Expansion & Contraction

It's OK.

Did you feel full from the holiday season (several ways to feel that...)?  Perhaps by way of contrast, how are you feeling now — empty, bummed or...optimistic?

Whatever you're feeling today, it seems that so many of the various rhythms of our lives could be described by the dynamic of expansion and contraction.  

Expansion, followed by contraction.  Growth and excitement, invariably followed by doldrums and apathy.  We experience things that really matter and then seem to go through times when it feels like nothing does.

But, over time, it is hard not to notice the repetitive nature of this dynamic.  

Like the seasons themselves, there are times when things feel rapid and vibrant and then, sometimes from sheer fatigue, we have to slow down or stop, to rest or recover.

January seems a bit like that for me, especially coming off all the indulgence of the holiday season.  We almost instinctively need a time to get back to basics, to live within our means...to contract a bit in reaction to all the prior expansion.  

And, after a while, we will start to wish again for some activity; for re-emergence.  

We will exert ourselves again, get tired, and need to slow down again.  Each cycle driven by something different, but also in a relatively conspicuous pattern — expansion and contraction...again, and again. 

Acknowledging this reality and accepting that unabated expansion is not even really feasible is both necessary and helpful.  Further, it seems like we actually need these kinds of rhythms because each contributes something good to the true nature of existence.

Ebb and flow.  Rise and fall.  Even, back and forth.  All of these are normalized realities.  They, in fact, are healthy for us.  It is fantasy when we imagine that constant rise is either necessary or realistic.

Recognizing these realities can help us offset what sometimes might otherwise be disorienting.  A new season is a new season.  In fact, a new season may not be unlike an old season, just not the last one.  We can comprehend the dynamic nature of things by observing them, especially over time.

So, as we seek to embrace what it feels like is happening to us, both when it feels great and when it feels bad, perhaps this is a time of year that can continue to both remind and teach us how to cooperate with this more timeless reality.

This moment is significant.  And, it is reacting a bit to a prior moment, which was also good.  And, there will be another moment following this one.  Each will participate somehow in expanding us.  It will also afford us the opportunity to contract a bit; to stabilize, to settle into the new that we've come to know.

Trust it — the dynamic is OK, in fact it is good.  It is good for us.