Living With The Cycles of Nature

The tides go in and the tides go out. It doesn’t matter if you live by water or not, our bodies are 90% water and we feel those tides. We feel all the cycles of nature and druidry is to live in harmony with those cycles. There are solar cycles, lunar cycles, daily cycles and all kinds of cycles, too numerous to cite.

Right now as we near the new moon what I am feeling is a combination of the solar cycle of spring energies wrapping me in a cocoon and the lunar cycle is squeezing me unmercifully! Perhaps it would be better to say that I feel trapped in my own skin! Something needs to give and it can’t be soon enough for me…

I guess I’m feeling the pressure that causes a seed to break open and begin sprouting. I can’t say that it is pleasant or that I am enjoying it. In fact, I’m blindly reaching out struggling to find some relief from the tension of motionlessness that has become near unbearable. What is it that I’m supposed to be doing? That’s what this post really is in fact, my trying to do something to get a little relief.

Even though there is only the present moment and will always only be the present moment, that is a bit misdirecting. Some times are better than others for certain activities and when we try to force things at the wrong time it is like trying to push a chain down the road. Nothing cooperates! Everything is much more difficult than it needs to be.

When we say there is no such thing as time and that there is only the present moment there is a paradox at work that we need to come to terms with. I will try to give an example from my own life.

My beloved dog Luci died last spring and this past year has been very lonely, especially because I’ve recently retired and with the lock downs it has been almost like solitary confinement. I lack simple companionship, human or animal. There is a great emptiness in my life. But no matter how many times I have tried to find a new pet (its been five times now) it never seems to work out. In the beginning this has baffled me. How can my present moment change to include a new companion?

The answer of course is that my new companion is out there, but it hasn’t happened yet. Nothing is happening in my present moment because it has already happened in the future and I don’t want to mess that future up by doing anything stupid right now! Things will unfold as they need to and they will unfold in a way that is blessed. I can sense that because I can sense the future and it is good. I was led to find Luci the first time and I will be led to find what I am supposed to discover next! That is the paradox that living in the present moment brings to us. The present moment is always changing into another present moment and since there is no such thing as time we can sense and enjoy all of them on some level even though what we sense might be limited.

Sometimes I think that life is like a printing queue that is backed up for up to an entire year. It’s in the queue, it will be printed out, but other things are first in line and I just need to wait. The good side to that is that it will eventually get printed out and in the meantime those other things that I have been waiting for are finally being printed out and I can enjoy them! Even if I seem to have moved on to other things.

For example, I’ve never had enough free time to do some of the things that I’ve wanted to do and now I have all kinds of free time. That free time has been in the printing queue for a long time and I’ve looked forward to it for a long time. Now its here and I’m struggling with it!

I think the lesson is to enjoy what is currently in my life and make the most of it that I can and be open to what comes next as it happens, trusting that I will know when it becomes available!