Growing pains
Is the cost of growth, pain?
As a child I’d lay awake in bed with achy shins, knees, and joints. I’d cry to my tired mother, desperate for comfort when we both should have been asleep. Though there was nothing she could do to make the aches go away, she’d sit next to me and rub my back until one of us was sleeping. These are growing pains, she’d tell me, and they will go away. A back rub will make any crying child stop trembling, and I did. Clothes that seemed brandnew began to fit small, and then not at all. My toes curled and squished in new to me shoes, and my legs though still short were quite lanky. I had grown and hadn’t known it. Only when I went back to what was familiar, could I see how much I had grown. There is a lesson in this. I no longer lived in the things of old.
The aches that keep me up at night are not my shins or my knees, but my chest. When the heart hurts does it also grow? Will this too pass? I thought I was done with growing pains, but I’ve realized the external aches only move internally as we age. My body changed shape, and molded itself into who I am today, and it will continue to do so until one day it will stop. My external growth does not ache anymore, or have I only gotten used to it?
A potter shape’s clay on a potter’s wheel, adding on or taking off inches of clay as the wheel spins around. Like a child growing an inch overnight. After a decent amount of time shaping the clay into a sturdy foundation, they begin the process of hallowing the clay out. This is significant, the clays comfortable, solid, original form is transformed and now it will be hollowed. We share this process alongside the potters clay. The outside of the clay has taken form but in order for it to reach it’s real potential, the potter cannot stop there. The clay’s purpose has not been fully revealed. In order to be used properly, it begins the hollowing process. This process takes time, tenderness and precision. We too, need these things.
As we the clay are hollowed, comfortability and familiarity is now lost. This is a fragile state for clay, what was once solid now has a gaping hole. Careful not to apply too much pressure or the clay will surely crack, as many of us do, the potter continues carving and smoothing out edges. Cracks can be repaired, though a more tedious process, the potter tries their best to prevent this by being gentle and moving slowly. Being gentle and moving slowly, seems hardest when we are the ones to do it. After the clay is carved out and it’s true design has been revealed, it takes a new name. I think we all take on new names, when we learn of our original design. We become something new, something better. In this case, the clay has taken the name ‘pot’. The clays truth and potential has been revealed. This is a joyous celebration, a new life unveiled. It now is ready to begin fulfilling its purpose.
The ache of my heart that keeps me up at night, continues to show me the hard truths and the even harder potentials. It shows me my purpose, my original design, and creates space for something else to take residency. I am becoming a pot. Created to house something beautiful, something life giving.
When we allow our clay to be molded internally our shallows are widened and are deepened. A depth neither we or the clay came with, meaning something other, something external has shaped us internally. A pot without this work would not be a ‘pot’ at all, but a heavy, wet, mound of clay existing in potential. We cannot live in potential, but we can exist in it. To only exist is not our purpose, if it was why do we ache so deeply? Purposeful pain. If we allow the heavy clay in us to harden, the more labor intensive and time consuming the molding will be. Hardened clay needs softening. This takes a lot of water, a baptism of a sort.
Our purpose would not be so easily reached, and the beauty we were made to hold would be a dream. When I lay awake, and my heart aches and there is nothing to soothe me back to sleep, nor distract me. I allow myself to dive in deep, until I fall asleep. I know what I am feeling, are growing pains, so grow I will. So, does the heart grow when in pain? Yes. What comes after the pain? I believe it is joy. New life is celebrated in granger after tragic death. The sorrow that death brings, carves out a place for joy and life to begin again. What was old and filled our heart is no longer there, a part of us has died. Just like how my old jeans, are dead to me.
A pots purpose starts with being filled with a substance that holds the potential of life. Dirt. Glorious dirt. Why would I want my heart to be filled with dirt? What comes out of dirt, is life. It does not end here, friends. More digging, and scraping is required for seeds to be planted in this glorious pile of dirt that we are now filled with. We do not grow sitting in pain, we grow buried in it. The joys of new life, the joy of beauty hidden within our depth, only to be revealed when the time has come. The richest life grows in darkness, and when it blooms what a joy it holds, what a gift that new life is. The seeds we sow, in the dark will bring forth joys we would have never known. We do not only grow in pain, but I do believe we feel loss to know and feel how deeply the gain.
Although, a garden sewn still needs tending.
The beauty we carry is still only potential after our clay is formed, the seeds have been sewn and joy has sprung up from soil. The work is not done, but it does get easier, or maybe we only get used to it. We dig dirt, repair cracks in our foundations, and plant new seeds and weed, throughout our lives. Whether it is in our potted garden on our lawn, or our most precious garden our hearts. At some point our foundation is sturdy enough to handle what is poured into it, and sturdy enough to house what comes out of it. Good and bad.
What we hope for is this. That one day our beauty housed will overflow growing too large for our little pot. Deep joy makes room for deeper pain. So we begin again, getting rid of what is old even though good, for new growth and better joys. The most impressive pots are usually very large, hand crafted and detailed almost to perfection, the most beautiful hearts are usually the same.
What joy to have growing pains.
