Reduction

I’ve been lucky. I have learned something that is changing my life. I sort of knew this, I had an inkling from my time of darkness, but I had no idea that what I was encountering had such widespread impact. What I refer to, is something that grew clear for me as I heard the important stories of others, who were knocked off of their trajectory and simultaneously put on one that was more complex, meaningful and liberating. What I experienced was the way that Life reduces, and paradoxically, enlarges one. This paradoxical part of living is news to me — very good news — and the type I want to reflect on.

Reduction, which is what I’ve been calling this ordinary/extraordinary part of Life, is a strangely new awareness, even though it’s been working me from the beginning of my time. I have only put it together, realized this was going on, recently. I guess it is an elder awareness. I needed a lot of life experience to see this pattern, this corner of the deep dark woods. Now, this place doesn’t seem so dark.

The paradox of reduction is a shiny new awareness, I’m just beginning to take in, so if I say something about it that you already gleaned for yourself, forgive me. I feel like a kid with a new toy. Now I can play at a new level, in a whole new way. To know that I’ve been accompanied by something that grants me just the right challenges, the ones that set me more firmly on the road that is most apt for me, is like playing on a trapeze knowing there is a better than safety net beneath me. Falling is a blessing!

I awoke on Friday morning, like I sometimes do, with the feeling of energetic lucidity. This morning it was like the firebird the Phoenix had come to perch on my mind. I was taken by its elegance, beauty, power and elasticity. Change was natural to its bearing.  On this morning my imagination was given very specific reign. I was captivated by a glowing symmetry. Life took away while it gave. Like breathing allowed me to live, the paradox of reduction/enlargement, allowed me to fulfill my self, the mission that insured my uniqueness.

It was like I am a kind of bell. I resonate for a long time. Excuse the noise. I find myself in various states of excitement. In one moment I am taken by the enormity of what has befallen me, and then I plummet over a whitewater-like cascade of realization that this is a secret that knows how to protect itself. I am thrilled into wanting to communicate what seems to be a miracle, then I realize that no words are capable of conveying this experience. I am delightfully baffled.

On a slightly more mundane level, I, being the intrepid fool I am, keep trying to find ways of describing the miracle of love that seems to underlay our lives. So far my nearest effort has been the one Alexandra brought to me. Being a good cook, and an artist, she is somewhat familiar with the ways of creation. Using a metaphor from cooking she was able to capture how something could get larger as it was being made smaller. Reduction is a cooking method where a substance, usually a sauce, is put under duress and made smaller, to bring out, and intensify, its essential nature. As one reduces a sauce, one also brings out of it the inner qualities that make it most flavorful and nutritious.

Apparently, back to the big picture, this is how Creation proceeds.  It knocks us down until we are just right. One of the most delightful aspects of what I am discovering is that reduction seems to draw out what is most essential. Something innate, and already there, is drawn forth. I like the idea that I’m being assisted, along my way, towards becoming more fully myself. When I let this in, I feel very wanted, like I exist for a specific reason. That perception relaxes me, right here in my skin. Can you imagine that, what is most essentially me is wanted. Wow! You can feel why I awakened!

The firebird hasn’t finished with me. I am more awake and thankful then I was, but despite a lifetime of direct experience, I can hardly believe the incredible luck that has come my way. I know I don’t live like I am wanted, like I belong, like I know this, my part, of Creation is unfolding right now. This is the challenge of my existence. I let my self get mesmerized by the surface of things, and give up touch with the deeper more essential nature of the moment.

I find that, despite how easily I get distracted, I am reassured by another idea/reality/perception that has come my way. I have reason to believe that part of the reduction process involves ripening. Age is paring me down, and along the way, I’m gaining experience, becoming more essentially me, dying before I die, becoming more as I become less. Reduction seems to me to be a primary way Life has its way with me.

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For more pieces like this go to www.elderssalon.blogspot.com

To hear archived versions of our radio program Growing An Elder Culture go to www.elderculture.com

To read excerpts, or otherwise learn, about Embracing Life go to www.davidgoff.net