In the 9 years I have lived in my home, this beautiful bush has created the most gorgeous blue flowers every other year. Not this year though.
Why was this I wondered?
I did nothing different in the way I cared for it. I was exactly the same.
Which left me questioning if other conditions, conditions in my environment outside of my control, did change. Or maybe, a condition had been accumulating over the past few growing seasons that I was not aware of- or perhaps, ignoring.
A fan of Oprah Winfrey's television show Super Soul Sunday, I have often heard Ms. Winfrey ask the prominent spiritual and religious thinkers she is lucky enough to interview: What spiritual lesson did it take you the longest to learn?
Such a great question.
For me, right now anyway, it is this: I can do everything "right," and still lose big.
Yeah, still working on that one...
I think though, like my hydrangea, it may have something to do with some of those mysterious concepts that Vietnamese Buddhist teacher and author Thich Nhat Hanh speaks and writes about that intrigue me so- like: Interbeing and Interconnection.
I'm also wondering about some of those other Buddhists concepts that I don't pretend to understand, but rather bat around in my tiny brain, like individual Karma and community Karma that speak to the power and influence of causes and conditions- even when we may not have entirely discovered what those causes and conditions are.
As always, these days especially in the post-election United States, there is much to contemplate and many opportunities to practice from the moment you walk out your front door.
Blessings to you in your own contemplation and practice today.
