Have you ever tried to neatly roll up silver wire?

Once out of the packet it would start to get entangled… at least in my world.

Even when I try to keep it nicely in order - at some point it seems to have its own life and the next time I want to use some suddenly it gets caught in itself.

One pull on the wire and it forms sort of a hook, a curve so narrow it would not move properly and get stuck.

That’s the moment when I would take it out of the packet in order to get it in … order again.

My experience so far: That’s not what’s happening.

The other day I cut some of it off thinking it would be easier - as the bigger part of it still looked quite neat. I “detangled” the shorter, more twisted one and tried to roll it into a nice … circle shaped form. That’s when I discovered that it had already been cut into two pieces at some point.

However… it was in a way easier - I also managed to get it into kind of the shape it had when it was new. But through the process of detangeling and rolling it up again it got kinks in places and  isn’t really round anymore. More like a crooked oval. Of course it now would  go back into the flat packet it once was. But looking ill-treated. And it lost its “springing” quality. (The one that actually was the reason for the “unmanagability” of it.)

The other, bigger part of the wire looked like it only had a few small tangles - picking it up to sort this out wasn’t helping in this case either.

At least not helping to get it back to its original very "nice and neat" form.

Looking at it I realised how that is a metaphor for life.

I left it how it was, took it downstairs into my atelier to make a picture of it - and it got even bigger and took more space. (The results you can admire in the picture.)

The metaphor is…

How we sometimes wanna sort out our “messy” lives to make it look nice and neat.

We start pulling on one end and suddenly get stuck. It’s like pulling on the past or the future in order to make it look good. Or to pull on ourselves. To make it or us the way our (fearful) ego likes it.

Streamlined neatly, no bumps or hooks or curves. Nothing we can’t foresee. Nothing that would be a reason for ill-treatment (judgement and the sorts).

But fresh from the shelf.

The nice self-shelf.

That’s not how life is.

It’s bumpy, spirally, we get hooked on things (our thoughts and ideas), we have to take turns we didn’t expect.

Once out of the packet it never will go back to the same shape it had.

If we try - our lives become small and in order to be streamlined and manageable we ill-treat ourselves. To fit into the packets. The one we think we need to be in to avoid what we fear.

And by trying to get back into that packet we lose the springing quality. This wonderment for life, the excitement to lean into a curve, to get dizzy from the spiraling, to go over bumpy roads and coming out of it expanded.

That’s what happens.

Once out of the packet our life expands. We expand. In miraculous, marvelous ways.

We create a unique form.

While we are on the silver path we sometimes can’t see the beauty of it.

We judge the ride while still on it - depending on how we think about it. How we think about ourselves and life at that moment. How it could be, how it should be.

But how about looking at it for a moment like we look at this springy silver wire?

Just looking at it - with curiosity and wonderment.

Wonderment for the way our lives unfolded, for the way we took turns and spiraled and lived through all the curves. Sometimes one round after the other seemingly on the same spot.

And with curiosity about where we might go, what we will encounter, what it will be and feel like to experience this next - whatever it is.

From afar it is a piece of art.

© Marlene Fuchs (marlenefuchs.ch)