I was outside in our backyard this morning looking at our tomato plants that have produced so much fruit this year. There are still tomatoes ripening, at least until the first frost anyway. It is hard to believe that those rows of giant plants were once fledgling little ones we nurtured under a light in our basement this spring. I often think I am just like those small plants aspiring to be the robust ‘adults’ that unabashedly reach for the sun and flourish all season long. Do you ever wonder the same?
In my thirties, I completed my second 200 hour yoga teacher training program, this time in rural Mexico. I was ripe to learn. My practice had shifted from an almost exclusive physical focus to one that included mindfulness through movement and a seated meditation practice. I was like the tomato plants that began as a protected seed in my practice who sprouted into childhood and who was gradually growing into a gangly adolescent. I wanted to be ready for the outside world but it was necessary to be exposed to the challenge of spending a short amount of time outside for many days in a row (away from direct sun and wind) before I could ever survive being planted in the ground. I had to face difficulty; to be hardened off if were to thrive.
I was challenged on my way home from this month away (and many times since). I remember peacefully sitting alone in the small Mexican airport terminal waiting for my flight to Houston. I wrote in my journal something to the effect that I was dedicated to maintaining the shifts I had observed in myself over the month. I was more of a watcher of my mind chatter and I had begun to recognize my reactivity. My experience of myself and others was also one of tremendous love; there was a generosity in me that was newly present.
I flew to Houston in a kind of bliss bubble. When I arrived, I had to go through security again. This was shortly after 9/11 when nothing about flying was efficient. I recall standing in line in Houston and seeing the craziness. I mean, really seeing the hyper activity and anxious tension of everyone around me. The woman directly in front had her laptop open on her rolling suitcase and was typing away madly while she aggressively spoke on the phone. There were arguments and lots of yelling everywhere because there were so many people missing flights due to the hold up. No one was wearing shoes or belts because airport staff was telling everyone to remove them even if they’d just entered the cue. Everywhere I looked I saw a kind of suffering and recognized that I largely lived my own version of this in my regular life at home by constantly running away from myself and toward my long to-do list. I could 100% feel the collective frenetic response to the stress of the room in my body and still I was somehow moving through the line unfazed.
I was calm of course only until I realized I’d missed my own flight out of Houston to Toronto. I got to my gate and the ground crew representative from the airline said there was nothing she could do for me. She told me that my name had been called and I didn’t respond and that made the three hour delay in getting to my gate my problem. I was advised that I would have to purchase a new ticket or fly on standby which meant at least spending that night at the airport.
I was incensed at the unfairness of it all. I had gone directly from my connecting flight into the security line and directly from there to my gate. I didn’t hear my name called because going through security had been complete madness. I communicated my perspective through angry tears; my equanimity entirely tossed aside.
I love this quote about meditation by Daniel Goleman, “It’s not the highs along the way that matter. It’s who you become.”
I am reflecting more and more on this lately.
What experiences have shaped who you have become? What changes stuck around and what made them stick? Do you know?
What difficulties have helped ‘harden you to the elements’ for better or for worse? And how many difficulties, if left to your own devices, would you have likely pushed away and said, ‘Not me, not now. I would prefer another manageable serving of joy please.’
Doesn’t a range of experiences create fertile ground for growth? Aren’t the highs important because they give you a glimpse of your true nature, your better self? Aren’t the neutral moments like the magical (often ignored) hum of insects, a kind of baseline of the beauty of being human? And the difficulties? Don’t these force you to root deeply, to sometimes pour more energy (and consciousness) into the earth and branch out under and above ground more than you can possibly imagine when you are still a seedling?
Isn’t it all necessary?
Before you can ever sustain bearing the fruit, don’t you first need the capacity to steadily reach for the sun?
What do you think? I would love to hear your thoughts.
