Story-A-Day #36: Dandelions

DANDELIONS

All it takes is a word. One word can will grow and spread, like dandelion seeds on a soft summer breeze.

What would your word be?

Your word might grow into an idea. There are hundreds of them circling our minds at any given time, each one clinging tenuously to the core, trying to be the one that sticks, the moment of enlightenment. Ideas can be fleeting, floating just outside the peripheries of our consciousness, but when a new idea hits, it is inspiration. Some people spend their entire life chasing a singular idea, only to have it drift away, always more concept than actual thought. Your word could become your greatest idea, or it could evolve into something entirely different.

Your word could elongate into the threads of a story. We all have stories in our lives. Stories are entertainment and therapy. They are a process of understanding the self, even when we are plying fiction. They are a way for us to digest the world; to take our pains, insecurities, and doubts and transform them into something greater. Our biggest concerns, through a deliberate process of third party externalization, become rational extensions of who we are. This is the storytelling process and your word could become a part of it, an entirely new story to share. Stories are a way to explain the unexplainable, to capture our emotions and help them make sense.

And maybe through story, your word will become an emotion. There are always emotions in the mix, as fragile as the thoughts that inspire them. Our emotions are the lifeblood of who we are, the great definers of self. It is our emotions that allow us to distinguish right from wrong, that allow us to set personal goals and targets towards which we can strive. Emotions are complexly unexplainable, yet they can be reduced to their simplest essence in the form of a word. Maybe yours.

And maybe your emotions inspire memories. These core pieces of our self are the one true element that we share. They are the bond that brings us close. Our memories play a significant role in defining who we are, especially as we relate to those around us. They are what give us definition.

The future is intangible and the present is irrelevant because it does not have context. Moments in time do not really matter until their time has passed. Conversations, actions, even inactions carry no relevance until they can be defined. The past can exist within fractions of instants, moments that are just long enough to be. Everything needs to be in order to have relevance.

Maybe that is your word. Be. Or maybe your word is not yet defined.

These words I have written mean nothing to you until you have read them, and as the seeds of understanding take hold, a greater knowledge blossoms.

Share your word. Put it out into the world. Set it adrift like dandelion seeds on a soft summer breeze so that your word, whatever it might be, will be able to take root and grow into an idea, a story, an emotion, or maybe even a memory that you can share with the world.