Chapter 51: Spring to Life
It is time once again to Stew on this! The rebirth of spring becomes a beautiful and helpful metaphor for my life.
My favorite season of the year is generally the one that is happening. But I do hold a particular fondness for spring, maybe because it is generally quite short. It also follows winter, which tends to be very long and snowy in these parts.
Normally I would not be having thoughts of spring this early in the year, but this winter was dry, and the heavy snow we got a couple of weeks ago is already gone. Amazingly, yesterday we even saw some buttercups flowering. Barring a “miracle March”, which Tahoe is entirely capable of, it will not be long before more flowers magically appear where there was snow literally just a few days ago.
That is what I love most about spring, whenever it arrives. Life just explodes everywhere. Everything “springs to life.”
To spring to life is to become suddenly alive…or more alive. And though I mourn the disappearing snow and therefore the cross country skiing we can no longer enjoy, with this promise of an early spring, I must admit I do feel more alive.
The rebirth of spring becomes a beautiful and helpful metaphor for my life. Indeed, there is life after winter and snow. There is also life after loss, grief, despair, hopelessness, and even pandemics.
There is life after schmootz!
Rebirth and renewal become obvious when spring arrives, but the truth is that every moment is brand new ballgame on nearly every level. I just tend not to notice because my mind tends to inform me that nothing changes.
My mind resists change. It seems to enjoy putting itself in a small room and drawing the curtains around itself. It is generally not until some light comes in, intentionally or not, that I am able to see any possibilities for change.
Right now, I am talking about those “bad” things that do not seem to change. I never have any difficulty at all believing that “good” things will not last!
When things do not seem to change, the only thing that is not changing is my mind. Perhaps I would spring to life more often if I changed my mind more often!
Indeed, as I look back, every time I have given myself permission to change my mind about someone or something – an attitude, perception, perspective, opinion, or story I was telling myself - I have felt more alive and more hopeful, even though the outer circumstances did not seem to change.
In one of Paul’s epistles in the Bible he says, “Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.”
How is that for a timely message?
I know that my greatest freedom and hope for transformation, both for myself and for the world, lie in my ability to renew my mind regardless of appearances. This renewal includes my opinions and judgments, the meaning I assign to things and, especially, how I think and feel about myself.
Yes, the most important thing I can change my mind about is myself. I am not a weak, broken victim of circumstance, but rather the infinite creator of my experience of life. I am not deficient, lacking or bad, but rather good, beautiful, true and infinitely powerful.
To that end, my intention is to start telling myself more of the things I used to share with my chiropractic practice folks.
For instance, the same power that controls the tides and paints the hillsides with flowers is inside me. This power is always ready, willing, able and eager for me to spring to life and give birth to everything that is mine to create.
Also, this power is present and active within me, right now and always, creating millions of new cells every minute from the food, water, and air I consume. This power exchanges atoms with the environment and creates a brand-new body and brand-new being in every millisecond.
Even if sometimes I cannot quite get to this truest of stories, knowing that change is constant can at least allow me to say, “This too shall pass” or “The best is yet to be” with some degree of assurance.
I intend to stop telling myself the same old stories about me. Instead, I choose to allow that power within me to spring me back to life and to a fuller realization that this next moment can be different, bigger and better. Both this next moment and I can be more beautiful, more joyful, more loving, more hopeful, lighter, brighter and saner.
I choose to allow the springing of spring to remind me to spring to life through the renewal of my mind. And if winter returns and spring holds off until May, as it usually does, I intend to make this choice anyway.
Stew on that, and I will see you next time.
We offer everything we do on a “love offering/pay the most your heart dictates” basis, just as we did in our chiropractic office. So, if this blog nurtures your soul and you’d like to give something back in exchange, click on the link below!