Lessons

Life is chock-full of lessons.

It’s a series of cycles. Or circles. Doors and windows. Mazes and puzzles. Pitfalls, pratfalls, and unexpected sunshine after rain.

Life presents a lesson. We attempt it, after own fashion. We dive in, or hold back and observe. We march stoically forward, or stand trembling, ready to bolt. We look for hidden traps or waltz barefoot, oblivious to the rocks and glass strewn amongst the wildflowers. We try or don’t. We succeed or fail. We learn, or travel the same cycle again and again until we do. And, all along the way, opportunity lies in wait, for good or evil.

But when it’s done, it’s done. If you have successfully navigated the lesson, you go on. If you have failed, or failed to try, you must wait for the next cycle, and try again. But, when the lesson ends, really ends, it's just not possible to hold on.

The need for a proper conclusion to lessons is a popular spiritual topic. Astrologers consider the planet Saturn the harbinger of Lesson’s End. Time to move on. Best get going. If you don’t, Neptune and Uranus will s-l-o-w-l-y drift by, sweeping away the books and chalk and construction paper-clippings.

“You. Go to the next classroom, please.”

Should you insist on dawdling, you may look up one day, and see that everyone else has scurried away, and Pluto is crashing down, pulverizing the schoolhouse.

"Yes, Dear. Everything’s gone. No reason to stay now. That’s it. Move on down the road."

If you believe in that sort of thing.

The Tarot shuffles you through the deck for your lesson. At some point, you find yourself swinging around on the Wheel of Fortune. Good times, bad times, good times, bad times. Up and down with the changes of life. Round and round go the lessons. But, hang onto a rung of the wheel too long, and Death (no, not really Death!) appears as the agent of change.

“Really, you need to graduate or regress or whatever you’re going to do, but you gotta get off this rung, friend.”

Still hanging around? 'Kay. Here comes The Tower to wipe away the chalk and books and … You get the point.

If you believe in that sort of thing.

The lesson’s the same. Embrace life. Take advantage of the lesson. Absorb. Share. Live.

But, when it is time to move on, pack up your knapsack, and look up for the new lesson. Don’t think of it as losing, and don’t throw away all you have gained in an effort to brace for the new.

Just waltz forward.

And, watch the glass.