A friend called the other day to share a waking dream (a way in which life speaks to us through an unusual event in our day). He’d gone to the garage to get into his car. Upon opening the garage door, he noticed an ant on the threshold. From the ant’s perspective, an enormous wall was suddenly gone, leaving it open to a massive, unfamiliar landscape. It appeared a bit befuddled by its newfound freedom. My friend felt the immense impact of the ant’s experience, perhaps reflecting some inconceivable shift to open up in his own life.
I wondered, would this be an adventurous ant—one who might dare to cross the threshold into the unknown? Or, would it be frightful and retreat to the three remaining walls that could keep its world smaller, safer and contained?
I read about the extraordinary capacity of ants. For example, the tiny leafcutter ant can lift and carry in its jaws something like fifty times its own body weight. That’s comparable to a human being lifting a truck with its teeth.
The ant parable continued to roll through my life like a ripple of resonant sound. In a matter of days, I was offered a business opportunity of equal measure to the fourth wall of my own container being removed. I had to make a decision. Would I remain in safe, familiar territory or accept the invitation to step out into a quantum new universe of exploration? When weighing my decision, I felt comforted by the story of the ant, knowing I wasn’t the only being on earth facing enormous possibility.
Crossing thresholds is a continuous cycle for one who is fully and humanly alive. We’re presented with a moment in which we either say Yes to life and expand, or say No and retreat. There is no right answer, except the one vibrating at the frequency of authentic response.
It may take the strength of an ant to carry forth the mission to which we’re called. We may feel small and insignificant, even powerless at times. Yet, if we’re being honest, something inside us knows Life must be met on its own terms, and that even the smallest within us is capable of great things.