I peered into the water tub in absolute awe while watching the goldfish swim around in circles at the bottom of the tub. I looked up and into my father’s eyes.

“You have fish in here” I said with a huge smile.

“Yes, they help to clean out the food that the cattle drop into the water tub” he said back with a smile.

In the afternoons my mother would frequently walk me and my brothers from our house over to the farm that our family owned. We would help with chores and visit with my father and cousins. Being raised on a farm taught me a lot about life. It gave me a deep respect for nature and all that it has to offer. I learned a lot about work and working hard. I learned about cycles in life, the lunar cycle and how it impacted the animals and the crops that we grew, the seasons cycles and how to work with them, the lunar cycle and how to ebb and flow with it, among many other cycles that life has to offer us.

This day was no different than many before and yet, it was different because there were new fish in one of the water tubs for the cattle. 

Months later I went back to the water tub and looked in only to be shocked at what I saw. Absolutely enormous goldfish were swimming gracefully around the tub, into the pipes and into the next tub further down the barn. I ran quickly from one tub to another trying to understand why and how the goldfish had gotten so large. I had only seen goldfish in small tanks before this and certainly had never seen this sized goldfish before. After watching them in amazement for a while I ran off to find my father.

“How did the fish get so large?” I asked when I found him.

He stopped what he was doing and spoke with me. “Goldfish grow to the size of their environment. If you keep them in a small tank then they stay small and if you put them in a large tank they will grow to the size of the large tank and if you put them in a water tub then they will grow even larger.” he explained.

Years later, I sat in silent meditation and this memory came back to me. It didn’t take me long to understand what spirit was telling me. I was keeping myself in a small tank and much like a goldfish, I was only growing to the size of my environment. So, I started making changes to function in environments that supported the growth that I wanted to see in myself and low and behold….. I grew!