Contraction then expansion. Or maybe the other way around

In September I went to back to school night at my daughter's middle school.  In one of her classrooms there were signs all over the walls of "universal themes".  A few of them are: power, structure, change, systems, conflict and relationships.  There are a few more that I can't remember right now.  

On the wall, universal themes are defined as central ideas about human nature that can be applied to anyone.  The main use of these universal themes is to connect ideas across many lines; cultural, gergrapic, ideological, etc.

I think about stuff like that all the time so naturally, these ideas have been running around in my head.

As I have reported before, I am on a quest to expand fully.... or expand into unlimited.  Maybe I could call it unlimited expansion.  Lately I've been noticing something about my quest for expansion...  

It is always sandwiched between contraction...... 

I think a good universal theme is Contraction and Expansion

There seems to be a pulse nature to my process.....  It is just like how there are two parts to a heartbeat.  Our hearts have to be able to do both parts of the heartbeat....they have to be able to expand and to contract in order to pump.

This has been very helpful for me to understand.  My impatient self wants to expand all the way and be in this open and expansive state already...and just stay there...I guess.  

​But this has not been what my journey looks like....

It looks and feels a lot more like a heartbeat.  I have moments of opening up; I feel what that feels like; I explore what is there for me to experience and then something happens to bring me back in ....maybe, hopefully, not all the way back in but at least somewhat.  Here is where I would usually get frustrated with my lack of "success" and feel like a lost case.  

But since I started to open up my mind to the idea that this pulsing of expansion and contraction is a process......  slowly expanding and opening up to possibility..... I can appreciate these contracting phases of the expansion journey.

As long as I stay committed to the overall expansiveness of my being and to appreciating the process, these contractions or "setbacks" are just as acceptable as the expanding.  Quite possibly, there cannot be one without the other.  

They are just the preparation for the next level of open.

And with the acceptance of contraction; 

I open