What are you cultivating, and where do you go to nurture it?
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Plot 48B is my friend Russell's allotment, and a few weeks ago was the setting for a small redemption story.
For a while I had been hitting obstacles. Various projects, various feelings, various directions I thought were all mapped out, derailing, probably my own sabotage for fear of success, perversely. Let's not forget that when you go out on a limb to make a difference, life will become different! Sometimes, practically speaking, it is easier to maintain the status quo. (At least, it is if you refrain from asking your heart what it really wants.)
Asking my heart what it wanted, and dealing head on with whatever was getting in the way, R's lovely missus shoved the key in my hand, so I cycled up the hill, unlocked the hallowed allotment gate and perched in this place of earthy nourishment with my notebook, gently drawing the words back on track. Views across the city with smoke rising vertically from chimney pots, strawberries growing at my feet, and someone playing sax nearby while the leaves turned – love was in the air, and so was clarity of purpose and vision. Back in the game.
It turns out Russell knows an unusual amount about compost, taking a rather poetic interest in it as a complex story about dead, rotting matter turning into the finest nourishment. He is an Englishman, and an actor, so of course it would appeal to him in Shakespearian fashion. Beauty from ashes, that sort of thing.
Careful cultivation working wonders.
If you see something precious, treasure it. Nurture it with patience. Tend it to life, knowing that all good things with love and space to grow will flourish and have opportunity to realise their potential.
Sometimes, other people will be this for us, and sometimes we need to find this for ourselves. A person, a place – find, or be, a careful cultivator.
{Today's Soundtrack: Be Yourself: A Tribute to Graham Nash's Songs For Beginners}
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