Exploration

When I was a child, I was fortunate to grow up in nature in a time before cell phones and social media. We were allowed to be children. We were not yet hypnotized by technology and confined to the indoors. We had the space and time to play, to do things for fun, and to explore nature. We could create adventures on a whim, and not have to plan for what came next. Experiences could unfold in the present through the magic of imagination and play.

After school was adventure time until the sun went down. This was our time. We went on bike rides and ventured off into random corners deep in the forest. We made rope swings, started fires, built forts and hideout posts, went ‘camping’, and pretended we were on expedition. We dug up ‘artifacts’ and encountered ‘rare’ animals. We made trails and carved out our own known pathways amongst the trees. In the wilderness of the woods, we could be free to imagine and explore without limit. These were the best memories of my childhood as they allowed us to be free and wild as we are.

I think our natural inclination to play and explore as children reflect our True nature as human beings. Unconsciously we understand as children that play and exploration is what we are designed to do. Children unite over fun, and they exercise their powers of imagination to create new worlds. Deep within, a burning fire to joyfully pursue exploration, learning, and expansion. We do not set out to do those things, rather, we set out to have fun. And through the process of fun, we can learn and expand our spheres. In our childlike innocence and wonder, we do not go into it with preconceived notions, judgements, and expectations. And it is in that perspective, we can open to the magic of exploration. Through play, we exercise our nascent abilities to manifest and create new realities.

Those same desires still live on in all of us. We are still those same children in perhaps slightly aged bodies. We still have that burning ember of desire to explore, to learn, to expand. To play, to imagine, to create. In a world that programs adults to work, not for meaning and fun, but for survival and acceptance, it teaches people to surrender their birthright to play and exploration. To abandon their childlike innocence, wonder, and curiosity to grow cynical, hard, and closed off to all that is possible. To stop questioning, exploring, and learning. To stop pursuing joy and fun. To stop imagining and dreaming. It is a process of deadening inside, that cuts off our connection to life. But the antidote to all of it is to simply go on an adventure, with wild abandon.

Exploration is an act of unlocking and harnessing the energy and potential within to create beauty and new realities in our world. The energy of exploration is the fuel for True progress, evolution, growth and expansion. Driven by inherent qualities of curiosity and wonder, it is the ability to imagine the possibilities of what could and can be, for the better. To be willing to explore is to be willing to live. You will never know what your true potential is until you explore the unknown. And when you are open to the magic and possibilities of life, magic will unfold around you.