On gardening your life

Good morning gorgeous, it's so lovely to see you on this warm summer morning. You're looking fresh! Today I want to talk a little bit about decorating our lives.

A lot of us, myself included do something counterproductive to our growth— we live like interior designers, trying to Extreme Home-Makeover our lives. We look at our situation and wonder what the better version would look like— the better title, the upgraded apartment, the money, the gold stars. We set goals and work toward them, checking things off the list as we upgrade them. We think the upgrades will make us feel differently about our lives, but when we get the new thing it doesn’t change us like we’d hoped it would. We absorb it into our lives and immediately look to the next achievement.

We’ve got it backward.

The gratification of the makeover wears off far too quickly, and we're left feeling empty. We need to stop decorating our lives, instead, we need to garden them.

The people with the best lives aren’t the ones constantly upgrading them, they are the ones tending to them. They create, nurture relationships, and care for their lives in ways that have longevity. They plant a lot of seeds in their lives and are ok with the fact of life and nature that some of them may never bloom.

Good lives are gardened.

Part of our garden needs to be about investing in ourselves, in our own growth and development. This looks like learning, self-discovery, self-development, therapy, and care. The work is consistent, and the rewards aren't immediate, but the payoff is much richer than the quick buck.

Part of our garden needs to be about investing in other people; building them up, helping educate them, and caring for them. Knowing that maybe, just when we need it, that energy may be returned to us. Sometimes I’ve forgotten I’ve planted a seed. I helped someone with their career 5 years ago and forgotten about it, only to have them turn around at the right moment and send an opportunity my way, or introduce me to the person I needed to know.

Part of our garden needs to be planting seeds for our future selves. Determining what we want our life to look like in 10 years, and starting to plant those seeds of work today. Gardening isn't glamorous, it's hard dirty work and there is often literal shit involved. Cultivating an incredible life isn't easy or straightforward, and it won't happen without our active participation in the hard parts.

When your seeds are everywhere, there is always something waiting to bloom.