POPCORN

Anyone who knows me knows that popcorn is my most favorite food, In the world! I actually know which movie theaters have the best popcorn, and to those I will go and watch almost anything as long as I can have my popcorn. I am a bucket girl, and yes, I want my free refill!

I also have a secret for popping perfect popcorn at home, which was what I was about to do last night, before I realized with horror that I was out of seeds. Well as you might imagine I was stressed, and went to bed craving popcorn. Then it occurred to me that life and people are often like popcorn, oh I’m just tripping? well take this trip with me.

Let us think about popcorn, it is a hard little seed, that is in it’s un-popped, or un-pressured state, it is to say the least unappetizing. It looks like potential but it’s, well, rather worthless. So how does it go from something small and unimpressive to something magnificent? Okay. Well at least something good to eat?

Well, lets check it out. I actually researched popcorn, here’s what I found; Each kernel of popcorn contains a tiny drop of water stored inside a circle of soft starch. The soft starch is surrounded by the kernel's hard outer surface. As the kernel heats up, the water begins to expand, and pressure builds against the hard starch. Eventually this hard surface gives way, causing the popcorn to explode. As it explodes the soft starch inside, the popcorn becomes inflated and bursts, turning the kernel inside out. The steam inside the kernel is released, and the popcorn is popped! Or for the sake of this conversation transformed.

I do know that heat and pressure is definitely a catalyst for change. So now is it just me, or is popcorn beginning to also sound a little like life to you? You see, when a kernel of popcorn is exposed to enough heat it begins to, well explode! When we are exposed to enough pressure we too begin to change. We may begin to brake out of our hard little shells just like that kernel of popcorn, finding it impossible to stay in the tiny places, or spaces, which have held us.

Now, lets examine that drop of water on the inside, Could this be true of us as well? Could there be a soft spot inside us? A soft spot that when triggered just right, could be exposed? That, when we are backed up against the wall could explode past what even we thought possible, past what even we thought we could be? Possibly becoming something wonderful, not unlike popcorn. Becoming light and fluffy.

Now I do understand, that all explosions are not good, and that being turned inside out, might not be a position that we choose to find ourselves in, and maybe that kernel of corn felt the same way. But lets remember the potential. As a matter of fact lets check out the word potential, for it means; Possible, but not yet realized. With a possibility or likelihood of occurring, or of doing or becoming something in the future.

And so, this is where we must do the work.This is where we must nurture or should I say protect that soft inside, our unmet potential. We must trust that it is there, we must trust that it is good, that we be ready for the day that the heat is turned on and the pressure rises, because you see, this is what I know so far; on that day when we are called out, or turned inside out, we too may be transformed into something wonderful. Just like popcorn.