Men and The Goddess

The title of Rosemary’s post of her poem, Butterfly, holds deep meaning in itself. Thanksgiving and Transformation aren’t words that go easily together, but if we give the pair a bit of thought there is more there.

We are now moving well into the last month of 2014. All the turkey trimmings are gone or put away. Is your sense of “thanksgiving” also put away with the November decorations, thrown out with the bones of the bird? Or do you practice gratitude all year long?

Rosemary’s second butterfly in her poem says: “Nothing is static. Nothing stays the same. The only constant is change.” Can we be grateful for every change? Can we look at every change as part of a greater transformation as explained by the third and smallest butterfly? This is the challenge the poem presents. It is the every day, small changes, moment to moment, that generate the transformations of our lives. And gratitude every day, moment to moment for those small changes leads to “thanksgiving transformation.”

Can you hear the vibration that rings between these two words? There is an echo between them, they are “light shadows” – we are thankful and we transform; we transform and we are thankful – every day and in every way. Thanksgiving Transformation is a state of being – continuous gratitude for the continuous state of change we experience. Thanksgiving Transformation is Life!

There is another pairing of words the squirrel of the poem brings to us: Presence and Preparation. These set up another vibration, the echo between being present in the moment, experiencing it fully, and being prepared for the next moment, that moment of change. It’s almost asking that we exist in two states at once; the dynamic about being prepared for tomorrow’s change while being fully present today is the challenge.

And this dynamic, this vibration is present in every breath, every heartbeat. As we inhale we breathe in appreciation, gratitude, thanksgiving for everything, especially the change of our body chemistry with the intake of fresh air. As we exhale we prepare for the next breath, exhausting the stale, used up air and the byproducts of our metabolism.

From the smallest change in our body chemistry, moment to tiny moment, to the great transforming changes in our lives, day-to-day, year-to-year, we are blessed. At the microcosmic level every moment is a miracle. And at cosmic scales, the beauty of the remnants of a supernova, as just one example, pictured here, are mind-boggling! I am in constant thanksgiving for all of it and all the blessings. I may not always be prepared for the coming changes, transformations, but I can truly give thanks for them!

Thanksgiving Transformation. You can’t have one without the other!