The Universe Keeps Expanding
The universe is not still. It never was. It is stretching out in every direction like a rubber band pulled to the breaking point, except there is no breaking point. Space itself is the thing stretching. Galaxies are not flying through space, space is carrying them. You look up at the stars and think you are seeing them where they are, but you are not. You are looking into history. Every star is a grave marker of the past, light sprinting at you across billions of years.
That alone should be enough to knock the wind out of your lungs.
I grew up in a world where rabbis told me the universe was built by design, skydivers told me the sky had no bottom, Thai boxers told me to take the hit and keep going, and vegan freaks like me insisted that compassion was the only path left if humanity was going to survive. Somewhere between all that noise, I realized the universe was not asking for belief, it was asking for attention.
Scientists say galaxies are speeding away from us faster and faster. They call it dark energy. Nobody knows what it is. Nobody. Every equation breaks down. Einstein himself almost puked when he realized the universe was not steady but stretching. He called it the biggest mistake of his life, and then physics marched forward and proved him wrong. That is the punk part of science. You think you have the rules written, and then the universe spits in your face and says, “Start over.”
What does this have to do with me, a guy who used to jump out of planes, wrap my hands in tape, smash my shins into heavy bags, and now spends his mornings meditating on nothing but breath? Everything. Because the expansion of the universe is not some cold cosmic fact. It is the same story as my nervous system when it cracks open under pressure. You resist and you shatter. You accept and you grow.
Think about it. Expansion is terrifying. You get into a relationship and it expands until it breaks. You start a business, it expands until you are drowning. You train for a fight, your lungs expand, your capacity expands, but only because you are willing to get punched in the ribs until you taste blood. That is how the cosmos works too. No expansion without pain. No growth without tearing.
And yet, expansion is also compassion. The universe did not fold in on itself. It opened up. It gave room for galaxies, for stars, for planets, for you and me arguing about food and sex and god and politics. If the universe had collapsed instead of expanded, we would not be here. Expansion is generosity. Expansion is the opposite of fear.
People get hung up on whether the universe has an edge. It does not. The universe is not expanding into something. It is making space as it goes. That is the craziest thing about it. It is the same with the mind. You do not expand into enlightenment, you make it as you go. Every breath, every round in the ring, every free fall out of an airplane, every moment you choose plants over blood on your plate, that is expansion.
So what does it mean for us. It means we are part of the same ripping fabric. The same acceleration that pulls galaxies apart is inside our cells. The same mystery that physicists label dark energy is the same mystery that drags us out of bed when we want to stay buried. You cannot hold it. You cannot stop it. You can only ride it.
The universe is teaching us the same lesson over and over. Stop trying to control the shape. Stop clutching at permanence. Expand. Open. Tear. Heal. Expand again.
I do not know if there is a god behind it. I do not know if it will keep stretching forever or fold back into fire. I do not know if there is meaning in any of this. But I know this: we are here, breathing inside an explosion that never ends. That is enough for me.