Spring is a time of growth.
In my garden, there are shoots coming up alongside weeds. It’s the time of year to choose what I want to see grow in the coming days, weeks and months.
Plants are amazingly resilient. They are dormant in winter and come back in the spring. My job is to remove what I don’t want and to tend what I want to see grow.
It’s the same with my thoughts. I have ones I need to tend and ones to let go of. There are also things to do and its counter balance – letting go of action to wait with hopeful anticipation.
My life is a garden – with things to tend and things to let go and allow to happen.
With plants, children, and ideas that we tend – encouraging them to bloom – both doing too little and doing too much can cause harm.
What is ours to do and what can we allow to happen? That’s the question. In the morning, when I make a list of things to do, I draw a line down the middle. One side is what is mine to do and the other, I surrender to the powers of the universe.
We cannot make a seed grow, another learn what we want them to learn on demand, or make a project happen any faster than it will. Hovering does not help and it is exhausting. That’s where exercising patience comes into the picture.
There’s not a lot I can do to change anyone or anything, but I can enter a stream of thought that is calm, encouraging, and clear. From that place, I can take constructive action and let go of the results.
I know that when seeds receive what they need to grow, they will, in their own time and own way. Each one is not exactly like any other.
Today, I am considering these questions. What seeds am I planting? How can I help them grow? What is mine to do and what I can let go of?
Plant Seeds. Water. Wait.
Waiting is not the opposite of taking action; it is an active decision to not act. Every action does not call for a reaction.
Have you heard the expression, choose your battles? I think it is so important today in a time of division and heightened tension, otherwise, we are constantly at battle.
I am not willing to go to battle over household tasks, driving etiquette, technology problems and other petty matters but if my nervous system is in a state of flight or fight, I might react before I even realize it.
On the other hand, I am willing to stand up for social justice, for peace, for love. Anything that is not aligned with them is simply not worth the effort. I ordered black boots and gray boots came in the box. Oh well. I asked you to wash your breakfast dishes and here they are. Oh well. I wanted to go for a walk, but it started to rain. Oh well, I’ll grab an umbrella.
I want to live in a society where everyone is assured of having their basic needs met. That is worth standing up for. This my dream: for all children to have access to good food, outdoor play, and respectful adults; for my grandchildren to enjoy nature’s bounty because we took care of the earth; to live in a world where we exercise our freedom and allow others’ the same right.
First, I need to practice it myself. Let it begin with me. That’s my intention for the spring planting season from now until the summer solstice, I will remember what I stand for and discern what is mine to do and what I can let go of.
In this way, I will plant seeds and nurture what I truly want. In celebration of the stages of life and the wonders of human development, one of my goals is to write, “Forty Stories of Grandma Love”.
There is no shortage of material – every day spent with the grandchildren is full of gems to mine. Their presence elevates everyday life. But my life can get busy and time gobbled up. If I want to make something happen, I need to create space for it.
So I decided to write an essay a day for forty days, beginning on Easter. After breakfast, I am writing with a pencil in a notebook before leaving the kitchen table. Each day, I have only one essay to write. This is a slow and steady way to write a book – a method that’s worked for me in the past.
There are many things I want to do and be but for today, I will plant seeds, then wait for them to grow with quiet, hopeful anticipation.
And write a book – one essay at a time – so one day, another book will bloom in the garden of my life.
