by Ross Bishop
It may be hard to believe, but your life is perfect. Your life - the people in it and the events that take place - is an exquisitely structured process designed to move you toward Mastery. We have this fantasy image of perfection as a placid, calm and serene pond where only gentle breezes dance across a glassy surface. The perfection image implies a kind of stasis, a thing so unchanging that it stands apart from the tumult of life. That may be the result in theory, but I don't think it ever really exists.
Strong winds, rain and storms sometimes whip ponds. The key is that no matter what happens, the pond adapts to the changes in its environment. That is its perfection. The process of achieving human perfection is not a calm and peaceful process either. It can be a rough frontier - a raucous, noisy, and painful arena where people bounce off the walls, get hurt and suffer. It is a place of lessons, bumps and rough edges. Things go “wrong,” and there is pain. Life is a place of change, and change doesn’t come without a struggle.
That conflicts dramatically with the rigid, glassy smooth, flawless perfection held up as the ideal by some religions, schools, cultures and even some parents. To expect flawlessness without failure is a guilt-creating game designed to keep people obedient, submissive and dependent.
It sets you up against an impossible standard. You are human after all! But then you can be herded into a corner with others because of your “failures.” And then you can be turned into obedient sheep, waiting to be led by someone “in authority.” You will then learn to ignore your own truth and give the leader or the organization your power.
It is essential to remember that He created the system you are a part of. He expects you to make mistakes. THAT IS HOW WE LEARN! You have free will, so you have to get this on your own! It cannot be given to you! When things are calm you don't learn much. That's great as a goal, but the way to get there is to stumble your way by learning! Make a mistake, and watch what happens!
Remember when you learned to ride a two-wheeled bike? Every skinned knee was a lesson. Watch a child learn to walk. He or she is down more than they are up! In a nutshell, that is life. Only adult life gets a good deal more complicated.
The Universe is perfect because it constantly adapts and changes. Stasis in The Universe is not perfection, it is death. To refuse to change is to die. In the universe when something contracts and rigidifies, the infinite energy of the system will grind it down whether it be a mountain of granite or a person with rigid ideas. Nothing (no thing) is permanent and unchanging, except Universal Truth and God’s love. This means that you are involved in a process that achieves exquisite balance through flexibility and adaptability in an environment that is constantly changing. And that means a certain amount of pain. Pain does not exist to harm. It is a warning that something is out of alignment. The Universe is asking you to change before things get serious.
Entire cultures have been based upon the militaristic idea that emotional rigidity is desirable. In these “stiff upper lip” cultures, emotions are suppressed as weakness. Life simply does not work that way! Trying to steel yourself from life through rigid practices in the quest for flawlessness only guarantees a greater eventual failure. Discipline is important, but only when done for the right reasons!
Our culture was built on the concept of overcoming limitations through the force of will. And it is difficult to move past this conditioning and see the process of life, with all its baggage and bruises, as perfect. But what is failure anyway but a problem of the ego?
God doesn’t care that you fail, in fact, he encourages smart failures because hopefully, you will learn from them. External flawlessness is only an appearance, and interestingly, it comes from the lessons learned through trial, error and failure. It is important to remember that you can’t fail at God.
The willingness to risk failure is central to the experience of perfection. The founder and great Master of Aikido, Morihei Ueshiba, appeared flawless in his practice of one of the most difficult of all the martial arts. Asked whether he ever got off center, Ueshiba replied, "I get off center all the time! But, I am able to correct so quickly that no one notices!" Awareness leads to the ability to correct in the moment rather than having to wait for things to build up and then hit you in the face.
Ueshiba’s awareness and his openness to what was happening was so total, so complete, that the practice of his art approached perfection. Ueshiba’s harmony was deeply compassionate and without judgment. He was willing to accept his imperfections and use them to "perfect" his practice. His Mastery was not that he was flawless, but that he was so totally aware when he was out of alignment, that he could make corrections almost instantaneously, and in doing so, he set an example for all of us to follow.
By its nature, change is disturbing and unsettling. From God’s point of view, the process of perfection (the process, not the result), creates opportunities for us to learn and grow. And that means that there will be waves on the pond.
Certainly, you do not want to go out and act intentionally foolish by purposefully making mistakes. That leads to “dumb” mistakes, and you won't learn anything from those. But if you can approach life with awareness, although you cannot eliminate its realities, you can do your learning through “smart” mistakes.
Some people’s ponds are always in turmoil. These people make the choice not to learn from their experiences. Even though they are presented with opportunity after opportunity to learn, they are so caught up in their fear and the tumult that they cannot, (do not want to) step back and see the larger picture. Others prefer turmoil because it hides what they think of themselves. And it means not having to confront those beliefs. Thus their lessons elude them. God’s view is of the longer term, on the growth of their souls.
Once you raise your view above the waves in the pond, the larger picture emerges. In each moment, life presents you with exactly what you need in order to move toward Mastery. The lessons are exquisitely crafted and perfect. You are never given more than you can handle, and you are always presented with the things you are ready to learn, although it does not always feel that way. That is because we are in the pond, dog-paddling like crazy just to stay afloat!
The principle of perfection holds that your life is exactly where it needs to be. As Emmanuel pointed out, "Who you are is a necessary step to being who you will be. . . ” In time, you will come to see your life as a succession of perfectly crafted challenges to those places where you do not move energy, where your pond is not calm, but stagnant.
Here's to ripples, not waves!
