Spring Cleaning for the Soul: Tips for Nurturing Your Inner Garden
Spring Cleaning for the Soul: Tips for Nurturing Your Inner Garden
BY MORGAN MARIEFlowers bloom when watered.
Gardens grow when nurtured.
Stretch your mind with me and imagine yourself as a garden. Consider the attention you’ve given to yourself in this last season.
Often what we choose to eat and drink has little to do with nourishment and everything to do with convenience or cost. Whether we are running from one thing to the next or frantically trying to put dinner on the table before 10PM, a well-rounded meal with the suggested elements likely doesn’t happen three times a day.
As to not make any assumptions, I will speak from my own place of truth and if you find any connection to my experiences just know you are not alone and you can borrow my watering pail for your garden anytime.
In complete transparency, I’ve kept a healthy distance from practices such as meditation for years. The thought of sitting still with myself and my inner thoughts is more intimidating than jumping on the line and preparing a meal in the restaurants we feature.
Feel better.
Reduce stress.
Enjoy life to the fullest.
Promises that anyone with a jam-packed schedule would gravitate towards.
For as long as I can remember, I’ve been directly associated with the word busy, as many can likely relate to. Every time someone calls me busy it feels as if I am being directly punched in the gut because the connotation comes with not showing up fully. I have a deep desire to slow down, yet even the idea of that seems out of reach.
Though spring doesn’t promise us anything, it offers an opportunity to start fresh.
So, in an effort of being true to my word, I’ve begun watering my soul.
“Focus your attention on your breath and let your awareness rest here,” I hear the facilitator say. I try my best to lean in while my subconscious mind shifts to and fro. My entire being has been crafted by experience to perform in the exact opposite way so I find it incredibly challenging to honor his requests.
“Allow your thoughts to come into your mind and exit peacefully as you focus on an intention,” he adds. My intention in participating in this mediation was to center myself in order to write a meaningful article for this Spring Issue, yet I find myself stressing about the outcome instead of the input.
“Settle into the discomfort,” he says. Now that I can do.
My first meditation was only three minutes and let me tell you, it felt like three hours.
Nonetheless, the next day I picked up my watering pail and stepped into my garden again when on a run, an activity equally as uncomfortable as meditating. I was a few miles in when the songs on my phone shuffled and landed on an eight minute track of brown noise. Instead of switching it off immediately and returning to my quick-paced motivating music, I let it play. For eight minutes I ran with my inner thoughts and actively chose to work through the doubt-filled dialogue.
Flowers bloom when watered and gardens grow when nurtured, I tell myself.
Here’s the challenge — our modern world celebrates chaos and promotes over-stimulation. I am a product of our society and I perpetuate this cycle with my daily choices in both my personal and professional life.
However, each day our bodies welcome around 330 billion new cells. 330 billion individual opportunities to bloom from bud to blossom.
As part of my gardening tools I was able to gather some wisdom from a healer, gardener, chef and an herbalist. Behind those titles are humans with hearts that long for you and I to flourish.
It is a pleasure to present the following pages to you in hopes that each of these talented writers brings peace into your spring season and new life to your internal garden.
