flowers

Good enough.

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The Daffodils are here.

Things are new. Fresh again. The spring is bringing me messages more clear than a sunny winter sky these days…sunshiney as the daffodils peeking out at me with their bright happy faces.

I am now focused on what matters most. You see, I have spent the better part of my life focused on the wrong stuff. Things like what I look like. Or how much I weigh. Or how many calories I have consumed on any given day.

Our society counts on us not feeling like we are enough as we are. Because if we were enough, what would happen? If you weighed enough and your teeth were white enough and your pants were a perfect size…what would happen?

Or rather, what COULD happen?

For starters, I think we’d be content with what is in front of us and focus in on the things that matter to us most. Things like sunrises and sunsets, flowers and new foliage blooming in our own back yards, or food and fellowship with those we love most. The little things. The beautiful things.

We would be less focused on our aging faces or those big bellies we acquired somewhere along the way. We would be content to be as we are…as things are…as life is.

I am all for improving ourselves. But I think I got lost somewhere on this path thinking the improvements had to be external. Or visible to anyone. The changes have to come more with the reality of life…the reality of how small we really are. The reality that right here, right now is good enough.

The flowers don’t feel like they aren’t doing enough. They know they are okay. They live for each moment. They go dormant when they need rest and thrive when the conditions are good enough.

Not perfect. But good enough.

And so here we all are. Standing on the precipice of change, evolution, and everything that happens and has been happening. And it’s all been good enough.

So this spring. I beg of you - of me - to let this all just be good enough…as it is.

Tiny Changes

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These little flowers changed my day in a big way today.

This morning I sat waiting for a client in a sweet, local cafe. It’s raining and the temperature has dropped a good 20 degrees over the past 24-hours. It’s gloomy, grey and wet… a mirror of my heavy heart these days. Between saying goodbye to our family dog a few short weeks ago and dealing with the rest of regular life like taxes, prom planning, bills and laundry, I just feel like I am moored to Life.

As I sat there, I looked down at the clean, marbled table and paused to notice this tiny vase and these little perfect flowers curling and weaving around each other. I was baffled at their delicate strength. I was consumed by their simplicity for a moment. I became curious about their unassuming gentleness and forgiving nature. They made me stop my train of though for a brief a minute…to pause, to breathe. To remember to forget and to let go.

Life can be altered in these little moments. They are the moments that encourage us to lean in. They are the moments that encourage us to breath, pause, remember or forget. They can be transitional and transformative. But mostly, they are when we can learn to tolerate ourselves, our stories, our lives, and all the things that wait for us beyond their delicate and perfect features.

Changes usually come to us when we are ready. But sometimes, I think the biggest changes can come to us in the tiniest moments, bravely weaving and curling their way gently into our tender, aching hearts.

This, too, shall pass.

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We are taught that to be accepted in this world, we must be perfect. Complete. Put together. We are told that our wholeness is what makes us intrinsically good. To be anything else is to be cast aside like a flower that's finished blooming. There is no room in our technicolored dreamworld for imperfections.

We aren't always taught to pause and appreciate the beauty in the falling apart. There are no books written on existing inside that space. You get no medal for getting out of bed or putting on pants. We are taught to run from brokenness. Fear it. Get as far away from it as you humanly and possibly can because it's painful, hard and terrifying. We aren't shown that despite our fragility during this time, being broken is truly a privilege. And we aren't shown that sometimes, being in that space is hard to get out of. Buck up. Chin up. Onward and upward. It's like the world doesn't want being broken to exist.

My words to you are this: If you are in the broken place, take your time. Feel around a little. Hold the space. Look for the beauty within it (For example - I know if the lights are off, I look much better in the mirror). Surround yourself with people who can do the same thing. It takes patience, courage, love and - above all else - empathy. Sit. Be still. And love yourself. 

Because this, too, shall pass.