Black Plastic Pros & Cons

Carole laid down black plastic in her vegetable garden to absorb and increase the heat in the soil for her peppers and tomatoes as well as to suppress the weeds. Now, a tribe of voles has taken up residence under the black plastic, and are pruning every plant in sight. Not only the broccoli and the beans, but also the peppers, including the hot peppers. (I wonder if the leaves and stems are as hot as the peppers?)

 We too lay down various forms of weedy thought suppression: Oh, i shouldn't think that or Oh, i shouldn't feel that way or I don't want to feel this painful feeling.

We try to grow nice-ness as our cover crop. And what happens? When we're not looking, our best efforts are nibbled away, undermined by the very feeling/thought we are trying to suppress.

Mindfulness is our refuge. Lean into that unpleasant feeling as if it's an acupressure point. Make friends with that unpleasant thought/feeling.

That's the way to grow a garden. Pepper your life with mindfulness.

Hiding Things in the Dark

Yesterday i discovered a dozen hyacinths growing in a cabinet where i had stored them in the dark in November. And then forgotten about them. Out of sight, out of mind. Those bulbs had sprouted and some had even bloomed!

This is exactly what we do when we suppress feelings and thoughts that we either don't have time for ("I don't want to cry in this meeting at work.") or that we are embarrassed by ("I shouldn't say what i'm really thinking out loud." or "That hurt, but big girls don't cry, so i'm not going to show my true feelings." "Stiff upper lip.")

We hide these suppressed thoughts and feelings in a dark cabinet, shut the door, and forget about them (or try to forget about them). [This is called repression.]

If we are successful at forgetting about them, these thoughts and feelings will "bloom" as projections onto other people. We truly cannot see that the person we are so upset with out there is actually ourself. We really believe that it's all about "them." It never is.

Equanimity helps us ride the waves, yes, even the tidal waves and tsunamis of our emotions. The pain comes, and it goes. Really. Really.

Finding our balance is daily life is an on-going practice of equanimity.

The 8 Worldly Winds

Pleasure and pain,

Gain and loss,

Praise and blame,

Fame and disrepute

Come and go like the wind.

Rest like a great tree

in the midst of them all.

          --the Buddha

Photo from National Geographic