Seeing the Whole Pond

Everything is always, simultaneously a grand conclusion and beautiful beginning, if it is done properly – with tact, fullness, certainty, authentic conviction, and comprehensive personal integrity. Eric Eriksson talks about the stages of identity development which fall into four categories:

• Diffusion
• Foreclosure
• Moratorium
• Achievement

For a long time I felt like I’ve been in the moratorium phase of identity formation, where you are kind of wandering, fully committed to investigating your authentic interests and whatnot, but without finding closure. However, while stretching after a run, I overlooked and saw the lagoon pond near my house for the first time today in its entirety. Before I had seen it basically in bits and chunks and pieces or the same hackneyed spots I had always visited with parents and family, but I saw the whole pond just like some other pond that I would visit, implying that it’s something that I’m emerging out of and can fully see in its full scope and entity for the first time. This means 1) that I am creating some closure and simultaneously a new beginning, the best type of conclusion coda possible. IT also means that

• my eyes are opening up
• awareness is increasing
• doubts are fading
• happiness is emerging!

This type of full-circle realization occurs within all of us all the time. I’m mentioning this personal realization as an example of the full-circle completeness of growth that occurs within all of us. We need to take the time to truly experience them, cherish them, and even appreciate them because they allow us to fully recognize our personal evolution. Our experience in life is about zooming in and panning out and from that scope and, as T.S. Elliot wrote in Little Gidding:

We shall not cease from exploration
And the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started
And know the place for the first time

Thus is the mantra of the true life explorer, and such an intrepid adventurer is what we should aspire to be.