Life is a marriage of beginnings and endings that flow together like the tides of an ocean. For every wave that is received by the shore, another is pulling away. The incoming water brings new life, new energy and washes over us with vitality and vigour. The receding waves pull us backward into the depths of the ocean where we merge with the vastness and oneness of the form. We move forward, we move back. We are drawn out, we are drawn in. We open, we close. We gain, we lose. We live, we die.
These states of expansion and contraction are like the two sides of a coin and neither are inherently good or bad. There are times in life for newness and movement and there are times for contemplation and stillness. Life is a continuum of joys and sorrows and this we all know- nothing stays the same. The key is shifting our perspective to align with the true realization that no experience is inherently good or bad and that life gives us what we need. Even when we feel we have been guided by our intuition, we may find ourselves facing unexpected loss and disappointment.
Often, we cannot see the significance of an event or importance of a lesson until we have reached closure. It is this sense of completion that frees us to open the door to new beginnings.
When we seek closure, what we really want is an understanding of what has happened and an opportunity to derive what lessons we can from the experience. Without closure, there is no resolution and we are left to continually grieve, relive old memories and traumas and remain forever defined by our past.
To achieve closure, we can create a ritual like writing a farewell letter to that person or experience and then burning the note during a ceremony. This ritual allows us to consciously honour and appreciate what has taken place so that we can let go of the past and move forward. It is also helpful to develop a regular meditation practice that provides us access to our inner guides and wisdom.
We can find some solace in trusting that no matter how bad things look from our perspective, there is Divine order at play. What may seem a like tragedy will take us where we need to journey on the path and teach us what we came here to learn.
No matter how much resistance we apply, there will come a time when we realize that going with the flow- like the waves of the ocean, is the only way to surrender to what is. The Divine is not limited to the constructs of either space or time, thus its orchestrations often elude us as we try to make sense of what is happening in our lives.
In the end, we can rest in the understanding that we are safe. That life loves us. That we ARE change and that we are all works in progress evolving in scared relationship (marriage) with the Great Mystery. Like the pebbles and shells dancing to and fro beneath the waves on the shore, we are the humble dancers moving to the silent music in accordance with that ever elusive choreographic genius.