The Joy of Insignificance

I wake up early Sunday morning. My husband is out of town and I have decided to go hiking. I have a split second of thinking how much work I could get done if I got at it now, but that passes quickly. I need to get to the mountains.

I load up the dog, throw on my running shoes, grab gloves and a hat and head out. There is sun in Seattle and I feel hopeful. My intention is to do a short hike, maybe up the backside of International at Alpental to avoid crowds and get a good uphill in. I arrive in the parking lot at 10 am and to my surprise there are only two cars.

I take one look at my planned hike and realize it doesn’t look great. There is not enough snow to dig my feet in, and just enough snow to make the rocks slippery. “Perhaps not the best choice all by myself,” I think.

Change of plan- Hank and I head up to Snow Lake. We are walking along at a brisk pace, the dog enjoying the freedom of a leash-less reality with so few on the trail. I love watching him this way. Something catches his nose and he is off, then back to me, then trotting up the trail like he really is the Brad Pitt of dogs. He is busy being alive.

I enjoy the smells and the surroundings, but my head is down and I am pretty focused on my workout at the moment. The clouds are thicker than I had hoped and I’m intent on keeping a strong pace. I’m in my head.

About half way up we start walking through snow and mud. I notice a sense of joy at snow, even if it’s muddy. We crest the top ridge having passed only one pair of hikers and head down toward the lake. It is stunning – snow down to the edges of the lake, sun breaks shinning through, and the most exquisite patterns on the snow laced cliffs and trees around the lake. I stand and take it in for all of three minutes before turning around.

I catch myself and I laugh, “You came all this way. Stand still and enjoy it!” I push myself to just stand there and take it in a bit longer. I watch myself with this task. How funny that I am off to the next thing so fast, but alas, it is chilly and wet and being still at this moment is easier said than done! We head back down.

Hank is running ahead of me and I get the urge to run too. We are booking it down the trail and it feels phenomenal. Crisp air, snow, mud, splashes, sun breaks, rugged peaks. And then it hits me – the joy of insignificance. I am so small. I matter, and I do not matter at all. If I disappeared right now, the world would continue to spin and grow and die and change and... In this moment I experience the most incredible feeling of liberation. I am running through the woods. I am no more important than anything else around me. My life, my busyness, my business… nothing is really all that important. It is like the weight of the world is lifted, and I am free.

As I come into this holiday season, I want to gift this to everyone I know – the joy of insignificance. To let down our hair and not let it all matter so much; to have vision and intention and passion, and still know that the only meaning any of it has is the meaning we give it. We get to choose the meaning we give our lives and the circumstances we live in, and choosing smallness is a powerful gift. I am small in the scheme of things. When I see this, I open to the depth of how grand and vast and magnificent the world is, and I no longer believe that everything that happens is about me.

My wish for you then, is to let go. Know that you matter, but imagine how awesome the possibilities of life can be when you also know that you are just a spec, a blip if you will, of divine expression happening in a vast ocean of time and space. You are, as Deepak says, stardust.

Let go- be insignificant for a while and open to the grandeur, the miracle of life that is happening around you.