues today.  The universe unfolds, generating galaxies, stars, planets, black holes, supernovas, solar systems, planets like Earth, you and me. Brian Swimme, an evolutionary cosmologist, describes it this way, “One of the 10 most radical discoveries in human history is that of cosmogenesis, the narrative of how the expanding universe is evolving into stars, galaxies, life, and human consciousness. The challenge to this discovery is the thorny question of how human subjectivity relates to the evolution of the universe.”

“Thorny question” for sure, and surely we relate through our own unfolding within the evolution of the universe in which we are embedded. James Hollis, Jungian, author, educator, comments on our human unfolding: “We are not here to fit in, be well balanced, or provide exempla for others. We are here to be eccentric, different, perhaps strange, perhaps merely to add our small piece, our little clunky, chunky selves, to the great mosaic of being.”

Reading this perspective brings me calm, for who of us is not strange and eccentric? Maybe trying to fit in is foolish even!  What a relief. Hollis also explains that our unfolding is exactly that – into something larger, more expansive. We see this in nature all around us in springtime.  He suggests that, when making a decision, we ask ourselves, “Will this enlarge or diminish my life?” He encourages us to choose whatever enriches, expands our own unfolding, and he reminds us that this unfolding journey IS our home! 

Photo credits:  Fern  - David Clode on Unsplash

Look around you as you take a walk this month. Look closely. Tightly bound leaves are unfolding on tree branches; daffodils are unfolding as they push out of the soil, reaching for the nourishment of air and light; magnolia buds are opening by the hundreds on trees, sending their scent to our nostrils; and fern fronds are spiraling out into the waiting season. All is part of the great unfolding that is springtime.