Getting to the Root of the Problem

I recently bought a grow-at-home microgreens set that simply required me to plant some seeds in a pot and then water. The microgreens grew beautifully, and I thoroughly appreciated and enjoyed their potent flavor as I sprinkled them onto my eggs in the morning and into my salads. But once all of the greens were clipped, it was time to retire the plant (as I was told by a good friend of mine that they don’t grow back). So I went to take it out of the pot and as I did, I noticed this intricate web of roots, like an entire intelligent system that was only visible when looked at from beneath the surface. This, as usual, got me thinking of how this relates to life.

So often we see only the surface of what appears as our reality. Perhaps we perceive the circumstances in our lives as occurring by happenstance, maybe we view the behaviors of others as somewhat curious, and possibly we interpret our own habits and reactions as somewhat of a mystery, without any obvious rhyme or reason behind them at all. But what this pot of dirt shows us is that there is so much more substance beneath everything that we see and perceive in this world, and if we want to change the patterns and manifestations that occur in our lives, we would be best served to look a little deeper.

Everything has its reason, even if the reason isn’t always obvious to the conscious mind. But just like with plants and their intricate roots that hide in the dark, so do our patterns in life have an intricate web of causation that either nourishes us, or feeds our insecurities even further. And just like with plants, if we want to truly understand where our thoughts and behaviors come from, we are going to have to look a bit deeper than just the leaves that we see sprouting above the surface.

You see, each thought that we have is like a seed that we plant in the fertile soil of our minds. And just like with plants, as we water the seeds they start to grow more and more until they finally surface into the light of day of our conscious awareness. But to think that something happens from nothing would be to ignore the entire process of germination that occurs when a seed is planted and fertilized and then finally grows to fruition. Yet, the process is the same whether it is a plant that is being nourished by water and the sun, or it is our ideas that are being fed by our own thoughts, beliefs, and emotions.

So, the next time that you have a problem to tackle, maybe you could look a little bit deeper than you normally would and ask yourself what patterns, habit, and thoughts you might have been feeding your mind that have been germinating to create the roots of what you are now seeing as your reality. And then ask yourself what new thoughts and habits you can adopt right now in order to plant new seeds so that you can experience something better during your next harvest.