Sometimes, outside on a walk, it is amazing to watch how things hold on to life.
In the alps, for example, as vegetation grows more and more sparse with altitude, the most amazing flowers can be found, holding on and even thriving in difficult spaces. Between rocks maybe or at a cliff. The wind pulls on them and there might be little soil. Some of them grew to have a protective layer of tiny hairs or narrow leaves that helps to lessen the impact of the harsh conditions found there but that’s what gives them their beauty and strength.
Those unlikely places are the places where they have taken root. It is their home. It is their chance at living.
We, too, can build a foundation in the most unlikely of places. When things are not how we first pictured them, we may feel frustrated or alone. It is in these places where growth and beauty can be found. Think about how nature unequivocally claims its place in the world. How might you apply this to your life?
Claiming our place
I often see people who are restless or unhappy, who want more, who compare their place with that of others. We tend to doubt ourselves and our capacity to survive in harsh places and conditions. We don’t like where we are planted. The soil is too little, too rocky, too confining, believing life has cheated us. We may grow disillusioned, fearful, angry.
Enough to hold on
If the soil is shallow, trees develop extensive root structures. A potato left in the basement may grow a pale sprout that appears weak and thin but as soon as it gets to some light from the window it starts producing leaves. We admire the rugged branches of a tree that has grown solitary and stubborn in an unprotected place.
Life takes hold all over
Look sometime. See how tenacious it is. Notice how it takes what opportunity it is given. It doesn’t apologize for its place. Its beauty is not changed. It doesn’t take time to think about what it is not, but instead it is what it is. It un-apologetically claims its place and defines itself not by where it is, but what it is.
The greatest discovery of our generation is that
by changing your thinking, you can change your life.
– William James
The rules of engagement