There are people who take the path of least resistance, and these individuals go unnoticed. They’re sometimes even considered powerless because of their refusal to exert overt power or influence over others. Sometimes they seem afraid or even believe that they are afraid, but these are the bravest people because they’re patient. When they effect change, it is in a conflict-free way unavailable to most of us bullheaded graspers.
They’re what I call portal farmers.
Here is a man who seeks change. He stands in the wind, in a sunny meadow. He holds the seeds of change in his hands and scatters them across the land. But these are wild seeds where the exact nature of the mature plants they’ll grow is unknown. The length of the stalk, the color of the flower—it all remains to be seen. Each seed is a small change in his life—new lifestyle choices he or his loved ones are taking that will form different day-to-day patterns than the way it was before. The plants that grow from these seeds are small, at first. But their blossoms are fragrant, attracting insects and the changes they bring: buzzing, pollinating, cocooning.
Soon, he sees the wispy flaps of butterfly wings.
The portal farmer watches and waits, as he knows the power of a single butterfly. Its unobtrusive whisking to and fro causes changes in wind currents that may, down the line, fell trees. He observes the blossoms blooming, the insects gathering, the clouds forming, the subtle changes occurring as the meadow changes color and scent, new seasons arise, and soon…
In the near distance, there is a glimmer.
It’s an opening—the portal he’s been waiting for. He breaks not a single stem, tramples not a single berry bush as he strides across the meadow, his life, toward that glimmer among the saplings. It is a portal to another world brought about by the subtle changes ever since the scattering of the seeds. He doesn’t delay. This is what he’s been waiting for. These glimmers don’t announce themselves, and they don’t last long.
He steps right through the glimmer, a portal, and is transported. Life on the other side is a whole new world. He didn’t fight for it. Didn’t even stand up for his right to have it. The portal recognized the man’s subtle invitation and appeared, maybe sooner than expected. Breathe the scented air. Scatter your seeds. Wait. Watch. The glimmers are there, for those with eyes to see them.