Who would have thought that one little weeding session could bring about so much learning?  Join me as I share 9 life lessons I learned while sweating like a pig.

“Life Lessons”… Could that be any more vague??  Life is huge!  Life is everything! 

What part of life are we talking about here?

I’m referring to the part of life that is present with you everywhere you go.

Whether you’re awake or asleep.

On vacation or working.

Feeling happy or sad.

This is the part of life that lives with us always, and will continue with us forever.

The fragment of us that is constantly ticking.

The slice of our mind that is interconnected with our heart and soul.

The portion of our being that we actually tend to hide from and pretend is not there.

Do you know what it is yet??

I don’t even know what to call it!  Haha.  But it’s the place where we carry all of our hurt, anger, shame, fear, self-doubt, etc.  AND. . . the place where we bring healing and love to ourselves!!

If you think this does not apply to you, you are in denial.  Everyone has painful issues of some sort to resolve, and we are going to talk about 9 ways to help you do so!

Early this summer, I rolled up my sleeves and trudged out to the garden to attack the daunting task of weeding.

I have a 60×30 foot garden, and it was one big mass of weeds growing.  I thought that I would clear them all out so that I could plant some vegetables for my family.  And while I was doing so, I had a lot of analogies come to mind, which is what I’m sharing with you today.

1.  Get the Small Weeds While You’re There

Our thoughts start out as a tiny little speck in our minds, as small as a seed.  When we continue on a thought, it starts to grow.  Some thoughts can grow as fast, big, and troublesome as a weed!

And the bigger a thought gets, the stronger the feelings grow, and the harder it is to change.  So instead of holding on to an unpleasant thought until it becomes bigger than you, take care of it while it’s small and easier to manage.

A huge motivator to do this is for your physical benefit!

Remember how our thoughts lead to our feelings?  Well, in the book Feelings Buried Alive Never Die by  Karol K. Truman, she teaches that every feeling has its own vibration, and when we hold a negative feeling inside us for a long time, it starts to wear on our physical body.

Once we are to the point of dealing with the physical issues caused by our feelings, that’s going to take a LOT of work to heal those emotions, let alone the physical illness.  So the sooner you can catch yourself thinking negative thoughts, the easier it will be to deal with them.

When you notice yourself start to feel annoyed at a person -pull that weed while it’s small!

When you feel left out of a social situation -do the work right then to bring yourself to a place of peace!

And when you feel overwhelmed, discouraged, or unsure of yourself -find the thought that serves you and redirect your thinking!

Please note that “pulling the weed” does not mean shoving the thought aside or pushing the feelings down!  That is exactly the opposite, and will actually cause yourself harm.

It’s very important to FEEL your feelings.  That is the first step in “doing the work”.  If you’re frustrated, then allow yourself to feel frustrated for as long as you need to.  Try breathing or moving your body while letting yourself feel.

Then, when you’re ready, release that feeling and choose a new one (pick a new thought to accompany it too).

If you address them as they come up they’ll be easier to manage than if you “let them go” until they’re huge and overtaking everything else.

2.  Some Weeds Have Roots Coming From Other places

We’re going to get deep on this one.  Did you know that we are BORN with thoughts and feelings swirling in our souls?

Yep, it’s true.

We carry on more generational trauma, emotions, and problems than we realize.

I realize that can be difficult to wrap your head around, so I make sense of it this way:

Have you ever been in a room with angry people, and found yourself getting angry as well?  Or the other way around with happy people??

Imagine a little baby being carried in the womb for 9 months, their intelligence is genius enough to pick up on and feel the emotions of those around them.

They could be born with subconscious feelings that they can’t even name.  Then when they go to have their own children, those feelings get passed on again to the next child and the next.  (Maybe there’s more to it than that, but that’s just how I help myself understand it.)

These feelings are very hard to address and heal because they run so deep.  Even when you finally recognize the issue with your conscious mind, you’re past the point of just “changing your thoughts”.

It reminds me of morning glory, which is all over my garden.  You can rip off the top and get some of the root, but in order to clear it entirely, it’s going to take MEGA work.  And honestly, thinking that you can completely clear those issues up forever might be a little unrealistic.

Don’t get frustrated when they keep popping up.  Just keep your emotional toolkit handy and deal with them each time you notice their presence.

3.  Sometimes You Get Dirty

Yup, you’re going to cry, feel angry, embarrassed, scared, or sad –all the things that you “shouldn’t do” are actually necessary to heal.  Can we just call them “dirty actions”?  Not because they’re bad, but because they are emotions that are not enjoyable and therefore not a place where we want to stay for longer than necessary.  It’s ok to get dirty sometimes! 

My daughter just got back from a 4-day girls camp, and was super dirty!  Did I refrain from giving her a hug because of it?  NO!

My knees were filthy while weeding!  I was able to wash them off in the hose once I was done.  Is that bad that I was so dirty?  No, but did I want to STAY dirty???  No again.  Do we want to STAY angry???  Not me…

So get dirty…. Feel all the feels.  Scream and yell into a pillow if you want to.  CRY!  And then when you’re ready to “take a figurative shower”, first validate how you feel by naming all your emotions.

“I feel ________”(mad/embarrassed/annoyed/etc –say them all!)

Then let go of them, by saying:

“I release feeling ________”(name them all again).

And finally, replace those feelings with new emotions: 

“I choose to feel ________” (joy/acceptance/love/etc).

Remember that you’re a human being, and you’re made to FEEL all the feels.  So let it be, and know that it’s ok.

4.  The Bugs You Encounter are More Concerned About Their Own Wellbeing Than Anything Else

Every person who crosses your path and tries to make you feel sad, insecure, embarrassed, or anything else is truly focused on themselves and their need to feel good and accepted.

If anyone puts you down, it’s only because they want to be “higher” than someone.  Please do your very best not to let it get to you, and understand that it’s coming from a place of hurt within them.

Some people might look and act pretty “scary” or intimidating, but just like all the spiders that were crawling out from under the weeds I was pulling, they are only looking for a place of safety.  And sadly, many people find their “safe place” by trying to make others feel inferior. 

It has nothing to do with you, and everything to do with them.

5.  Celebrate Your Wins, Take a Break, then Keep Working

I had been out working for a long time and I had a huge bucket full of weeds.  I thought I was doing awesome… and then I looked up and saw I was NO WHERE near done! 

I thought to myself “I’m going to focus on what I DID, and go in for some water and rest.  Then another day I will go weed another patch.”

Don’t feel like you have to resolve all your deep issues at once.  Take the time you need, and focus on what you have accomplished.

6.  It’s Easier to Weed When the Dirt is Moist

You know what that means – Cry…cry…cry!

Open up and let yourself feel and be real.  Maybe tears will come, and maybe they won’t, but the weeds will slip out so much easier if you are willing to be vulnerable, than if you are hard inside and fighting it.  When you can truly open up, you’re more likely to get the whole root than if you stiffen up and just sweep the surface.

7.  You’ll Never Be Done Weeding

If you’re a human being with a healthy functioning brain, you will always be “weeding out your thoughts” because there will always be new seeds being sown.  Just like those dandelion seeds that are always going to blow into your yard, there will continually be new situations arising in our lives that will need our attention.

We live in a world with people, and they’re going to say things we don’t want to hear.  We have an inner critic that will endlessly fight to bring us down.

And more than likely there will always be some deep generational roots that you don’t even know are there, causing you to think and feel certain ways. 

Sure, we can try to AVOID using irrigation water (aka weed seed) on our gardens just the same as we can try to avoid letting troublesome people into our lives.  But that’s easier said than done –some systems are set up to use irrigation and some lives are set up with certain family/community members/coworkers/etc.  Just keep this in mind, and seek help on how to set up boundaries and handle specific situations with certain people.

Whether it has to do with other people or not, there will always be new issues popping up in your brain, so don’t get down on yourself for not being able to achieve a weed-free life!

Just expect to always have something to work on!  Especially the art of continuing self-love!

8.  Sometimes You Need to Turn the Noise Off So You Can Listen to Your Own Thoughts

I love listening to podcasts, I’m especially loving Jody Moore right now!  And when I do mindless work by myself, I usually like to listen to her or an audio book.

However, this day while I was weeding, I chose not to turn anything on.  I didn’t expect much to come from it, I just thought I’d let myself be present in nature and free my senses up to notice things around me.

Before I realized what was happening, I had all the above analogies running through my head!  I was excited to apply what I was doing to real life and share it with you, and if I’d had someone else’s voice sounding in my ears, that never would have happened.

In regards to healing, it is so important to be present with yourself so you can process your thoughts and emotions.  Ask yourself questions of why you feel a certain way –what thoughts are you having about a certain situation that’s leading you to those feelings?

Now, of course there is a time and a place for “noise”.

I am so grateful to have access to audio books, podcasts, and fun music, and am equally thankful for little moments of silence.

No one can tell you when to put your ear buds in and when to set them aside, which highlights the beauty of your choice! 

Be in tune with yourself.  Notice your thoughts and feelings.  Pray to God to help guide you.

9.  There are Times When You Think You’re Doing the Work For a Certain Reason, Only to Realize it’s Not What You Thought

I went out to weed so I could clear a space where we would plant our garden!  In the end, we didn’t end up planting a garden this year.  There were a couple obstacles in our way, and we ultimately decided to take this opportunity to prepare our garden for next year!

Right now, it’s just one big open space.  And the plan is to divide it into smaller sections with pathways in between.

No work you do will ever be a waste of time or pointless, even if it seems so.

If I were to have weeded everything, only to have the garden sit that way until new weeds sprang up, I still would have come out with all the thinking I was able to do along the way.

Nothing is ever a “waste of time”.  There is always something to learn, a person to meet, feelings to feel, and more!  Even if you aren’t able to put your finger on it and say “ah-ha, THIS is what came out of that”, just have faith in the process of life, and know that everything has it’s place or purpose.

Conclusion

I love it when I find analogies between the little things I’m doing and something grand.  It’s just another reminder to me of how wonderful life is, and how much there is to learn!

Thank you so much for being on this journey with me!  Let me know you’re here by dropping a comment!  (You should see my face when I get an alert for a new comment, haha).

Either way, I love and appreciate you being here today.

Kayleen

SDG

Love Yourself Amongst the Mess is a good reminder to be kind to yourself, no matter what craziness is happening in your life.

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