I used to feel that I didn't have time to do inner work. There were too many other things going on. That I'd get to it later.
And then I discovered fractals.
A fractal is a pattern that repeats forever. Regardless of how zoomed in or zoomed out you are, every part of the fractal looks very similar to the whole.
A tree is one of many examples. It's made up of a similar branching pattern that you can find looking at the veins on a leaf, the way branches grow from the trunk, and the tree's overall shape.
When I discovered what fractals were, something clicked into place for me. It was something I felt like I had known my whole life - but my logical mind circumvented and kept insisting that it was only the big things that were worth my attention.
Fractals helped give me permission to instead focus again on the small things. Fractals helped me understand that the everyday choices we make reverberate to create the pattern of our life and the larger systems in which we are a part.
While this can feel overwhelming, it can also be empowering.
A small change in the original pattern gets repeated and changes the whole.
In Emergent Strategy, adrienne maree brown (a book I highly recommend!) beautifully presents fractals:
"In a fractal conception, I am a cell-sized unit of the human organism, and I have to use my life to leverage a shift in the system by how I am, as much as with the things I do. This means actually being in my life, and it means bringing my values into my daily decision making…
Our own lives and work and relationships [act] as a front line, a first place we can practice justice, liberation, and alignment with each other and the Planet."
:::
Shining a light on the patterns in our own life is hard - but it's the foundation of so many of the changes we want to make.
I designed the Ember Circle to be a place where women can come together to unlearn what we don't want our lives to echo. Through a thoughtful process, members of the Circle increase the awareness, clarity, and intention that they bring to their smallest choices - and in turn, everything that those reverberate out to create.
To change from the inside out,
xo Jess