How we see
of threads and sculpting and letting go
I’ve recently been in the Allegheny Forest. I went to hike and write.
I stopped at a ranger station on my first day and they suggested a few trails. Upon learning I was a writer, one ranger thought I’d like to sit on a rock at Jakes Rocks. She said there was a lovely overlook from a large rock.
The next day, I drove to the overlook. I expected one large rock, a beautiful view, and some surrounding trails through the forest. As I started wandering through the trees, indeed I found the overlook with the beautiful view, and…
I found a forest full of the most exquisite, glorious rocks of all shapes of largeness. Tumbled moss-covered rocks with ancient trees bent around, over, through, and between.
I was in another world. I climbed rock upon rock upon rock. I went under, over, and through. I sat upon them and hid underneath. I wrote and drew and dreamed. I found rocks I remembered and rocks who remembered me. I giggled with the elves and smiled at the fairies. Talked with the mushrooms, stood still for the chipmunks, marveled with the spiders, and let myself be seen by the canopied sky.
I was large and small. Old and new. Alive here and all the times before. I was ache and longing and knowing and awe. I was wish and surrender. A human being with more than human beings.
It was this way for me. Endlessly abundant, richness of surprise, expanse of connection, forever home. Not one rock with a lovely view, but endless rocks with endless views of everything.
Later that evening, I went outside to find the full moon. I looked and looked, waited another hour, and looked again. I couldn’t find her. She was blanketed by a thick overcast sky.
Yet I felt her—endlessly abundant, richness of surprise, expanse of connection, forever home.
Why am I telling you about a forest and the moon?
I could just as easily be telling you about my garden and my cat, a school and a child, the news and a neighbor, or a table and a cup of tea.
It’s all large and it’s all small. It’s all seen and unseen. All obvious and ordinary, and at the same time, always endlessly miraculous.
How we see the sky shapes the sky.
How we see a conversation shapes its content and layers.
How we see learning shapes its possibilities.
How we see nature shapes our aliveness as (or, with/in/next to/separate from) nature.
How we see matter shapes the kinds of matter with which we sculpt.
How we see our soul shapes the expression of our knowing.
I’ve been playing with the image of threads as a way to see and talk about strands of energy and ideas in a particular context. I’ve previously described such multiplicities as stories or layers or timelines. Indeed, they are. And there’s something about the image of threads that seems helpful, accessible, tangible.
This a good time for us to see and play with threads.
Everything has been loosened. Old ideas and ways of being have been untethered or are in the midst of their untethering. This is why when we look at the world, our communities, our schools, ourselves, what we see (and feel) might appear as a big pile of mess.
Untie and loosen a bounty of threads and indeed, things get messy.
Yet we can learn to see the mess for its various energetic and idea matter—its threads. We can see the threads that are loudly pronounced in neon, the ones humans are tugging at and tangling in tight bundles. We can see the sticky threads that try to grab and spool us in. We can see the familiar threads that we’ve attached to ourselves, but they don’t seem to fit anymore. We can find the newer threads that may appear translucent or fleeting at first. And we can learn to connect with the expanse of matter that we may not yet see or feel as thread but becomes more tangible and alive the more we engage with it in reverence.
All the threads are loose enough, visible enough, present enough for us to pull, to see, to hold, to play.
They work like pathways. The threads we choose to attune to, the ones we use in our conversations, the ones we tell stories about and weave through our minds, the ones we sew into our work, the ones we listen to, nurture, and trust, these are the threads that sculpt how we see. These are the threads that sculpt what we create through our seeing.
How we see the sky shapes the sky.
Nothing is set. Nothing is too far gone. There isn’t definitive doom on the horizon. Although there are certainly neon threads you could use to sculpt doom if you choose.
Look at any context, conversation, or story and you will see the threads around it. Fear threads. Savior threads. “They’re wrong, I’m right” and “if only, then.” Urgent loops of “must act now,” “grab yours while you can.” Dismissal threads of “that’s not real” or “it’s a conspiracy.” Sticky threads (like those insect tapes that trap and kill) with “group think,” blame isolation, and spools of scapegoating.
Yet, when you slow down, look more closely, and sense into the fullness of the whole, you can let go of the noisy, sticky, familiar threads and see through the bundles of tug and tangle…
to find the expanse of threads inside and beyond the thick overcast sky. You begin to have access to the endlessly abundant moss-covered rocks full of wisdom—your wisdom held in our collective fascia and sky.
It’s here where we become the thread, and we sculpt.
love+light, Melissa
