Tag: growth

Slow Happiness

As I look out the window at the sunshine on my garden, I remember the many days that I saw the same view differently—when the glass was streaked with rain, when the ground was hard with frost, and the plants that are budding and growing so beautifully today were nothing but tiny seeds or bare sticks. It all changed so slowly, but it changed so much. And as good as it looks today, I know that there are even better things ahead—the apple blossoms will ripen into apples, the rose stems will bloom with their own unique colours and fill the air with their intoxicating aromas, there will be blueberries and strawberries and maybe this year we’ll finally get some grapes from the grape vine, now that it’s more established. It takes time, establishing. Our blueberry bushes give us a lot more now than they used to, and the apple tree is a little bigger every year. Life is like that, too, isn’t it?

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Two Powerful Skills You Already Have

Walking and eating are two of the most fundamentally basic human skills—the kind of things we learn in infancy. But I have found that walking and eating are also two of the most powerful contexts for experiencing human connection. What do we suggest when we want to see someone? More often than not, it involves eating at some point. Or walking. Or both.

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Strong Trees Don’t Grow Overnight

A few weeks ago, I posted a poem about an oak tree. In the poem, and in my mind, oak trees are big, spreading trees with thick trunks and impressive reach. They are a picture of solid stability, untouched by passing storms. Which sounds nice, doesn’t it? With Ireland now entering another full lockdown for at least the next six weeks, the ability of oak trees to stand unshaken in a turbulent world is enviable. Right now things look awfully unsteady, from where I’m sitting. 

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