Month: April 2020

Your Mind is a Rose

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After watching my garden wake up this spring, it occurred to me that opening one’s mind is like a rose blooming. Everyone’s mind is beautiful, in its own way. No two are exactly alike, just like the roses blooming in my garden. There are different colors, different scents, different shapes.

When you are young, your mind is like the tight, new rosebud. Closed to the hatred and meanness of the world. The bud shows promise, and teases you with the possibilities that it holds. Just like a young mind. As you learn and explore, your mind swells with knowledge like the bud swells with new petals and nectar. Growing and giving a glimpse of what is to be.

Then, you really start learning and finding out new things for yourself. Some of them good. Some of them bad. Some of them painful. The sepals start to open. The rose is nearly ready to show you what she has.

Finally, the rose opens. Petals and scent spilling out and making the world even more beautiful than before. Your mind is like that, once you have grown into yourself. You add joy and beauty and ideas and kindness to the world. Other people are drawn to it like the bee is drawn to the rose. The gorgeous colors, scents, shapes combine to make a unique experience that no other rose can truly replicate. So it is with your mind. No one else will ever be you. No one has ever been you. You are unique, precious, and wonderful. Just like a new rose.

 

Broken Means Beautiful

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This is a meme that I really like.

It tells me that feeling broken isn’t necessarily a bad thing. In fact, it adds to your beauty. Think about the butterfly. It doesn’t exist until the caterpillar is totally broken apart and recycled into a whole new creature. Most people think the butterfly is far more beautiful than the caterpillar. But, you can’t have one without the other. The organism has to be a caterpillar. It has to be completely broken. It has to be recycled and rebuilt. Then, and only then, does it become the butterfly. The butterfly doesn’t last for long. Maybe as a reminder that all things, good and bad, will come to an end. So enjoy them while they are here, and let them go when it is time for them to pass into the past.

I often feel broken. Many people do. I am learning though, to change how I view the nature of being broken. There are many uplifting quotes (broken to let the light in, broken crayons still color, etc.). All of them have their own truth. Breaking is painful, but necessary to grow and develop. You can’t become unless you let go of what was and the old you that held you down. Be the butterfly! Come back stronger and even more beautiful from the breaking than you were before the breaking!

Seedlings and Inertia

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It has been a while since I wrote anything. I blame the inertia of being stuck at home with no one to talk to or do things with. It’s kind of like being stuck within my own head. Not necessarily a good place to be. As the days have passed, it has become darker and the webs thicker and harder to move through. So, I’m finally making progress through the webs and into the spring sun.

There is nothing I can do to stop the process, that I am not already doing (staying home, making masks, using technology to connect to others). So that means it is time to enlist that DBR skill, radical acceptance. I don’t like the situation or approve of it, but I can acknowledge it as it is, and make the best of the situation. To that end, I have been doing things here at home to make myself master of what I can. I am taking online classes. German through Babel, and a computer science class from Harvard (free). I am enjoying the stimulation of learning new things. I have been working in my garden. I have new seeds coming up, stretching to the sun and being happy to be alive. I am making crafts. Crochet, cross stitch, and book making. I hope to make a substantial dent in the Christmas presents for this year while I’m stuck here at home.

Ugh, there goes the negativity, again. I can’t change the situation, so I must change my perspective. I have an opportunity to get a lot more done here at home than I would if I weren’t working from home. I get to learn new things. I get to create gifts for others. I get to help Mother Nature spread love and joy. I have time to journal and be mindful about what I am doing. The solitude gives me the chance to think and reflect, not just react. I know that this will change. We cannot exist like this forever. I don’t think we’ll go back to totally normal, but we’ll get close.

My garden is waking up. There are flower seedlings coming up in the flower bed. I can’t wait to see them bloom. All the different colors and shapes and scents lifting my senses and making me happy. I have lettuces ready to harvest! Yummy! I have tomato plants and pepper plants and broccoli, too. I have been moving some of my ferns and my lemon tree outside, along with my ponytail palm. The palm is probably 40 years old. It belonged to my grandmother before I got it. It has lots of new growth on it. The lemon tree is happier outside. I hope it will bloom and set fruit this year. I would love to drink lemonade made from my own lemons. My blueberry bushes and strawberry plants are blooming, too. The happiness they seem to feel calms my soul and reminds me that life will continue, no matter what else happens in the world. The buds and seedlings are breaking through the inertia. Spurring me on to keep doing and being. I am whole. I am content. I feel serene.