Try thinking about your words and actions as seeds.
One way to do this is to start at the end. Ask yourself “What kind of plant do I want to grow?” And try to plant the right seed in the right soil for it to flourish.
The other way round is to think about means: “If I do this, what is it the seed of? What kind of plant will grow from it, and where?”
This applies to almost everything – relationships, health, habits of thought, what we read, how we spend our time, who we spend it with, what we pursue, places we go, the motivations we allow ourselves to follow.
What seeds do you plant most often?
What could you plant more of?
What might you need to uproot?
Who are you planting for?
What’s left behind when you’re gone?
As we build our lives, organisations, communities – as we build a society – what plants will flourish best together, bringing life?
I love the parable of the man who plants a mustard seed, which “though it is the smallest of all seeds, yet when it grows, it is the largest of garden plants and becomes a tree, so that the birds come and perch in its branches.”*
You can’t see the future, but you have a pretty good idea of what sort of garden you want to live in, and a pretty good idea of what seeds you’ll need to plant. Sow those.
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*No, I don’t think that mustard is the smallest seed or the largest plant either.