Self begets self.

The Old English language used the same word for tree that it used for truth. The word was treow. The word humility shares its Indo-European origins with the word humus, soil. Taken together these facts form a useful idea: just as a tree grows from the humus of the forest floor, so the truth grows from humility, the soil of our being. 

Truth here has nothing to do with morality or who's right and who's wrong. It's truth about the self, what is true and what is not true about me. Who I am, and who I am not. Truth in this case means simply 'what is.' Knowledge of this truth comes from taking care of the soil of our being, the humus of self, humility. It comes from bearing witness to what is actually going on in my inner condition, and in my outer life. It means discovering and accepting the good and the bad without judgment, avoidance, or attachment. 

To do this frees me to simply be who I am, which will allow all my potential to rise to the surface uncluttered by the desires or illusions I have about myself. Self begets self. When I cultivate humility, the truth emerges, enabling more humility, and so more truth. This cycle of self is continuous and leads us into ever deeper knowledge of ourselves, through ever deeper revelation of who we really are.

It's a painful process, a mythic process, because it requires a passage through death. You have to allow little parts of yourself to fall off and die. But these little parts do not die in vain. They fall to the ground of your being, decompose, and return to your inner soil the energy they previously consumed. This energy can now nourish the truth of who you really are. We tend to think of letting go as loss. But it isn't. To let go of something that you can't have, or that doesn't serve you is to give it a chance to become something you can have, that does serve you. In this way even my delusions can be helpful, and my broken dreams can help enhance my life. But it's painful. It's a dying. Unless the seed falls to the earth and dies... .

The ground of our being is supported by the Underground, the Divine. In the deepest place the soil of self mingles with the Soil. This is where the primal energy comes from, up through the soil of self into the roots of the tree that gives shape to that particular expression of God which is me, my life. This tree is you living through the seasons of your life, letting your leaves flower and fall to nourish you at the roots with energy originally derived from the Divine. To tend the soil where this tree grows is to foster access to that Energy. In this way the tree becomes strong and beautiful with roots that reach deep and limbs that stretch and flower to their fullest. 

Ever forward.

 

Posted via email from Ever Forward