Imperfect, Perfect Parallels (© 2022) Water is an imitator. It takes on whatever shape it's held in, filling out each curve, bump, wall. It travels in each of us, so that we are simply its carriers, bringing from one place to another. Water is a traveller, a wanderer, yet it is also content to simply rest in the alcove of a lake bed or the dip of a puddle. It is a magician, a trickster, a nourisher. It is many things, and none of them.
Afraid of the Misunderstood
We are afraid of what we don’t understand.
But what we don’t understand are simply life’s divine mysteries, not meant to be dissected, discovered, dealt with. We are meant to stand in the river of not-knowing, to be okay with letting enigmas slip through our fingers, clever as water rivulets. We do not have to fathom every answer in this universe.
Water is sly in that way. Just when we think we have tamed its wild waters, understood its deepest depths, it reveals yet another secret, shows another side of its honest ferocity. How can the same peaceful being that embodies a water droplet be the same as the brutal, frothing waves of the ocean?
We make mistakes in assuming. In thinking that water is an emotionless being, or that we should have the right to know every crevice and niche of this planet, we take ideas too large to fathom and attempt to cram them into neat, packaged boxes. I know one thing: that doesn’t work.
If an answer isn’t readily available, a labelled box waiting for its contents to be neatly packaged inside, we do not appreciate its wrapping of enigmatic unknowns. We only want to split down to its core, to find what has hungered our curious appetite. We only wish to slake our thirst of analytical intervention. We only seek to find, to name, and to place into its respected classification.
This is the paradigm of humanity. We are curious to a fault; we cannot accept that we do not need to know everything. Our curiosity drives us to extremes if only to declare that we have found an answer to an unknown.
But when there is no “practical” answer – that is, no answer that can easily elude subjects we feel uncomfortable discussing in our carefully constructed world of science – that is when we draw the line. We build barring conclusions between ourselves and the mysterious; we write off what will not fit in our air-conditioned, fluorescent-lit lives.
Water will show us, eventually, that there’s things out there too large to cognize. That’s what I think, anyway. Because the other day, I tried to understand the true size of this place we live in – also called the universe. I simply can’t grasp how we can have so many problems and be so swallowed up by comparably unimportant stresses when we reside on a tiny rock suspended in space, surrounded by galaxies and stars and planets.
If we accepted the perplexities that entwine our world in riddles, maybe we could actually enjoy living on this wandering, celestial body, comforted by the fact that we’ll be okay, even if we don’t know all the answers. Because maybe it’s best those answers stay hidden, wrapped up in questions, mystifications, intricacies. Maybe it’s best that us humans continue in our quest of curiosities, never quite satisfying that internal, eternal seeker of possibilities. Maybe it’s best that we keep trying to understand that a raindrop is the same as an ocean – both misunderstood, both full of mysteries, both okay to be simply in awe of.
As I am typing this, Of Monsters and Men’s “King and Lionheart” is playing, which is appropriate, as I relay this comment. The Medicine Cards refers the Black Panther as “embracing the unknown”. If the animal card is picked, it ‘maybe telling you not to worry about the future. Trust that you are not suppose to mentally “figure it out” at this time. You may need to confront fears of the unknown, of being less than you truly are, or an inability to simply BE. Let go of fears that appear as obstacles or barriers. Embrace the unknown and flow with the mystery that is unfolding in your life. The next step may be leaping empty-handed into the void with implicit trust. In the stillness of the void, find the will to avoid foolish interpretations, going deeper into your own self-discovery and healing process. Here you will discover Black Panther’s unexpectant blessings…..you are reminded that every human being emerged from the darkness of the womb; you once felt that the silence and the ebony void of this nurturing space was the safest place to BE.’ As our body consists of 75% water, and according to Science Alert (https://www.sciencealert.com/99-9999999-of-your-body-is-empty-space) the body is 99.9999999% empty space (void), individually, we are truly a mystery. This must have something to do with why you win the games we play, so consistently?