Weathering My Own Storm🪷

“The lotus never argues with the water. It simply rises.” (photo by DD🌻)

For the ones who patiently tend what others cannot yet see.

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Gardens can be clear and neatly laid out, so you know where you stand. But there is also uncertainty, and not everyone knows how to navigate it.

It takes years of practice… staying in your own lane and so company, tending to your own garden…. to remember who you are, to push the clouds away, and to keep the chaos at bay.

Even if gardens thrive best with a bit of warmth, air, light, and the occasional disruption. Because quite frankly, I am not necessarily someone that strives in chaos!

I need peace and calm to find myself.

With last week’s Buck Full Moon, intense and illuminating, I reclaimed my own clarity and strength.

I know more than ever who I am: DD, the queen of my own green land of love and joy. No one, I say no one, can upset me unless I allow it.

That doesn’t mean certain situations or words don’t sting… or even break the heart of my little garden. On the contrary!

These days, I am fiercely selective about who I invite into the garden of my life.

The beauty of my thin boundaries is that they let in so much light and love… but sometimes, they let in the storms too. Storms that could knock you off your feet, especially when they aren’t yours.

“The earth has music for those who listen.”

~ William Shakespeare

Yet, I have cultivated ways to anchor myself, so I am no longer swept away by life’s intense waves. Especially when I have been in the ocean swimming that very same day, I see myself become the whole ocean… washing away what doesn’t serve me and moving with the storms of life.

However, not every garden is prepared or ready to weather the storms and uncertainties of the unknown. I remember too clearly what that’s like. While it was hardly easy, this shaped me as the woman I am today.

Every garden needs a swing… somewhere to pause between the past and the future.

I know that dance: one step forward, two steps back into the past, as if nowhere could be better than there… home.

But we know that is not true. If it were home, why don’t we live and enjoy it… the dream come true? In that precious present! Or is it that we strive to live our nightmares instead?

I have been living my life in paradise lately, but somewhat reluctant to move forward… even to a paradise island.

And now I am wondering: what if the next step isn’t about leaving paradise, but carrying it with me wherever the storm may take me?

🌿 Tend Your Inner Garden🌿

As you move through this week, I invite you to pause and ask yourself:

• What storms have shaped the garden of your soul?

• Where do you find your anchor when the waves of life pull you under?

• What would it look like to carry your paradise with you, wherever you go?

Remember: You are both the gardener and the garden.

The one who tends, and the one who dares to grow.

Tend to your roots.
Prune what no longer serves you… this is how you make space. Not for others’ demands, but for the wings you were told to clip.

Trust your boundaries.
They are the fences others tried to blur, the lines they called selfish when you finally said: This cage is not my home.

Bloom where you are.
Not out of duty, but out of love. Not for others, but for the you who is blooming… here, where the soil remembers your name.

Let tending be your defiance. A quiet no in a world that calls care control, that confuses love with clipping wings.

If this resonates, tell me: How are you tending to your garden this week?

Let’s grow…rooted in hope, unapologetic in bloom.

DD🌻

The Compassionate Gardener

As you move through this week, ☘️ may the road rise to meet you, And the wind be always at your back.

******

P.S. I use AI to polish my writing because, quite frankly, if I let my thoughts run loose without structure and clarity, you would all get lost in the maze.

I have been writing this way for over a year… this Note’s structure was crafted long before AI tools were part of my workflow.

And yes, I might lose a few sticklers over it, but to be honest I really don’t care.

The thoughts, stories, and even the pictures are all mine… so no AI involved there.

This tool just helps me share my work the way I intend.

Hope you enjoy!