By allowing them to kind of be how they are and grow how they are in a way,
It has allowed me to learn how to show up myself as I am.
Yeah,
I guess I never thought of it that way.
Expansive is sort of the best way for me to describe my religious inclinations and my kind of understanding of spirituality.
And yes,
One of the ways that I have been able to sort of experience the divine,
But also sort of allow myself to be permeated by the divine,
Has been in nature in a lot of different ways,
Right?
So there's,
For me,
It kind of,
It all takes on the tone of sort of where I am,
Like physically where I am.
So,
You know how when you meet somebody in particular,
Sometimes you meet a person and you immediately click,
Even though you don't know them really well,
And you can have some really meaningful conversations.
Other times you kind of meet someone and it's sort of surface level appreciation.
And then there are people who you know really,
Really well,
And you can really kind of dig into those deep truths and deep realities with them.
And sort of the way I experience nature,
Outdoors,
Plants,
Earth,
All of that,
Is very much like that.
So kind of different experiences depending on where I am and what my relationship to that landscape is.
I'm really,
You know,
I love kind of vistas and I love,
You know,
Big geography and all that kind of stuff,
But really where I find my truths and my connections is in plants.
So I,
You follow me on Instagram,
So you know I'm like really obsessed with my backyard.
And like finding these tiny little areas of my backyard that are just special in whatever way.
They may be ridiculous to someone else,
But to me it just kind of speaks to me in that moment.
So I have learned just a ton just by kind of showing up in my backyard.
And by that I mean literally walking outside and just saying,
Okay,
What am I going to see today?
And I don't have a huge backyard at all.
It's deep and it's very wild.
I have a lot of just things that grow wild back there.
So when I talk about spending time in my backyard,
I don't want you to imagine that I have this like landscaped area at all because I do not.
It is,
There is just,
There's betony everywhere.
There's wisteria that's kind of taken over.
Ivy,
Pokeweed growing crazy.
It is a really old backyard and it's a really wild backyard.
Well,
What is really beautiful about that is,
You know,
I am all for the wildness.
I love it because there are secrets inside that wildness,
You know,
And they're like pockets where God exists.
And I think what's really interesting about that is that the wildness is you,
Your generosity towards the plant and allowing it to be what it is,
You know,
You're allowing it to do what it will with freedom.
And that's a really beautiful,
There's a lot of grace in that,
I think.
Yes.
And so that is actually one of the things that has allowing that to happen in,
In my backyard.
So in this space that I kind of steward and take care of,
Allowing it to be what it is,
Even though,
You know,
Folks come over and they're like,
You need to like plow that under,
Or you,
You know,
You could get some weed killer,
Right.
And just spray it all over there.
And I like so adamantly resist that for,
For,
For many,
Many different reasons.
But but by allowing the plants to do what they want to do,
Right.
So by allowing them to kind of be how they are and grow how they are in a way,
It's it has allowed me to learn how to show up myself as I am.
So how to kind of show up as this sort of whole person,
Which is,
I said,
You know,
Kind of when I,
When I introduce myself,
I always do sort of a risk assessment of what parts of myself do I share?
What do I,
You know,
How,
What kind of tone do I use?
Do I use my educated voice here?
Or do I just kind of come as I am and really experiencing this landscape out my back door and digging into the beauty of it and seeing,
For example,
After,
You know,
I let the pokeweed get six feet tall,
Seeing the amazing,
Beautiful colors in the berries and the way that they flower before they bury.
Like all of those are just really incredible beauties and incredible,
Like just moments in time in that plant's life that I'm able to witness because I'm just letting it do what it what it does.
And so by giving that grace to something that most folks would say,
You need to dig that up,
That goes in the trash.
And looking at it and being able to like just kind of stop and see the beauty in that has allowed me to kind of stop and see sort of the beauty in my own mess.
I need to thank Ellen Knight for sharing her story and her garden with us today,
As well as the creators of the music used,
Raphael Crux,
Winnie the Moog,
Kloss Appel,
Music Files,
Luca Fraula and Sasha End.
For complete attribution,
Please see the Bite Sized Blessings website at bite-sized-blessings.
Com.
And remember,
That's bite spelled B-Y-T-E.
On the website,
You can find links to other episodes,
As well as to books and music I think will inspire and lift you.
Thank you for listening.
And here's my one request.
Be like Ellen and live into the wildness in the world.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
