Create Your Own Mold, Then Break It If You Want
“As it turned out, the work I had to do was messy and deep. I slogged through it until one day, exhausted and with mud still wet and dripping off of my traveling shoes, I realized: “Oh my God. I feel different. I feel joyful and real. I’m still afraid, but I also feel really brave. Something has changed — I can feel it in my bones.“
-From Brene Brown’s book “The Gifts of Imperfection: Let Go of Who You Think You’re Supposed to Be and Embrace Who You Are.”
This bones feeling is change at the core. Getting back to living from our original wiring before the bad things of life happened to us. And it’s usually dirt in your fingernails, back-breaking, hot sun on your back work. The growing of plants and crops is much the same, with the requirements also being consistent attending-to, nurturing, protecting, patience, and intention. Personal growth and mental health don’t happen by accident, just like plants aren’t planted and cared for accidentally. There was a great deal of intention behind them. The Gardner is a visionary, designer, and implementer. His vision speaks to what could be if he digs deep enough and cares long enough, regardless of what the seasons bring and regardless of how much the plant waivers in trust. His design is based on his creative vision of something beautiful, his plan of work that will need to be done to see the vision to completion. The implementation is the work. This is where love and self-sacrifice are almost always required. And this is where originally-made promises and commitments often go awry. It’s the most not fun part, and the hardest part.
A vision is nothing without design and implementation. There would be nothing to look upon if everyone stopped after vision and design. We’d be existing solely in a blanched world of great ideas.
When a seed is planted, two things happen. The seed sends off two shoots. One shoot is sent down into the ground, where it is rooted. At the same time, another shoot is sent up. The second shoot will become the plant that grows; the growth that makes its spot of earth more beautiful. Both growths are necessary. One can’t happen without the other. Oxygen, care, shelter, and nurturing are essential to both. With these, color and brilliance follow. The air becomes more breathable, simple…simply breathable because rare, organic, and authentic qualities are present.
We go through our lives both as the gardener and the plant, sometimes simultaneously. Both require a great amount of trust, and an even greater amount of vulnerability. The gardner doesn’t ask for perfection, just belief. The plant doesn’t ask for perfection, just freedom to become what it was meant to become. If it’s done right, a full circle of gratitude, rest, and inspiration forever continues.
Don’t stop your work of getting back to you in all your perfection and imperfection. It is really a work of compassion, accepting yourself as perfectly imperfect. Removing yourself from the molds others have created for you. Create your own mold, then break it if you want. Judge yourself less, speak with kindness, operate in grace. You are establishing roots that will be resilient and resistant to what life surely will bring. Let them run deep and securely. Surround yourself with who and what you want to become, surround yourself with the people that make deep breathing, dancing, and healing not only acceptable but vital. Let your petals spread out with radiance and health because you know your roots are secure. The belly-laugh-sand-in-your-toes-smell-of-baby’s-skin-Saturday-morning-blueberry-pancakes kind of security. Keep envisioning, keep designing, keep implementing. You will be left, just as you were when you were born, with a mind awake and a heart wide open to love.
**This post was taking from a previously written entry at Handfuls of Earth blog(also by Sarah Fleming)..