The Beauty is in the Details
One beat, one breath, one touch;
so insignificant and yet
making a difference in your day.
~ S.W.
The full pink supermoon called to us to lift our heads up and out of our work, our worries, our boredom. Her call was not to be ignored. So, feeling a sense of urgency and wanting to be in the best place to see her rising soft and pink over the trees in the East, we responded with joyful anticipation and headed over to a favorite nature preserve of ours that has become a place we frequent often for our walks.
Excitingly and without much effort, we found ourselves willing participants in a glorious magical world with the place all to ourselves.
We headed straight for a prominent spot in the wide-open, high up on a hill. I thought to myself if a stone circle was going to be anywhere on this great, open expanse of land this would be the perfect spot. There is an energy of centeredness and focus here. One can view the entirety of the surrounding area from this grassy knoll. I wonder what the indigenous people felt about this place. I imagine with its hills rolling down to a saltwater river, its quiet estuaries, marshes, woodland, and freshwater pond that this place was respected and considered very important and special to them.
As I sat there quietly, the grassy hill beneath me shimmering in soft, crisp moonlight, I could feel the power of the moment. There on the threshold the world felt more immediate and all of nature's secrets were tugging at my sleeve. The peepers seemed to replace the cells in my brain and I thought how lucky the nesting birds were to be serenaded every night in this massaging sound bath. As if suspended in this amphibious cacophony, the rasping mating call of a lone woodcock could be heard down the hill at the edge of the field. And, striking a soaring black silhouette against the twilight sky, I spotted an osprey circling high above the quiet water hoping for one last meal before the stars sent him back to his nest for the night.
In the stillness of the moment, I couldn't help but contemplate our current global situation. From within this place I found myself rising out of the personal stories and into a shared communal story as a bigger picture began to take shape.
Beauty is growing in our lives. We're becoming more and more aware of how the small, the tiny, the insignificant, what was once hidden from our daily view is now rising up into our awareness.
Our macro world view is being eclipsed by the micro. The imperceptible is replacing the obvious as being important and worthy of our attention and consideration. What was once nonessential is now essential. The insignificant now holds sway over success. Questions are arising. How are we all connected? How is my life connected to other's lives? What can I do to help? What needs changing? Answers are emerging from places in our psyche we didn't know existed.
We are now living in the mini-verse.
Pay attention to the hidden places. Notice what dwells there. Life starts in these infinitely minuscule spaces - in the cells, cracks, hollows, droplets, in the spaces between the notes, and in the secret thoughts filled with unspoken words. At this time all the hidden aspects of our lives are becoming magnified, and connections are becoming uncovered.
Through our stillness and forced focus we are reimagining our world. Our lives are becoming graced by the sparkling presence of the beauty of the mini-verse as we learn to live in an emerging new reality. The inhabitants of the mini-verse have always been here. In the past our preoccupied eyes have glazed over them preferring the grander spectacle on the horizon. Consider the benign fuzzy rabbit-foot clover or the dusty chicory lining the roadside; they too embody great beauty like that of a rose, a sunset or a snow-covered mountain top.
As our awareness softens and we turn our gaze from the horizon towards the ground on which we stand, beauty rises up to meet us.
In the past many have given little care for the small and quiet things, preferring the exotic, bright, and more gregarious. A blessing of these times of closeness, clarity and limitation is the opportunity to recognize and appreciate the beauty of the world with new eyes and a thirsty heart.
Spending time becoming conscious of and engaging with the mini-verse will enrich our lives and bring the answers to the problems we've created. Those who have been conscious of the mini-verse and the power of the seemingly insignificant have known all along that true wisdom, true power, true connection lies on the fringe, in the quiet world that exists within the vibrant. The pulse of life is loud within the silence of the small.
Look at what is informing the obvious - there lies the answer, the solution, the love.
Sitting high up on that knoll wrapped in a blanket woven of stars, the full pink supermoon, peepers, and crisp winter grass I experienced first-hand what it means to live in a mini-verse that is very much present and celebrated within the universe.
