One of my son’s super powers is his eye for details. He has a knack for spotting the tiniest of things. I’m never surprised when he finds a coin in the grass or spots a marble amongst pebbles. When something is lost I go to him for help and invariably he finds it!

I think over the years this penchant for noticing details in the environment has grown in me, too. I was sitting on my porch trying to escape the hustle of the house and there on the table beside me was a tiny little lacewing larvae, crawling along the edge.

I love lacewings. As adults they are the prettiest green, with fairy-like wings that will often carry them to perch on a window screen in order to get closer to lights. Their larvae (one seen here) are known as aphid lions, or trash bugs. The larvae cleverly hunt a favorite food, aphids, by hiding themselves under debris they pile onto their backs, allowing them to enter into aphid colony undetected by the ants that guard it.

Not to be outdone by the these two eye-catching developmental life phases, lacewing eggs are found at the top of thin hair-like structures connected to leaves, other plant parts, or….opps! your car. Their eggs appear as if they are floating in the air like balloons. Away from the surface, the eggs are protected from predators. (But on your car, well, we hope for the best.)

Aside from their beauty, and their role in keeping plant damaging insect populations in check, I share this moment with you here as my way of encouraging you:

keep an eye out for the tiny ones,

the little beings of the world around you.

An Invitation to Connection: Curiosity as Your Guide to See Little Beings

Be curious and look little beings on your wanders. Accept their invitation to open you up to a world that is beyond what you normally notice. These moments foster a sense of awe. They can create a feeling of warmth within your heart, and a peaceful, transcendent feeling that comes from being transported to a perspective on this world that is bigger, beyond you yet including you all along.