Hard work does NOT have to pay off.

When I first started dabbling in gardening, I went straight for the practical vegetable. I didn’t really like it, so after a few years I decided to switch my focus to herbs. Eventually, and to my surprise, I shifted my little gardening dabbles to flowers.  

This surprised me, because as a hard-working midwesterner I’ve always been a “time is valuable” kind of person.  If you are going to spend time on something (even if it’s just some summer dabbling), it should give you the best bang for your buck.  Vegetables and herbs add to my overall health, and are therefore worthy of my time. So why was I drawn to the impractical flower?

In the forward of his book, Awakening to Your Life’s Purpose, Eckhard Tolle speaks of the impractical flower as earth’s first surprise. The viewing of a flower was probably the very first time in all of existence that something was valued for something other than survival. 

This idea of shifting values makes me smile.  But it also makes me uncomfortable. It hints that my hard work won’t always pay off.  That stings a bit.  It means that I may end up spending my valuable time on something that doesn’t help me or the world in any practical way.  That scares me, if I’m honest.  My ego wants to puff up and say, If my work has no value then neither do I. 

But therein lies the lesson of the flower.  The only value it needs to be, is the value of being a flower.  The only thing we need to be is simply here and simply human.  We just are valuable.  No work required.

Again, my ego wants to puff up and speak of slacking through life and responsibilities. And that seems all fine and dandy, until we find ourselves in a situation where we work hard on something and it doesn’t pay off.  And then that same ego berates us for being worthless.  

You are valued. No work required.   

Until next time,

Laura