We hear a lot of talk about evolution these days. My experience is that it is not an abstract, scientific concept, but an actual force that expresses itself in all of our lives. Your evolutionary impulse does not come from your mind. The mind wants status, security, approval and control. It resists change, transformation and evolution. I’m sure you have noticed this! Many of us are dragged through an evolutionary process kicking and screaming, surrendering to it only when we have no more options.
I have been exploring ways and means of facilitating the process of evolution, personally and collectively, with my students and clients, over the last 20 years. (See the newsletters on my website for more on this topic.) It seems very clear at this point that we all need to evolve, that conscious evolution is a process that never ends. We don’t reach a point and think, “Great, now I’m done!” On a deep core level, our true self is whole and complete, right in this moment. On the level of discovering how to live as a human being, the learning is endless.
On one level, evolution is essential because we keep bumping up against the things that aren’t working. On another level, evolution is just what is happening, whether we like it or not. It just seems to be what the universe does. When Barbara Marx Hubbard speaks of evolution, she talks about the caterpillar and the butterfly. When the caterpillar is at the very beginning of turning into a butterfly, something happens which is invisible to the eye, and essential to the ongoing transformation. The caterpillar grows ‘imaginal cells.’ These are a new kind of cell, capable of imagining the possibility of actually being a butterfly. These tiny imaginal cells are what support and initiate this whole radical process for the caterpillar.
I think we all have these imaginal cells inside us, given to us for our own evolutionary journey. These are intimations, vague longings, dreams, voices, hints and whispers of the next step for us, a possibility that our mind cannot formulate. Our mind judges the future in terms of the past. It is very limited in its capacity to sense new possibilities.
Take some time in the next week and see if you can discover some of your imaginal cells. What are they telling you? Even if it’s just the vaguest whisper, don’t give up, keep listening. Your evolutionary imperative is not going to give up on you. When it comes to the choice between comfort and safety vs. evolution and transformation, just see what it takes to say connected to the bold and courageous part of you. Everyone has courage. It’s part of our true nature. Just call it forth. Ask it to reveal itself, day by day. Without trying to get rid of the fear.
Let me know how it goes for you. I’m interested!
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