my plant analogy

I wrote this five days ago and never posted it . . .



My mom has several plants in the corner in front of the kitchen sink. They all get plenty of light there, but some grow faster than others. One green ivy-like plant grows the fastest of them all. My mom transferred one of the smaller parts of it into a small flowerpot, maybe the size of my fist. I asked if I could keep it in my room.

Sometimes I water it; sometimes I don’t. I guess that’s responsibility in its most elementary form: giving a growing thing the sustenance it needs.

Most of the plant seems happy. Most of the leaves are the color of Kermit the Frog. But there’s this one leaf that doesn’t seem to catch onto the idea; it’s brown and shriveling. I want it to fit in and be like the other leaves. The plant is doing well; why does that one leaf have to bring the rest of the plant down?

Sometimes my life feels like that. Most of me is centered on what’s important: on Jesus, on loving others, on building relationships. But there’s often one leaf -- one part of me -- that drags the rest of me down. It’s the leaf that worries too much, that thinks about itself too much, that stares at the mirror more than at my heart, the leaf that talks too much, the leaf that talks too little.

I want to get out my Fiskars scissors and clip off that one crumbling leaf. It’s bringing the rest of the plant down.

But then I remember why I water this plant. I water it to keep the green leaves green, but mainly, I water it in hopes of saving this rather miserable-looking leaf. If there isn’t room for improvement, then what’s to push us past status quo?




Sometimes when I re-read things I wrote a while ago, I dislike them. That's why I just decided to post this and not re-read it.

In other new, have I ever mentioned how much I hate yelling? And pessimism?