In my Garden

   

  

Pink Ginger

 I can think of very few tasks which bring me closer to the earth and so in tune with God than tilling my garden. Under the early morning sun, with a fresh breeze every now and then, and a symphony of different birdcalls, I dig. This is always a happy time for me...I am in a world of my own..I relish digging the soil, sweating it out, feeling the warm moist dirt with my hands, amazed that these dark brown crumbs can actually sustain life. And how can you describe the smell of earth? With my little shovel I plow and peer, and marvel at the unrecognized realm of life that exists underneath (yes, the roots coming from nowhere and everywhere, the fat earthworms, the little bugs and ants that live subterranea). I study every leaf and petal, much like the doctor that I am, doing my daily bedside patient rounds, watchful of every nuance of decay and growth.

Gardening can be a very spiritual experience. If I am sensitive, each act of poking and digging, pruning and repotting can become an act of spiritual meditation.There are many universal laws that can be gleaned from a garden: laws that govern personal growth and how to handle people  are very similar to laws that govern plants and gardens.

I am not surprised. God is the creator of gardens; he is the Supreme Gardener.

 Jesus said,"I am the true vine and my Father is the gardener." 

Yellow vine

Look at these pretty flowers below. I did not put them there. I woke up one morning and found a sturdy seedling 4 inches high jutting from the ground. Before long, it has grown into this wonderful bouquet. Who planted them? I didn't. Maybe the birds did.  Or the butterflies. Or God. Who fed them? watered them? I don't know. But they are there and they are beautiful, and I enjoy them...it happened without my planning or my planting. Sometimes good things or great things just come about without me planning them and working for them.
These are called "blessings" or gifts. And life is like that, sometimes.
I don't always have to be in control.

 Another precious lesson I learned is each plant is unique and will grow best and bloom where the soil, sunlight and water suit them the best. "Bloom where you are planted" as some pop
motivational psychologists declare just does NOT work for plants in a garden. 

I was an amateur gardener wanting to grow an English cottage garden in my backyard in Sta. Rosa. I wanted roses, vines, impatiens and hydrangeas to surround me. I wanted bursts of colors from flower boxes and baskets. So I started planting impatiens in flower boxes and hung them by my windows which happened to face the scorching afternoon sun. They grew lanky and tall, bloomed scarcely and then wilted. Even if I fertilized them. They didn't look happy at all. I told my landscaper friend about this and he laughed at me like I did the most stupid thing.  English cottage garden, hah ! In the Philippines? So, I have learned to study plants and their specific needs for soil, sunlight and water and the times of the year when they bloom the best. Much like people, there are sensitive plants that you need to handle with care and just need the exact amount of water or sun, while there are also plants that can withstand days without watering or can be left to the mercy of the hot tropical sun in summer. If you want people to bloom, put them in an environment which will be conducive to their growth. You cannot go against nature, force them in a place where they struggle with their survival or worse, make them do things which they are not gifted to do and expect them to excel.

Now, let's go to deadheading. In gardening, deadheading is the removing dead flower heads from a plant to encourage further blooming, i.e. pruning.. Do you know that deadheading is a Jesus principle? In the Book of John chapter 15, Jesus says "He cuts off every brach in me that bears no fruit, while every branch that does bear fruit he prunes so that it will be even more fruitful."

Bougainvilla 

I
In the beginning, I loved the sight of flowers so much I didn't have the heart to deadhead. In the Philippines, some old folks even advise against pruning because plants may feel slighted and stop growing or blooming ("baka magtampo").  I did not want to touch my plants with pruning shears until I talked to my gardener friend who advised that the more I cut dead flowers, the more the plant will bloom. I don't know why or how deadheading works but it really works. Maybe pruning streamlines the plant's use of nutrients and water, redirecting them to producing flowers and fruits instead of being wasted nourishing dried up stems and petals.

Golden Crossandra (photo taken by Patrick Gutierrez)

When God starts using his pruning shears in my life, I don't readily welcome it. Pruning can be painful! But Paul in Hebrews 12 says, "No discipline seems pleasant at the time, but painful. Later on, however, it produces a harvest of rigtheousness and peace for those who have been trained by it."
Do I want my life to bear fruit? I should be willing to be pruned.
So many aspects of my life steal my joy and productivity. It may be pride, unforgiveness, bitterness, anger, envy, sloth, addictions, procastination, excessive ambition or materialism. Deadheading or pruning is cutting away these parts of my life so that all my energies go into bearing fruit.

          

Love and Devotion from my garden

                 

Crab's Claw

Lantana camara or Verbena

The other important thing I learned from my garden is, just like with seemingly hopeless people, you just don't give up on your plants. There have been so many occasions in my garden when a plant looked so sick or so completely infested their leaves and stems have fallen off or dried up, I condemned them as goners. Then I took a second thought and started cutting away all the dead and infected parts of the plant, invested in bit more care than the usual, tended
them daily, put them in the gentle shade with enough moisture, and the plant came back to life.

Love and Devotion- the other color.
I took this picture from Taal Vista Lodge along Tagaytay,not from my garden.