Fine-line Balances — An Intuitive Art
I am thinking quite a bit this week about those subtle balancing acts we must learn to master if we are to become truly mature and full human beings. To be ONLY happy, or understanding, or even balanced, is to miss half of life and not grasp the depth of human experience. To be ONLY worried, depressed, irritated, or out of control is, similarly, to move through life hopping on one foot. For instance, in my relationship, at times I want space and at other times I want close intimacy. If viewed with a positive spin, both states come from the soul and are empowered: I am centered enough to be able to be alone and vulnerable enough to let go of my ego and merge into a more complex state where I know "self" and love in a larger way with another person. Seen with a negative spin, it could look like I'm retreating into my cave as a way to avoid giving up control of my reality, or that I want another person because I'm needy and afraid to face what might surface from my subconscious depths were I alone.

There are two polarities to everything: 1) the balanced flow back and forth between the two natural poles of something: eg, sleep and waking, panic and curiosity, blankness and imagination, joyful spontaneity and pressure to perform perfectly, knowing the divine inside yourself and outside yourself, as one and as plurality; and 2) Seeing those oscillations from the point of view of soul (love/unity) or ego (fear/separation). I am first trying to allow myself to experience both sides of every polarity and the fluid interconnection between the halves. Let myself rock back and forth and know the whole process, and this takes time, as I must go through several full cycles of each one before I feel the circle or figure-eight. Second, I am focusing on shifting from judgmentalism and being "bothered," to allowing and appreciating every phase of every cycle. Working with the mind's duality and mirroring can be quite confusing! Perhaps that's why the mind keeps trying to stop the flow and make a pronouncement: THIS is the way it is!! And of course, then it promptly changes. Then the mind makes a revised pronouncement: UPDATE: THIS is the way it is!! Under it all is the consciousness and presence that fuels, and knows, the entire game.