Blueprint for Life

Have you heard the simple saying, ‘in a nutshell’?

I hear it less now than I did in the past, but occasionally someone still mentions it. Ordinarily, they’re using it to sum up an idea in just a few words, or as another way of saying, “to make a long story short.”

The funny thing is, it hardly ever does. Most stories seem long, including my own, as if they are too difficult to shorten.

Hearing the expression recently I thought about nutshells. Take an acorn, for example. Acorns are very small, about the size of a large marble, but they can grow to a towering height of 60, 80 or even 100 feet tall.

How do you suppose the contents of that little acorn can create such a marvelous tree? Can you imagine the blueprint inside that sets in motion such a spectacular event?

I realize many things must come together to make it happen. Water, soil, decent weather, absence of fires, good nutrients, and of course the warmth and nourishment of the sun.

I started to wonder about other things in nature. Do all of them come from such humble beginnings?

That got me wondering about us. About our human species and our beginnings. We start out even smaller than an acorn and look what happens to us. Sure, we don’t grow to the impressive height of an oak tree, but we are incredible, nonetheless.

Do we each have a blueprint hidden inside of us? And, are our blueprints unique?

It feels important to me for each of us to decide about our own answers to these two simple questions because it sets the stage for what we experience in our lives. If we believe our life is cast in stone, it will feel very limiting to us. But, if we consider that our blueprint is just a starting point and that we can build on it in any direction we wish, it becomes something else entirely.

I want to share what feels like the truth to me.

I believe each of us chose to come to earth and that we created a blueprint that would allow us to experience a certain kind of life. I also believe that we have complete free will and are able to shift and change any part of our blueprint that does not feel right to us. We can choose to embrace any ideas that support us and choose to release any ideas that restrict us or confine us or limit us in any way.

You may be thinking right now, how can our blueprint provide structure for our life if we don’t know what our blueprint is? After all it’s not as if we were handed an instruction guide when we arrived.

So, how are we to know what our blueprint is?

I believe there are many ways to uncover our blueprints.

We are each naturally gifted with some talents, ones that become obvious to us by our own observation. At other times, someone else may see something in us that we don’t and encourage us to pursue new paths. And, as we move through our lives, we are likely to discover parts of your blueprint as we attend school, play sports, engage in the arts, learn skills, or excel in a profession.

For me though the best way to know about our blueprint is to talk with god about it. To have an honest, direct, open conversation, asking for insight and placing yourself in a receptive frame of mind to listen and hear god’s answers.

In my own conversations I feel guided and supported. I am never told what to do and I’ve come to realize that every path leads me forward, if I am open and accepting. I understand that my blueprint is only a starting point for my life, and I am free to expand, to create and to experience all possibilities.

I marvel at the beautiful design of each of our blueprints and what we are capable of becoming.