The Pea Sprout and the Sunflower (Your Life is a Garden: Part 2)

Your life is a garden.

When you first feel called to grow something new, it’s scary.

You know in your heart that your old garden is no longer enough for you. But now what?

You aren’t sure. So you decide to go with your gut, and experiment with growing some peas.

You imagine how beautiful and tasty these peas will be when they’re fully grown. You feel excited! Inspired! Motivated!

Then you look back at your garden, which is a mess of various plants, some of which have been growing wild for years, or even decades. There are also quite a few sunflowers, because that’s what you got good at growing.

“Where the hell do I begin?” You think. “This is never gonna work.”

But still, you wade into your life garden and begin pulling out some of those old plants that don’t feel right for you anymore. You clean what you can, all the while dreaming about the new things you might plant in these spaces.

Then the rain comes.

For days, weeks, months, you stare at this muddy mess, feeling paralyzed with fear.

But, one day, for no obvious reason, you get up and decide it’s time to plant those new seeds.

That’s when your Inner Tyrant shows up to whisper words of disparagement in your ear.

“This is crazy!” it sneers. “Stop this madness now before it’s too late to turn back! You’ve spent years learning how to grow sunflowers. You’re good at growing sunflowers. You know nothing about growing peas! This is going to be a disaster!”

And let’s be honest, you have no way to prove it wrong, but you’re desperate to experience something new, so you keep planting your peas.

A few months later, the first glorious green sprouts poke up through the soil, dreaming their own big dreams of reaching for the sky.

“Whoohoo!” You’re excited! Your tiny seeds have become real plants, and they’re growing! This could work!

But while doing a happy dance around your living room, your Inner Tyrant returns to taunt you.

“What are you so excited about? Hardly anything is happening in your stupid little garden. This is just a bunch of useless sprouts! These won’t keep you alive! Why don’t you go back to growing sunflowers? At least you know for sure how to grow THAT. These new things you’re growing are a huge risk!”

This time you feel so beaten down, you decide to call two or three friends to ask if they think what you’re doing is crazy. Unfortunately, you have chosen to call your old friends, who are still growing sunflowers. So, even though they try their best to support you, you can hear in their voices that they do, in fact, think you’re nuts.

Now you feel demoralized AND lonely.

So you slump in front of the TV with a glass of wine and watch a movie marathon. Strangely enough, all the movies are about persevering through adversity.

This leads you to a surprising realization. You need to make some new friends who are growing peas, or at least who are not afraid of growing new and different things in their garden, so they can share tips and cheer you on. “That can’t be so hard,” you think. “I just need to do a little research and find out where these people hang out.”

Feeling more optimistic, you pick up one of the self help books you’ve had on your shelf for ages, but never actually felt like reading till this very moment. It opens to a page that seems to speak directly to you.

It says “Don’t fear the Inner Tyrant. It’s a relic from the primitive part of your brain, which believes all change equals death. To successfully counter the Tyrant, you must install a new mind program—a Cheerleader that says only kind, positive things. Without installing this new program, you will never be able to enjoy growing anything new in your life garden.”

“Chee-zeey!” Your Inner Tyrant drawls. “And hopeless too. You’ll never get rid of me!”

You fear this might be true but, with nothing to lose, you decide to try it anyway.

“Holy ah-mazing sprouts! Look at what a good job you’re doing! Just keep going. It won’t be long before your life garden is as beautiful and vibrant as you dreamed it would be.”

“Take that Tyrant,” you think, feeling badass and hopeful—which is a damn fine combination.

Then…uhm…

“Wait! No! N-n-n-n-no! What are those other plants doing in my garden! I worked so long and hard to get rid of those!”

You did. But they’re ba-aack. Those are the weeds. All the old patterns and experiences you thought you had already removed, yet they’ve returned to wreak havoc.

You shake your fist at these weeds, then at the sky, cursing the Universe for bestowing this horrible unfairness upon you.

“Why this again? Why me?!!!!”

Next you try to reason with the Universe.

“Look, I’ve spent years taking those things out of my garden. I don’t deserve those things. I don’t want those things. I command you to stop allowing those things to show up in my life garden! So be it!”

For good measure, you wave around a couple crystals, sage yourself, and repeat some mantras in Tibetan that someone told you were powerful.

Then you return to your couch, where you crumple into a heap of self pity and re-watch a whole season of Game of Thrones, and eat a tub of ice cream.

Fortunately, it’s impossible to stay sad while eating ice cream. Soon, you feel so much better you decide to roll up your sleeves and get back to work. Besides, you’ve just eaten a week’s worth of calories, and you might as well put all that energy to good use.

“Screw it. I can do this! I’m going to pull those old weeds out of my garden one by one!”

And you do.

Yes! Your garden is looking fabulous, if you do say so yourself. Organized! You’re on top of things! You feel proud!

For a day or two.

Then you find yourself screaming at the poor little pea sprout you only planted a few weeks ago.

“Why aren’t you growing faster you dumb pea! What’s wrong with you?! Okay, okay, I know! It’s not you; it’s me. What’s wrong with me?! I’m doing this all wrong! I hate myself! I suck at gardening!”

As you turn to storm out of the garden you bump into one of the giant sunflowers you planted months ago. It’s six feet tall, a noble tower of greenery, topped with a plate-size head of yellow blossoms that have expanded toward the sun.

“Excuse me,” it says. “What am I, chopped liver? You do know I was just a little black and white seed a few months ago? Look at me now.”

“Oh,” you say, laughing sheepishly, somewhat weirded out that you’re being told off by a plant. But the sunflower’s just getting started.

“You know what?” it says. “There was a time when you once yelled at me, thinking I would never grow. Yet, you stuck with it and here we are. And now you never even look at or appreciate me. I may be old news to you, but I think I’m pretty amazing, and I’m your creation too!”

“Right. Yes. Sorry sunflower! I do remember when I didn’t believe you’d ever grow, yet here you are. My deepest apologies. I agree you are quite magnificent! And, yes, of course peas take many months to bloom. It’s crazy for me to expect them to be ready to harvest after just a few weeks.”

“Exactly,” says the sunflower, nodding its regal head. “If you want us plants to grow you have to be patient and diligent in taking care of us. And, just for the record, all living things, including your ideas, grow faster when you talk kindly to them every day. We don’t respond well to yelling or negativity.”

“Thank you sunflower,” you say. “I’ll keep that in mind.”

Feeling a wave of gratitude for the sunflower’s wisdom, you stand tall alongside it, gazing up toward the sun. You feel the sun’s love and warmth, and its enduring promise to grow whatever you choose to plant, water and nurture. This feeling of gratitude grows inside you until your body can no longer contain it, and tears stream down your face.

You remember that, just a few minutes ago, you were cruelly shouting at your little pea sprout, so you return to water it, pat a little rich compost around it, and sing to it about all it will become someday.

“I will never give up on you little pea sprout,” you whisper. “I promise I’ll do all I can to help you grow to your fullest potential. Even when I’m bored, even when I’m tired, even on those days when I feel like giving up, I will keep planting and watering, growing and nurturing you.”

Later, you curl up in bed, feeling proud of yourself and your garden. You’re full of gratitude and satisfaction for all those sunflowers you grew from seeds into giant, beautiful flowers that, in turn, gave you so many more seeds that you were able to feed your family, friends, and even a few cheeky chickadees. And you still had seeds leftover to plant more sunflowers.

“Maybe I don’t feel like growing sunflowers anymore,” you think, “but since I did such a good job growing sunflowers, there’s no reason why I can’t learn how to grow some peas, and anything else I feel like growing!”

And then it comes to you, the realization that you’re growing so much more than sunflowers and peas. Because the process of finding the courage to plant those new seeds, then diligently taking care of them day after day, also grew your patience, skills and self confidence.

And among the many moments of frustration, there were moments of great joy and pleasure, even peace, as you toiled in your garden, caught up in your own devotion to bringing new life, new creations, into the world.

And you think: “Maybe it’s not really about the sunflowers, or the peas, or how tall they grow or how many people I feed with them. Maybe it’s about growing my ability to enjoy all the stages of my garden—the mud, the new seeds, the new sprouts, the new plants, the new flowers, the harvest, and the old plants dying to make way for the new.

“Maybe the most important thing I’m growing is my self.”

 

[I wrote this story for all of us dreamers and visionaries, makers and creators, who are out there working our butts off in our life garden. Never give up, my dear brave gardeners. Persevere. I see you out there, tired and toiling away, and I’m here to remind you: you’ve got this.]

Please share this if you know someone else who’s out there trying to grow new things in their life garden, who could use a little encouragement.

Rise up and shine as your True Self,

Shawn xo