Welcome.
About six weeks ago,
We got two kittens.
They were tiny things then.
Either could fit comfortably in my hand.
Since then,
They have more than doubled the size of their bodies and their weight.
Things they once couldn't see the top of are now easily accessible.
Their bodies are twice as far from the ground as they were.
Their legs twice as long.
Their paws are twice as big.
One wonders how they can even run and pounce without falling over their newfound length.
How they can coordinate leaps and bounds,
Paws and legs,
With only occasional crashes into furniture and walls.
Things that were foreign and frightening yesterday are sleeping nooks and toys today.
Noises that once sent them scurrying now barely elicit the opening of an eye from a cat nap in the quiet kitten afternoon.
Their tolerance for growth is frankly astounding.
Imagine waking up tomorrow morning with your body noticeably different.
Your legs longer.
Your head closer to the ceiling.
Your clothes looking better suited to a younger sibling.
But cats grow rapidly.
Kittens don't know any other way of being.
Every day is new.
Every day is a new challenge,
A new mystery.
It is the stuff of their lives.
It is,
Of course,
Also the stuff of our lives.
Growth both thrills us and shatters us.
We are constantly being renewed.
We are constantly being destroyed.
We swing between poles of opposites,
Happiness and sadness,
Love and hate,
Rich and poor,
Like a kitten scampering from one end of the house to the other.
Today I invite you into a meditation on growth.
Whatever that might mean to you,
We are constantly growing.
Our bodies,
Our minds,
Our spirits.
Change in our lives comes from growth.
And growth in our lives both comes from change and fosters change.
You might acknowledge some ways in which you have grown.
Might acknowledge changes you have made in your life.
You might also acknowledge ways in which you're growing in this moment.
The ways in which you're being stretched.
The ways in which you're stretching yourself.
Perhaps you're growing simply by being here and giving yourself the gift of meditation.
How wonderful is that?
It's okay if growth makes you feel out of sorts.
It's okay if you stumble over feet that are bigger than they were just last week.
It's okay if you bump your head because of your newfound height.
Alice Walker describes growth like this.
Some periods of our growth are so confusing that we don't even recognize that growth is happening.
We may feel hostile,
Are angry,
Are weepy and hysterical,
Or we may feel depressed.
It would never occur to us unless we stumbled on a book or a person who explained to us that we were in fact in the process of change,
Of actually becoming larger than we were before.
We are always growing,
Though perhaps we do not acknowledge it.
Perhaps we do not see through the pains of growth.
Perhaps they hide for a time the marvels of what we are becoming.
What are you becoming today?
Growth is change,
Stretching,
Perhaps tearing.
Alice Walker concludes by saying that whenever we grow,
We tend to feel it as a young seed must feel the weight and inertia of the earth as it seeks to break out of its shell on its way to becoming a plant.
Often the feeling is anything but pleasant,
But what is most unpleasant is the not knowing what is happening.
Those long periods when something inside ourselves seems to be waiting,
Holding its breath,
Unsure about what the next step should be.
For it is in those periods that we realize that we are being prepared for the next phase of our life and that in all probability a new level of the personality is about to be revealed.
Growth isn't always painful,
Of course,
And often the pain we feel from growing is simply an expression of fear.
Change can be frightening,
But it can also be wonderful.
A liberation.
You might find yourself sitting beside a window looking into the world and you catch a glimpse of something heavenly and you grow.
You catch sight of a perfection and it stirs an inner flame.
The beauty out there awakens this flame in your heart and in your mind and it changes you.
You grow and encompass something new.
Whenever this happens,
Welcome it and follow the melting into your heart.
There is blessing here.
It's an invitation.
The world is an open-air ashram and the guru is everywhere.
Can you welcome growth however it shows up?
In thoughts?
In your mood?
As a change in state of consciousness,
Growth can be surprising.
Appearing in your life with no notice,
Without a hint it is coming until there you find yourself.
Welcome the sense that at times you will have no idea what is going to happen next in your life.
Welcome that you have no idea what will spur growth,
What your next glimpse of perfection might be,
Or where it might come from.
When you welcome surprise,
You are more likely to perceive the magic show that is our every living moment.
They say the universe popped into existence out of nothingness.
In an infinitesimal portion of a second,
Everything that is came to be.
This is what magicians are telling us when they pull rabbits out of hats.
Joy rises in us when we accept the surprising nature of reality.
Opportunities for growth abound all around us.
Growth is pain and it is ecstasy.
It is the result of long years of planning and work,
Or the result of a single fortuitous moment in which we changed into something different.
The old skin of what we were might shed slowly,
Slowly revealing what we have become.
Or it might melt away in an instant,
Like dust washing away in a summer rain.
Growth is blossoming.
A flowering of something within us,
Finding its way out to the world.
Sometimes we are the one doing the growing,
Changing inside our own little cocoon,
Hidden away from the world.
Other times the growth happens to someone we know,
Someone close to us.
Their growth can be just as frightening,
Just as threatening as our own,
Perhaps even more so.
But we might also find in their growth an opportunity,
An opportunity to stretch ourselves to grow.
Be wildly devoted to someone or something.
Cherish every perception.
At the same time,
Forget about control.
Allow someone or something to change.
Passion and compassion,
Holding and letting go.
The ache in your heart is holy.
Accept it as the rise of intimacy with life's secret ways.
At the same time,
Forget about control.
Allow someone or something to change.
This ache in your heart is holy.
Accept it as the rise of intimacy with life's secret ways.
Our kittens wake up in a new world every day.
A world that might seem smaller or might seem expanded as they reach for new things and continue to grow.
It's an amazing process and no different in any way that matters from our own days.
Growth is pain and joy.
Stretching,
Perhaps tearing,
Evolving into something new or simply shedding something old.
It can happen over long periods of time or in the flash of a moment.
It is in those periods that we realize that we are being prepared for the next phase of our life and that a new level of the personality is about to be revealed.
You've grown in the past 20 minutes.
You've performed an act of self-care.
You might now find your way back to this world,
But carefully.
Things may seem different,
Perhaps smaller,
Perhaps brighter,
But it is you who have grown.
If your eyes are closed,
You might allow them to open to seek your next glimpse of perfection.
Welcome back,
Y'all.
