When I was receiving a Reiki attunement I had a vision that I was a small bean shaped seed made of light spinning in outer space. As I spun I grew larger, turning into a small sapling and then swiftly becoming an enormous tree. My trunk shot upwards and my branches expanded into the vastness of outer space. I was made of light and pulsed the light of the universe through my very being. This vision was followed by a witnessing of my birth, which was both shocking, brutal, bloody and marvellous.

This was several years ago now and today I had a realisation that our soul is indeed like a tree and our current earthly life can be likened to a single flower. We blossom into the earthly realm and experience all the seasons; the exquisite sunshine, the tormenting wind, the heavenly light sprinkle of rain and the relentless torrents of a pummeling downpour. We may be lovingly caressed or trodden on and beaten to within an inch of our lives, or both.

We experience beauty and we are beauty itself. To witness the fullness of our life from birth to death, with all of its cycles, lessons, growth, sadness, pain, grief and wonder is the most exquisite beauty. We don’t come here to only experience joy and pleasure, we are the full expression of life and from the vantage point of the soul, that is a thing of beauty.

Our only role is to be ourselves and experience what there is to experience. We may be pollinated by an insect or bird and feel the thrill of deep connection. We may ripen ourselves into a fruit before being eaten and eventually excreted as more seeds. When our role is complete, is it sad? Do we die? Yes if we can only identify ourselves as the flower, but we are also the tree which lives on.

The greater aspect of ourselves, the tree, learns from each flowering, slowly growing and evolving. Our body eventually returning to the earth and becoming nourishment for the soil while our soul lives on, as an eternally growing, evolving, living light essence of the source of the universe.