I am a Glorious Geode!

Ignorable from the outside… brilliantly gleaming on the inside!

On my recent retreat to New Mexico, surrounded by all that spectacular natural beauty, I, unsurprisingly, took the opportunity to ponder rock.

The varied layers, the multitude of colors, the craggy textures… I could sit and just gaze at the formations by the hour (and indeed, I did). In fact, here I am on our silent day, legs stretched out in front of the library under a tree, journaling, admiring the view and thinking about how this breathtaking formation came to be.

When I consulted my AI, it said, in part:

“Kitchen Mesa at Ghost Ranch in New Mexico formed through the deposition of various rock layers over millions of years, spanning the Triassic, Jurassic, and Cretaceous periods. The Late Triassic Chinle Group, including the Painted Desert Member, was deposited by rivers, while the Jurassic Entrada Sandstone remnants of a vast dune field are also visible. Cretaceous coastal plain deposits capped the mesa. In essence, the formation of Kitchen Mesa at Ghost Ranch is a testament to the dramatic changes in the Earth's landscape over millions of years, with rocks deposited by rivers, deserts, and eventually a sea.

Rock, how it is formed, etched, sculpted over time by the elements that come into contact with it resonated with me and my own…formation. I, like rock, am in large part the product of what has impacted me. Things have been deposited, others eroded away; I remain proudly, steadfastly standing, forged by it all into what I am today.

With “rocks on the brain,” I meandered through our silent day, deeply absorbing the natural wonders that - literally - surrounded me. Our retreat activity that day was assembling a “soul collage” with meaningful images representing our true self; what we know and what we need to remember so that simply by looking at the collage, we are reminded of the truest, strongest, most authentic version of ourselves. I thought of it as my personal Superhero Baseball Card (highly collectable, I might add…).

After perusing a number of magazine pages, I was drawn to one featuring geodes - and started cutting! The image of something so ordinary in appearance, so “overlookable,” so take-for-granite-able (sorry - couldn’t resist the pun…) on the outside - but that was nothing short of magically, stupendously, magnificent on the inside - was a perfect metaphor for me. I’ve been treated (even - and maybe especially - by myself) as though I didn’t matter, was un-special and unlovable in my natural state; yet inside, there’s treasure that is my essence. I’m sparkly and gorgeous and delightful. My beauty runs deep; I’m a wonder. I am a goddamn glorious geode!

Epilogue

When I’d been home a week or so from the retreat and life was returning to “normal,” my eyes happened to fall upon a shelf of my precious items whereupon, none other than a geode that I’ve had for 40 years (and had clearly forgotten about), sat. Not only am I a geode, but I have one too which has gained a more conspicious place of honor so as to remind me on a daily basis of my rock status! (I also have a whole geode that has gone missing but when I find it, I’m cracking that sucker open! I wonder what beauty is hiding in there?