How to find new life? You follow the impulses toward a better life, even when it’s hard. That is what I do, and it’s not easy but the alternative is a prison of routine and amusement seeking to avoid feeling dead. Remember the sprout struggles out of the seed. The chick struggles out of the shell, the bud struggles to open, the fledgling struggles on the edge of the nest, for the sky beckons. I’m sure it’s terrifying, those wings have never had the chance before. It’s not easy. Maybe you think you’re too old to change.
Do you resist asking the question how to find new life? Do you limit the possibilities to expectations based on the past? Are new events limited by your past? No. This day has never happened before. Do you hesitate following the impulses toward things that really make life worth living e.g. like being open to a more truthful, more trusting love. The negative thoughts might go a bit like this, “It’s too hard.” Oh really? The pursuit of the truth is too hard? A deeper love is too hard? Freedom is too hard? More choices are too hard? Really? What if a sprout, a chick, a bud, or a fledgling accepted such pleading for ease. Then again, not every seed develops or every chick hatches, or every bud opens, nor every fledgling soars.
The arguments against breaking out of the old leave the question of how to find your new life unanswered.
Wait! Perhaps I’m being too hard dear reader. What if you’ve never thought about it? What if you’ve never put up a scale and honestly weighed the alternatives? What if others clipped your wings, and made it impossible to live truthfully? Even worse, what if the lies you’ve used achieved a valuable reward? What if you’ve never had a lover hear from you the whole truth in your life? Maybe you tried the truth and felt berated or left alone. Perhaps you’ve known a betrayal that I can scarcely imagine. Yes there is risk but that is not the end because life still abides in you, as the impulses that haunt you with discontent and the inner knowing that there is something yet to discover.
Did you know a bird’s clipped wings grow back after a molt? Wings must be continually clipped to rob the bird of its birthright. Not flying becomes normalized, a habit. But you are not a bird, you don’t live in a cage, or do you? The cage of what’s easy; of what’s already known. Do you console yourself with like-minded people who agree and lie to each other saying, “what we do not have, is not worth having?” or “What we fear must be bad.” If so, are such opinions irrefutable? No! For here is one voice among the din that refutes them.
How to find new life? You follow the impulse toward life, in your own unique circumstances. We face the fear.
Remember fear is an errand-boy who should only be delegated simple and specific tasks.
Tasks like avoiding real harm e.g. violence, coercion, recklessness and deceit. We must not become a servant to fear because many fears do not adapt well to life. How many people passed a test they feared they would flunk? How many of us feared rejection and received acceptance? How many fear to admit fallibility? As imperfect, as fallible and as foolish as any life occasionally is, like a fledgling daring an awkward first flight around the nest. All new discoveries can feel awkward. I see your feathers have grown back.
I know some of you don’t believe me and that’s an irony because it is I that don’t believe you!
I simply don’t limit life to my expectations and my past because life is bigger than both. I say step out of those expectations into what life is offering, that is how to find new life. Remember, the isolation of lies is lonely, pretending takes effort, discontent is a burden, manipulation is hard and seeking refuge in amusements is it’s own work.
I invite a new life, a better life. Not just in my life, in your life. If we’ve become habituated to not flying (and not trying), that’s still all it is, just a habit. The issue is nothing more than breaking that habit. We may fly close together or far apart, regardless, I hope for your freedom in the vast sky of life. I know it’s scary to move toward a more truthful, daring and loving life because you must fly out of the false security, you must leave the atrium of mind and fly into the vast sky of what life actually offers.
2 replies on “Find New Life”
Todd, once again you speak to me from an honest and real place in my own heart and head. Namaste brother!
[…] What can we do? If we care, we can give our time and we can tell the truth to people who are perhaps more vulnerable than they have ever been. We can say, ‘I don’t know what to say to you, but I’m here if you need me.’ We can insist to spend the night because being in darkness bereft invites a crushing despair. Give people space but don’t go too far away. Perhaps one of the best things we can do is an old tradition, we bring or make food. It’s so hard to eat in the midst of tragedy and harder to cook. Food is something we all share, eating is the epitome of saying, ‘I want to live,’ food is moving away from death, food is coming back to life. […]