The gestational time for this bud to blossom was 11 days. As I watched this incremental process of opening of a bud to show forth as a flower in our garden, I observed three events. The process was slow. The closed and crowded petals opened in an orderly arrangement of petals. The flower was ready with nectar.
I took time to search for its symbolism!
Each of us is in this process in life.
Our being and doing are the ways we express ourselves while being open.
Our being corresponds to the inner self which is the core of our life, where the substance of our life resides. Our shared thoughts, activities, relationships, professional roles, communication process, etc represent our doings. There is often a synchrony between our being and doing. It is who we are in our inner being, which often is expressed in our doings.
The opposite of synchrony is dichotomy. The being and doing do not correspond. Often they are not mirror images, but our doings reflect at least a resemblance of our true self!
I passed through seasons in my life, when it was difficult to conform to a synchronous behaviour.
I often lived in the interface between synchronous and dichotomous behaviour!
For a bud to become a flower is a seamless movement, because it is conditioned to be that way.
One of the few refrains of Dr Hans Burke, the Swiss thinker, philosopher and a contemplative was, 'simplify, reduce and renounce'! It is the pressure to accumulate, self propagate and pursue visibility, which would make a person incline towards a dichotomous living, a contradiction between the proclamation of values and their practice.
To be true to oneself would mean, that we move towards integrating our belief and practice! The flowers is full expression of the bud. A bud is an expression of the plant.
If only I can be a full expression of who I am! For this to happen, it is important to long for the vision of life to become a reality-'not to be ministered unto but to minister'!
If giving and forgiving are the truths that reside within, then the journey towards integrating belief and practice would have begun!
M.C.Mathew (text and photo)
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