Pruning Your Life To Bloom
The grocery store was selling gorgeous African Violet plants. I bought 3, brought them home and grouped them on our dining table. As Del and I talked over morning meal I stared at the flowers.
They were beautiful. Each one was a shade of purple, with velvet green leaves. Each plant was different, each deeply gorgeous in its own way. As I stared at them, I realized that some of their blooms were spent, and some of their leaves had faded, so I began to pinch off the dead blooms and leaves. Of course every gardener knows how important it is to prune a plant so that none of its energy goes towards maintaining what is dead or dying. Pruning allows all of the essence of the plant to go to its budding and blooming.
Bloom Energy
The plants became even more gorgeous as I pinched and pruned and the older blooms and leaves were removed. With more light and air into the town of the plants I could see a large whole of new buds in various stages of increase getting ready to bloom. And now of course, all of the plants resources were directed towards their growth.
How like our lives. Except most of us are not pruned well. We hold on to what is no longer needed in our lives, fearful of letting go of people, places, and things. We often live in the past because we believe that there is no future, not realizing that there are already buds that have bloomed, and new buds appearing in every life. But, when we let the old remain, our energy and attentiveness is drained away.
Just for a moment imagine yourself as a gorgeous plant. Are you planted in nutritious soil that encourages, supports and feeds you? Or are you living in depleted soil? Are you well watered, or do you allow periods of drought, maybe playing a game with yourself called, "let's see how long I can survive without this."
Are you a plant that loves shade or sun? Where are you planted? Does it hold what you need? Do you feed yourself well?
Since a plant can't stop itself from blooming when well tended, are you allowing yourself to bloom? Are there still dead and dying blooms and leaves on you? Do you just wait for them to fall off or do you prune them quickly? Do you see how gorgeous your current blooms are? Can you see how many new buds are forming that will continue to express what you are?
You live in a garden, called the universe. Have you noticed the beauty of the other plants colse to you? In an lesson of the Tv show "Rebecca's Garden" she spoke of how gorgeous a orchad becomes with the range of leaf, branch, flower shapes and color. It is the diversity of the orchad that brings its beauty to life. How diversified is your life? Are you trying to survive isolated from what supports you?
We are constantly reminded of the worldview that suggests that it is potential for our lives to not bloom. This worldview fosters fear by using the principle of lack as the groundwork of life. It encourages us to keep what we have, even if it no longer serves us. Although widely agreed with, whether through discouragement, fear or ignorance, there is no need to live within these conditions. It is only a perception, and all perceptions can be shifted.
It's an active choice.
The true ground of being has never changed. "Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they toil not, neither do they spin: And yet I say unto you, That even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these." And the instructions on how to live as this free time have remained the same, 'But, seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you. (Bible - Mat 6:28)
This shift to seeking and insight the Principle of omnipresent animated Love, the governing force of all that is, reveals the ground of our being as a continual expression of the beauty of Life. Each of us contains all that we need, and will continue to contain all that we need to bloom. All that is required of us is to make an active option to tend our gardens well, and to let go of what is over so what is to come has room to bud and bloom.
After pruning the plants I headed to my office, with at least a exiguous hint of self-satisfaction. Later that day I stopped by the violets to admire their beauty. They did look beautiful. However, lying right beside them on the table was a pile of dead blooms and leaves. I had forgotten to throw them away. As we prune those dead leaves and blooms out of our lives we may be feeling very beautiful, but don't forget to completely throw them away rather than leaving the remains for others to clean up.
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