Saturday, December 10, 2011

Chaos or Imaginal Experience?


We call chaos, experiences or events that we can't track, understand or make sense of. Our response to chaos is commonly that of "reaction" – a non consciously chosen action. We experience ourselves at effect of the world when we “react” to our environment. Deep held beliefs about who we are and the nature of our relationship to the All, keep us at effect of circumstances. The truth is that we have come here to experience free-will (not reactionary will) and be conscious co-creators in these very special times in the history of our world.

Could what we call "chaos" really just be the perspective of our limited selves?

Could chaos actually be the work of the Great Opulent Design that surpasses the tracking capacities of our egoic minds?

What we witness in nature is that chaotic experiences are closely followed with a cycle of reorganization, which results in a new and more adapted operating system or existence.

The life cycle of the butterfly is the archexample of this. It starts as a caterpillar, heavy and pretty much confined to the area where it hatched. It looks like a “finished product”, yet something unbelievable is about to happen. At some point after eating as much as it could, and growing fat, it hangs itself, lets go of its old self, turns into a gooey soup of imaginal cells, to become what it was born to be: the beautiful winged creature we call butterfly.



I have often wondered what the experience of the caterpillar might be as it slowly disintegrates under the action of self-created enzymes. How aware is it? Does it freak out? Does it know what it's up to? And if yes, does it still freak out?

When we look back at times of chaos in our lives with honesty, we can usually see the good that came out of them. Sometimes we experienced an inner shift that changed everything about the way we perceived our reality, and brought forth behavioral changes that resulted in the manifestation of different creations. Other times, we have just found ourselves in new circumstances that are better suited to facilitate our living our purpose.

If we’re even honester, looking back at the times right before chaos showed up, we’ll see that somewhere, we KNEW that time for change had struck, but didn’t think we had it in us to initiate the required changes. After all, why step into the unknown when we just arrived at a point in our lives where we start feeling shaky. Shouldn’t we be looking for stability instead? It’s like being at the end of the road we’re on, and standing on the edge of a cliff.  And we’re like: “No way I’m jumping!” And we wait… until LIFE gives us the push, and rather than diving gracefully out of our own conscious choice with a beautiful triple summersault, we fall down with flailing arms and legs, kicking and screaming like a three-year old on a sugar high at bedtime.

What if we could truly and deeply realize that just like the caterpillar, we are NOT the end product and will never be. Nothing is.  We are constantly in a process of change following the cycles of: creation, conservation and destruction. The Hindus have attributed a God to each aspect of the cycle. Brahma the Creator, Vishnu the Conserver, and Shiva the Destroyer.

When Shiva comes knocking on our door, can we welcome the divine plan behind the scary appearance of destruction? Then rather than chaos, we would have the opportunity to see what it’s like to be having an imaginal experience. Imagine that!

Remember this when chaos becomes overwhelming to you:

You are butterflying yourself!

We are all constantly butterflying ourselves!!



Who wants to remain caterpillar all of our life, when our purpose is to fly?

The critical situation of our world, and its very real prospect of self-annihilation, is not unlike the chrysalisation process of the caterpillar. The old obsolete egoic structures will be shed, and we will ALL emerge on the other side as a butterflied people and planet! The question is not whether it will happen -it is happening - but whether we will transition with a triple summersault or kicking and screaming.

©2011 Francois Levannier. All rights reserved.  www.LoveYourLifeAndBusiness.com