The Little Package that chanGed Everything...

"Great Acts are made of small deeds."  ~ Lao Tzu

It was a shoe box.  
Or had been, in a former Life.  
By the time he showed it to me, gravity and the coming of the years had downgraded it to 6 uneven segments of cardboard barely fashioned together to hold his treasures, his keepsakes, the scattered mementos of a young, but well-traversed life.

His "Box of Cool Shit".  

Out of its mired and dilapidated mouth, he produced old photographs, small pieces of granite, shell and jade.  A cheap string of beads from his maiden voyage to the Big Easy.  A delicate arrowhead, smooth and ancient, beside them.  The Dead in Vegas ticket stubs.  A whale vertebrae.  The broken nose from his first surfboard.  The frayed edge of a patch from his childhood blanket.  

In our first weeks together, we would sit upon the floor with his sagging box at hand, and we would reach in and tell the story - piece-by-piece - of what he found inside.  
In these small moments, did he weave for me the greater picture of his character, his heart - offer me miniature windows into the tender places of his soul.
In these small ways our Love began.

........................

I have been a busy, little bee in the hive of social media these days.  
Each day a new blurb.  
A new photo.
Sharing and tagging and hash tagging like a hungry little Kardashian.  
And it's felt like long trip to church on Easter Sunday.

Joyous.  Light.  Celebratory.  Sweet.  
A re-birth.

Because a few weeks ago, I hatched a little harebrained scheme with some of my fellow LadyFriends/LightWorkers about a way to integrate some of the work we do individually - in areas of self-care, ritual, sacred study or spiritual practice - and transport it to the Virtual sphere.

Me:  Hey.  Do you guys wanna create an Instagram challenge with me?
Awesome Lady Pals:  Uh, yeah.  What does that look like?
Me:   Well... What if, instead of getting people excited to go do a bunch of different versions of #handstand each day or photograph pretty pictures of #rocks & #trees, we challenged them to witness something #sacred each day?  (Which could, ya know, depending on who you are, look like different types of handstands or rocks or trees...)
Awesome Lady Pals:   So if I get this right---- pretty pictures plus reflective stories plus mindfulness plus art plus sharing???  Yes. In.  When do we start???

And thus, a miniature movement was born.  

For while, by myself, I may not be compelled to say, share the gritty details of my childhood battles with bulimia or document my morning walk in the woods, nor the little selfies I take now and again to remind me to find Beauty even in the places where I thought it lost.....In this container we've built - four women, 20 days, and numerous opportunities to pause and gather and reflect back the Good and True and Change we wish to see within our World - well - this humble "box" has caused me to be Bold.

By placing aside this tiny parcel of time and intention - it has enabled me to step in, dive deep and Share openly - at a level I hadn't yet been.  

..........

So I wonder today what are the boxes you're building?  What tiny vessels are you crafting to carry your Heart, your Dreams?  What little ships are we building to launch our Visions, to bring them to Shore???

A place to connect the Infinite to the Infinitesimal.  
A nexus where the Grand and insignificant intersect.
A little launchpad to shoot your MoonRockets from.

The teachers tell us if we want a Practice - just set aside a few minutes each day.  Ten will do.
Want better handstands?  
Roll out the mat, set a timer, and start taking deep breaths.  In a year or so, you may very well have beaten Gravity at its game.
Gonna pen the next Great American Novel?
See how many blogposts, or poems or postcards or humble, single pages you can fill out first.
Do we dream of Big Big Things for this Life of Ours?
Then we must be willing to show up to the humble work before us - with Huge, Gargantuan Heart.

......

Eventually, I took what little money I had saved from my hours spent barista-ing and bought a fitting vessel for my Love's beloved "sh*t".  Heavy, polished wood with brass handles and fittings that could proudly carry his treasured things.  He thanked me, gingerly re-housed each item inside it, and has them to this day.  

But when we look inside every now and again, I am reminded - though the box is lovely and pleasing to the Eye - it matters little. Its contents are what revealed his worth to me.  Each piece wrought with meaning and selected with care. Showing me a bit of what it looked like - to hold the Vision of a Sweet Tapestry of a Life in one's mind & heart - and to stitch it together - one blessed fragment at a time.  

May you continue to unearth the tiny boxes that will bring our Masterpiece to light.
May you fill them with courage and delight.
May you be heartened and inspired to open them up and display them proudly to the world - the stories, lessons and nuggets found there.  

Write to me and tell me about your boxes and the treasures you keep.
Join us for the final 10 days of our Reclaiming the Virtual Sphere for the Sacred.  
Choose a period of time to enact a minor revolution all your own.  
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