Gardens are not permanent!

Gardens come and go....with the seasons....with my interest...with the weather....they are not permanent. Alas, I am a fickle gardener. One valuable lesson from my garden is to give up controlling tendencies. The opposite of yes is not no....it is control! Behind that controlling impulse is fear, the fear that we will have to feel something that is unpleasant....disappointment, frustration, pain, grief or defeat. Yes, is acceptance, control is refusal. Accepting the garden as it progresses involves a certain amount of detachment from the outcome. The perfect weather, the most fertile seeds, no pests....not so much going to happen! A guarantee never comes with a garden....we must let it have its way with us. A great gardener enjoys the day, the present....NOW....with an eye out for the weather, invading pests, gently weeding and cultivating the soil and fertilizing the growth.

Like our gardens, perhaps is is our refusal to accept ourselves, others, circumstances and events, our illusion of control that denies us the grace of staying more fully in the present. Our persistent resistance to our realities, our attachment to control, might be the cause of our fussing. And, I have found, much to my embarrassment when we do say yes to our realities, we push our particular "yes" onto others forgetting that we have a different reality to affirm. No two gardens are alike! Perhaps, the joy of gardening in the present lies in the graceful practice of five essential loving qualities....attention, acceptance, appreciation, affection and allowing. I give up my willful, peevish opposition to life's givens, the disarray, the chaos, the stormy weather of injustice. Instead, I trade in my armor of control for the unpretentious freedom of gardening britches. I give up my feud with reality...trading it in for true growth. Ahhhhhhh....what we learn from the garden!