Embracing the Chaos

How did we get here?

Throughout history, time and time again human evolution has seen the rise and fall of civilisations, each rebirth bringing forth a new way of existing on this beautiful planet. When honing into our current time, all we potentially see is chaos, not realising that our vantage point is limited to the time and space we are living in. If we zoom way out, we get a glimpse into the larger orchestra at play. An intentional flow, a pattern of contraction and expansion on every scale that has played out over multiple eras, expressing different themes, but following the repeated cycle of birth and death.

The journey of creating something new is often conceived from a passionate or inspired idea. A dip into unknown waters, scary, yet the desire to manifest is greater than the fear. It starts with raw ingredients, unstructured concepts, fragmented parts chaotic in nature, with unlimited possibilities of what it can become. 

It is our choice and intention that sets the manifestation wheels in motion. Bringing order to the chaos and collapsing all possibilities into a finite end product. The concept "if you can hold it in your head, you can hold it in your hand" comes from the notion that we are creator beings. In order to create, we have to tap into the field of chaos and from it, build the reality we desire. 

Augmentation vs. Transformation

If you want a house radically different to the one you are living in now, rebuilding it will require you in some way to destroy the parts you no longer want. The broken walls and frameless doorways may seem messy when in the process of renovating, yet it is only once you strip away what is no longer needed that you can begin to conceptualise and design the house you truly want. Adding an extra room or changing up the decor will augment the house in some way, but if you want to change the foundation of the house, a trans - form - ation (change in form) is necessary. 

The above depicts the proverbial process of transformation, with chaos playing a pivotal and necessary role. Chaos is the caterpillar dissolving into to soup, before it emerges a butterfly. The burning of the Phoenix before it is reborn out of the ashes. The breakdown of disjointed, corrupt systems, so that a unified, optimised system can come into place. The perceived chaos is making way for something greater to reveal itself. 

As Within, So Without

One of the biggest mistakes made by us is thinking we can manage this chaos by shifting what we see externally. Once I get a new job, once I find a new partner, once a new president is elected, once we stop polluting Mother Earth, the list goes on. These things may need to change, however the point of departure lies within. The chaos we see in the outer world, is a reflection of what is going on in the collective psyche. A Dark Night of the Soul, calling us to wake up from our internal denial and turmoil, a mirror to our unprocessed personal wounds and traumas.

Dr Carl Jung referred to this as the collective unconscious or the shadow. The more we suppress, the uglier it looks when it eventually comes to the surface (and it always comes to the surface in some form or another). Confronting this is no easy feat, as we are often deeply unaware of what most of the suppressed "stuff" actually is. It takes courage, self-honestly and radical responsibility to see the chaos around us as teachers and catalysts for sustained change. The broken parts are waiting to be transformed into something magical, never accomplished before. Thisis how we learn and evolve as humans. Transcendence can only happen when we have integrated all the darkness and the light, but on the other side of it lies the calm after the storm, you just have to trust the process.

Below are coaching journal prompts to shift your locus internally, when chaos is raining down:

• What is this experience reflecting back to me?
• What can I create from this state of in-between?
• What is no longer serving me?
• What do I need to let go of in order to move forward?
• How do I take action with what I know?
• What is my relationship with chaos? (Do I try to control it?)
• What am I choosing to align with?

Remember, still waters never made a skilled sailor. All that we go through in this life is happening for us, not to us. This moves us out of victimhood and into adopting a growth mindset and being open to possibility.