Abundant water, fertile rich soil, a perfect climate — none of these have helped. The trees have grown tall with lush vibrant leaves. Bumper yields were forthcoming over the last 3 years — now nothing. The farmer is in despair. Even his long handlebar moustache is drooping.
He has heard rumours of The Plant Whisper — that fabled, semi-mythical figure who can be summoned to a barren orchard, commune with the trees and restore them to abundance. He finds an obscure link on the Dark web, performs the summoning ritual, pays across the kriptokoinz and waits….
And waits…
And waits some more…
One cold morning The Plant Whisperer materialises, walking out from the morning mist, and slowly ambles into the midst of the planted ranks of trees and turns his head to the side as though listening. After a pause, he squats down, grabs a handful of loose soil, lifts it to his nose and sniffs deeply as though savouring a rich broth. He takes a pinch of the soil and tastes it, rolling it around in his mouth, his eyes having the same dreamy look as a connoisseur tasting a magnificent vintage.
He stands up and slowly walks down the serried ranks, occasionally stretching out his hands and brushing the leaves, his eyes half-closed as though listening for whispered words on the soft breeze that tinkles through the leaves. He stops before the biggest tree, leans against it, wraps his lanky arms around it, and presses his forehead against the smooth, cold bark.
After what seems like an eternity, but in fact is only a few minutes of tree-hugging, his soul seems to slip back into his body and he straightens up. He turns and walk towards the farmer.
The farmer’s mouth is about to open, but The Plant Whisperer holds up a peremptory finger and says, “Shhh, Listen!”
The farmer stops and listens. He hears the wind, birds and his own breath. He raises his eyebrows in the universal sign of inquiry.
“Can you hear the bees?” The Plant Whisperer asks.
“There are no bees here, there was a bee farm over the hill, but they packed up and closed shop. There have been no bees here for the last year,” he says, his voice faltering as the sentence progresses and realisation dawns.
The Plant Whisperer turns his back and disappears as he came.
Growth is fascinating. It mystifies me. Intrigues me. Perplexes me. Excites me. Sometimes even terrifies me. Imagine if you are a caterpillar with acrophobia (that’s fear of heights — fear of spiders is arachnophobia. Most successful caterpillars have that one). Your metamorphic growth is good, even necessary, but flying could be a tad scary.
I think the biggest obstacle to growth for most of us is the fear of the results of the growth. Most of us would like the results of the growth without the actual growth. Like winning the Lotto instead of learning how to earn the 273 gazillion bucks. Money for nothing. If only the cost was nothing.
The opposite of growth is sterility, barrenness, nothingness. The Void. The grave. This duality is intriguing and challenging. Take any skill or ability you have. If you stop using it the ability will deteriorate or even disappear. Whether biologically, intellectually, emotionally or spiritually, if we do not grow we deteriorate and diminish. We become less. Our strength, capacity, resilience, creativity, adaptability and ability to grok can increase and grow — or diminish and dissolve away if not used.
Sometimes it’s as simple as finding the missing bees. At other times, growth needs a nuanced and flavoured approach to unleash it. It’s like trying to add the right combination of spices that creates a meal that is greater than the sum of its parts, as opposed to the vile concoction I created last week that tasted as though my tongue was being scorched with a lightsabre (a red one — not a blue one).
The obstacles to your growth might be simple, they might be complex, but the journey is always worth it.
Unfortunately you can’t literally summon the *insert_your_name_here* Whisperer to help you find the missing bees in your life that are holding back your growth, but the first step is to take stock and see if there is an area of missing growth in your life.
Go ahead. Do that. The act of identifying the problem is going to go a long way to identifying the solution.
