Spiral
In the National Aquarium in Baltimore there is a tank that has a spiral ramp in the middle. The tank is all around this ramp and with each turn of the descent, the hardscape of coral reefs, sea plants, seaweed, and the stationary softscape of anemones, starfish and cave dwelling eels, change. The sharks, grouper, and porcupinefish all circle at different speeds and in different directions. As I descend I feel like a part of a grand process, one that I have only a small amount of agency over but that has a rhythm and pace to it - an interconnection. Other people in the aquarium also circle down or up the ramp at different paces, they too are of different shapes and sizes. We all move around and around and around.
When I return to any particular point in the spiral, I see familiar landscape - a giant rock or a log. A notable crustacean. At first, my brain registers the familiarity- I know this place! But then, when I have a moment to sit with it I realize it is not exactly the same. I am at a different height, the angle is different. So although that stone was there before and I know it, I can now see its shiny underbelly and the algae growing there. And the fish that met me at eye level at the previous loop are now slightly above and I see their lighter bellies, smooth and taut rather than their stripe-finned sides.
The soul journey is like this. We like to think that progress is a straight line but that is a falsehood of the materialist mind. The journey sometimes feels like a circle (and often the ways we try to do the journey without wise support can be a circle, following our blind spots round and round). But if we have a sincere desire to grow and change, and we have wise support, the journey is more of a spiral. There is a deepening. It is circular, but in three dimensions. Like the seasons. Every year there is a spring but it isn’t the same spring.
Sometimes the darkness is overwhelming. If we have done some unproductive circling before we truly got on our soul journey, we are sensitized to fear getting stuck in a loop. And so we see the things that look the same, that recurring part of the spiral, and we panic. The fear brain screams - I am here again! Look - its THAT rock! That same fucking speckled rock! I am not going anywhere. I am going in circles. This isn’t working. There is no journey. Just my same dumb loop.
And this is the point where I ask us to pause, to stay with the familiar long enough to look at it more closely. If you do this you can see that you are in the same spiral but it is not exactly the same because you are at a different angle. That rock is still that rock. (Of course it is that rock - its YOUR journey! That is YOUR ROCK! You may see that rock for the rest of your days as it is your karma in some way - you and that rock are intimately linked in ways understandable and not.) But you are different - you are seeing that rock from a different angle.
Contextualizing our journey this way can help us adjust to the rhythm of the soul life. It is not a line but that does not mean that it does not follow a pattern. It is just a pattern more ancient and rhythmic than the rise over run of modern productivity. As we descend into ourselves, our presence deepens and so the energy gets more dense, more intense. We become more the naturally sensitive being we were always meant to be and so become less tolerant of things that do not suit our soul life. We learn to build a kind of sea legs, a metabolism that allows us to withstand the pressures of the depths and to trust the inner path’s unfolding. And we gradually also become acclimated to the truth that each of us is a part of a dynamic and intricate ecosystem whose journey of healing and growth is intricately connected to the journey of every other thing.
Because unlike the Baltimore aquarium, your depths don’t end. They just keep going, keep circling, keep richening. Your depths are unfathomable.