“Nothing is, everything is becoming.” - Heraclitus of Ephesus

There is an ineffable quality in the nature of becoming. Like the Skin Horse, from the "Velveteen Rabbit," we realize that it doesn’t happen all at once. It is easier to see the nature of becoming when we are at peace with the world around us. Call it the Tao or Zen or Joss or whatever you like. It is a smile that hurts your face. It is a laugh that hurts your sides. It is a sigh that signals happiness. It is stillness. It is a fire in the breast that never dies. It is the realization that you can want and not need. It is the profound understanding that, in and of yourself, you are becoming complete. Call it awakening.

On the way to the train today, I strode past a girl with a lavender carry-on bag and a hard hat. It was an incongruous sight and I slowed my pace and turned to her. I noted the strange juxtaposition of the, frankly, girly bag and the hard hat. She was a mechanical engineer working at the airport. Her team was replacing chillers (used in the cooling of industrial buildings). The old chillers and cooling towers were made of wood and had long outlived their usefulness. We shared some words, some ideas, and a smile, just two people on the way to the train. I wished her a good day and we headed off to our respective destinations. There was a moment where in the midst of all our hurry that we shared that moment of peace that comes with becoming. She was young and I'm, well, I'm not young, but I will settle for immortality. But we were both in the process of becoming, even if it was just for that moment.

I recently spoke to someone who is dear to me about the nature of steel. When steel is made, iron is forged and infused with carbon. The carbon hardens the iron and it becomes steel. The fire is what heats the metal, but what infuses it causes it to change. When you are in the fire, when you are becoming, what infuses you? Is it what you want to be made of?

The fire tempers us and we burn.

Burn with me.