"Today is the first day of the rest of your life” (Original source unknown)
Sitting in my morning meditation, I couldn’t help but ponder the labour, all the energy, that has gone into this moment.
My slippers come from a store that sells products from factories filled with employees who work on assembly lines. Those goods are then packaged and shipped for sale, and they travel in boats and trucks over hundreds of miles, eventually arriving at the store in my small city. The trucks themselves were manufactured in large automobile plants, and their drivers took special trainings to operate these oversized vehicles.
These men and women also have friends and families who wait while products are delivered, and there are the store employees who stock their shelves before they go home from work… .
The socks I wear are made from wool, which, when I stop to ponder, makes me think of the sheep the wool came from; of their long coats, the food that fed them, and the labour it took to harvest their wool. And it goes on… after shearing, the fleece would have needed to be cleansed, bleached and sent to a factory where it was coloured and processed before being manufactured into a pair of socks.
Next, I think about my tank top and I remember being at a conference in Ontario where a handsome young man was talking about the work of opening hearts, especially those of men. I, moved by his passion, went out and bought a tank top with a big red heart on it.
The favourite sweat pants I wear also have a story. I bought them on Quadra Island from a woman who had a small clothing store, selling mostly one of a kind clothing. I’ve had these pants for almost 20 years and every time I put them on, I remember their story. I wonder about the artist who designed these pants. I wonder if the artist knows how much I love what they created, how comfortably perfect they are, and how they don’t look much different now from the first day I got them.
Now, consider how the lifespan of all these things is so small when compared to the sun I see rising over the horizon and glistening its rays on the ocean water, or the rock formations created from years of ice and snow, storms, and the pressure of heat and cold.
A man came to fix our internet connection yesterday, and he told me a story from an archaeologist who said this spit of land we live on was inhabited by people 9000 years ago. It is still littered with artifacts. (9000 years ago… and I’m worried about tomorrow?)
All that IS has an energy story… a path that led it from where it began to where it is now. But this path isn’t the end. It is just part of an endless journey.
Everything comes from stardust, energetically formed and created into an infinite number of things. If I were to sit and calculate everything, all the energy that it took for my experience, in this moment, everything in my sight, the details of my environment, and I wrote the story of all the people and places from which each thing has traveled… . The idea blows my mind.
I am part of an intricate web. Everything that makes up who I am today came from the same Infinite Resource as all else. Somehow, my story fits with your story, and so it all continues on.
At the end of the day, we all go back to stardust. Everything is in perfect, circular motion.
(This article was inspired by a talk given by Missy Christensen)
PLANT THE SEED
CLICK HERE FOR AUDIO AFFIRMATION: https://youtu.be/ZSHogyNwWB8