Grown Up World: Sit in the Contradiction by Caryn MacGrandle

It occurred to me this morning in meditation that evidence of maturity and balance is being able to sit in the contradictions of this world.

We’re not all good. We’re not all bad. People can have good intentions and be bad for you. People can have bad intentions and be good for you.

‘All is well. Wellness abounds.’ Source (Abraham Hicks) says.

No it’s not. You respond.

Yes it is.

That is our task. To get back to ‘yes it is’ no matter what is going on in your life.

I had a situation that ended badly a few months back where I feel that I was treated unfairly and not seen. Parts of me want to ‘correct this.’

My ex-husband’s new girlfriend keeps telling me personal things about my ex. Things I already know. Reasons I divorced him. I struggle with telling her I do not want to be involved with this any longer, but also wanting to know what my daughters are living with half their life. 

The man I have been seeing tells me things I have always wanted to hear.  The person I want to be. The person I am becoming. When he tells me these things, a part of me immediately thinks, ‘he is lying.’

Like Vasalisa in the Baba Yaga story, I pick up the corn kernel (millet) and examine it.  I use my intuition and discern what is good for me and what is bad.  I am those things.

I realize that I must be the first person to believe them. I work on it.

There is this women who comes into the convenience store that I work at who is old, wrinkled and poor. 

Yes, I work at a convenience store part time, and I like it. Another contradiction. I see the pity in many of my acquaintances’ faces, but it is a sense of community: a small town convenience store. I hear stories. I see the same people day after day.  They help each other. I go into a meditative state making pizzas and tornados. Time flies when I am there.

Problems abound. Lots of them. But there are those who hold the life vests. 

We have lost that in the white collar world, and it needs to be found. 

Online virtual worlds are not healthy or balanced.

Back to the old woman. The convenience store exists on alcohol and tobacco sales: ways to dull the pain of this world. She buys neither; only drinks or food with food stamps or change. She and her husband sit in their car which looks like it belongs in a junk yard.

And her eyes find me. They smile.

They truly smile. There is a difference you know.

I see peace. I see contentment. I see love in those eyes.

The old wrinkled lady whose skin looks like the bark of a tree, sitting in her dilapidated car with her husband having just bought a processed sandwich with food stamps or change.

She has something precious.

I see that.

I know my task is to find that more and more despite anything and everything going on in my life. 

BIO: Caryn MacGrandle is the creator behind the Divine Feminine App which has been connecting and inspiring women [and other genders too] throughout the world since 2016 as a directory to find Sacred Circles, events and resources. Women find the app each and every day, and it currently has almost 8000 users from around the world. Caryn has also hosted Sacred Circles and events for the past nine years and is passionate about the power of a Circle to heal individuals and the world. She has participated in numerous online and location events such as the World Parliament of Religions in September of 2021 in which she presented a workshop on Embodying the Goddess: Creating Rituals with Mind, Body and Soul and just recently a webinar/panel with Dale Allen presenting Dale’s Indie film award winning “In Our Right Minds: Leading Women to Strength as Leaders and Men to Strength without Armor.” Each and every day, Caryn (aka Karen Moon) works tirelessly towards her belief that the most important area to first find equality and balance is the divinity found within yourself.