Welcome to embracing sacred incompletion.
When things seem incomplete,
It's the openness they have to being fed by life.
There's nothing wrong or illusory about bringing projects or actions into completion in our lives.
In fact,
Doing so can be a powerful way to clear the energy of things,
To renew them,
To restore them.
It can be a form of courage to bring those things into completion that are wanting completion.
That is a form of maturity and that is rightfully cultivated.
But we can start to get into trouble if we look at ourselves as projects that can be perfected or completed.
This is even more true when we're looking at others or the world itself.
Whether we're talking about ourselves,
Others,
Or the world,
These are not projects to be perfected or completed.
The notion of sacred incompletion tries to pierce through cultural metaphors that treat ourselves and life like a race,
Or a project,
Or a thing,
Where in reality we are a beautiful mystery dancing with other mysteries in an unfoldment that never ends,
Is never complete,
And is never perfected.
The dichotomy of complete,
Incomplete,
Perfect,
Imperfect don't even really make sense when we apply it to life,
Ourselves,
And others.
I invite us to bring mindfulness to metaphors derived from medicine,
Like being healthy or being ill.
And I want to encourage us to inquire as to whether we are trying to set our lives up as a project to finally be completed as a healthy being,
Or as a being free from pain,
Perfected in some way.
All of this goal-oriented behavior is fun and can be an adventure of some part of our lives,
But our deeper self to bigger adventures that we may not ever really understand completely.
And this incomplete blessing,
Like the incompleteness of these ultimate mysterious projects,
Is a wonderful thing.
There are many people who live beautifully with terminal illnesses.
There are people who live in a manner that is inspiring,
Because it helps us remember what life is about in the first place.
At this stage in our lives,
Whether we feel like we are succeeding at a project or failing at a project,
Will ultimately bring us to the same place,
That the project itself is not where the mystery of your being is located.
And that measuring everything against this made-up pursuit may make us forget the sacred incompleteness that puts us in relation with our bigger story.
From this perspective,
It's quite funny that we don't accept our imperfections,
Because we will always be imperfect.
It's a losing battle to try to be perfect,
Or try to make others perfect,
Or the world perfect.
But life does become more skilled at meeting the needs of all beings more and more effectively.
It's a movement towards increasingly diverse forms of beauty.
Perfection is not the goal of these pursuits,
Any more than evolution is trying to finish a race.
The point of the race was just to run beautifully.
What we can sometimes mistake for competition or competitiveness is nothing more than the world itself trying to make a more beautiful thing emerge.
And when it does,
It inspires others.
The thing that emerges through us isn't even for us,
Even though as a beautiful side effect,
It nourishes us too,
Because it nourishes life itself.
We might find as we cross the finish line that we've made up,
That we keep doing the things that we were doing before we crossed the finish line,
And that it was never about the finish line.
So what is sacred incompletion then?
It's the realization that the finish line and the race and our participation in it are not about the finish line and the race,
But it is about the way we participate.
And if the only way we know how to motivate ourselves in this moment is to participate in a race,
Then that's okay.
But when the race is done and we become confused,
We'll find ourselves running for the pure joy of it,
Because running is a beautiful thing,
Because it's a thing that humans do.
So in whatever race we may be imposing on ourselves in this moment,
Thinking that we are too early or too late at the finish line of some goal we've made important to ourselves,
It can be helpful to remember that it's the beauty of the way we're participating in the race that matters itself.
It's not even a race at all.
It's just about being in the world beautifully together.
It's about being beautiful alone or in solitude,
Or being beautiful when you're worrying or confused.
It's about making wherever you are an opportunity to create and acknowledge the beauty that's possible,
And the beauty that's making itself actual through every thought and every action and every decision you make.
Sacred in completion is the idea that there's always more beauty to create,
Because we are beauty.
This notion of beauty is not opposed to tragedy and grief,
For the very grief of life itself is a form of celebrating its beauty and preciousness.
But as we grieve,
It's important to remember that those things about the world that we might want to change,
Those things about society or politics or the environment or anything really,
If we look at it like a project,
If we look at the world as an imperfect,
Incompleted thing and judge that as bad,
We might begin to engage with creating this change from a place of project,
Instead of a place of creating more beauty.
And this may end up repelling others and making them not want to participate with us.
So as we learn to come from a place of mutual creation,
Of a sense of adventure,
A sense of humility,
A sense of embracing the mystery,
That it's possible that none of us really know what this great mystery is all about.
And how incredible is that?
That anything I could say this life is about,
It's definitely about more than that.
It's about more than I can ever understand.
And so trying to live out of an ideal will always be a bit short of life trying to emerge through us,
Which is a more direct connection to that mysterious wholeness that we are.
And that even this perspective about sacred incompletion is still just a thought,
Trying to make sense of a greater whole,
That it only touches a little bit,
In an attempt to see it a little bit more beautifully,
To bring some humor into the idea that we could ever really complete anything.
That every project we ever do,
We look back on with more adult and more mature eyes,
Thinking how we would do it now,
If we had a chance to do it over again.
Which is an interesting way to say that everything that we've completed in the past is always offering itself to us for renewal.
And how wonderful is it that we could never really complete anything?
That everything offers itself up to be renewed.
Our relationships,
Our concepts of ourselves,
Others,
And the world.
Our relationship to the land,
To other beings,
To other species,
To other cultures and communities,
To the books that we've read,
Or the heroes that we've looked up to.
That every seeming repetition is an offering,
A question,
An invitation into renewal.
May these words,
In their humble attempt to make sense of the beauty and fullness of a world that they could never truly comprehend,
May they be an inspiration,
A seed.
May they be a form of incompletion that is renewed in you and through you,
In a way that resonates and is aligned with your being,
And what is seeking to unfold through you,
Anew,
Today.
Blessings,
Friend.
May everything that seems incomplete become the beautiful incompletion that opens up into the mystery that it makes possible,
Into the renewal that it is inviting of you,
So that the never-before-seen beauty wanting to emerge through you as a place to belong in the bigger picture of life.
