Dear Wise Flower,

Our daughter Grace has been dutifully tending to a small pot of basil seeds the past few weeks.

At one point, she got frustrated. The first pot of forget-me-nots never sprouted, and it was looking like the basil might have the same fate.

Her first impulse was to give up, but low and behold this week, four wee green shoots emerged, eagerly reaching toward the sun.

It's so human to want to give up when something isn't happening according to our timeline.

I'm reminded me of I post I wrote when I waited for some zinnia seedlings to sprout two years ago and I too almost threw the pot away.

But Grace's patient tending of the seeds — moving them from windowsill to windowsill to get more sun, watering them a little each day — reminds me of the kind of regular tending we must do for any seeds we want to nurture in our life, whether it's a dream or a way of being.

With all the rain we've been having I feel we are in a nurturing mode right now. It seems the perfect time to reflect on those seeds in your life that could benefit from some regular tending from you.

What's a small regular action you could do that would support one of your most cherished heart-seeds?

What nourishing actions would allow it to emerge out of the darkness of the soil and begin to grow and thrive?

How do you cultivate patience when the seeds aren't emerging as quickly as you would like?

I invite you to ponder these questions, and look soulfully at what you can do to support your seeds as they grow into strongly rooted plants.

I'm currently working on two offerings that supports people in discovering the possibilities and pathways for tending these soul seeds in ways that work for the flower you are.

My intention in all I do is to remind you that you are a precious flower and your heart-seeds (whatever they may be) are needed in this world, to own and honor the unique flower you are and to share resources and possibilities so that whatever seeds you want to bloom into the world can thrive.

Sending you steadfast patience and the deep knowing that your seeds are emerging, whether you can see them or not.

big love,

Shannon

Dear Beautiful Flowers,

It's been a long time since I last wrote in this space. I am returning from a lot of time composting and am ready to blog again. I am dipping my toes back in with this note I sent out today. I am forward to sharing more flowers, more inspiration and more stories with you. Thank you for being here and most of all, thank you for being the beautiful flower you are.

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For me, the news that Osama bin Laden had been killed deepened my heart's desire for more love and more peace in this world.

{imagine a world filled with peace amongst all. how awesome would that be?!}

But sometimes when I feel overwhelmed by the pain and suffering in this world, I want to shut down, to give up. It feels so hard and vast.

 But thankfully, this week I remembered the flowers.

{yes, yes, the flowers can heal so much!}

I see the hyancinths in my yard and how they keep blooming open no matter how harsh the conditions might be — rain, sleet, snow (yep, this is springtime Wisconsin!).

And I think of the desert flowers who don't open until the heat gets oppressively hot.

Knowing this about flowers, I know this about us humans, too: 1. we are made to overcome adversity and 2. no matter what the conditions are, it's important to keep opening to blooming.

And so my practice this week has been around cultivating an open heart, through prayer, meditation, breathing, and leaning in when I notice I want to close down.

Yesterday, I felt called to do a lovingkindness meditation. 

{Meditation teacher Susan Piver has a wonderful free mp3 here (scroll down to bottom of page).}

If you aren't familiar with lovingkindness meditation, it is a Buddhist practice that opens your heart to yourself and all of humanity.

To do this practice, you start with wishes of wellness and peace to yourself.

Something like: "May I be well. May I be happy. May I know peace and ease."

And then you extend this wish to people you love, people you are neutral about (the grocery store clerk, the mom at the park) and finally you send love to those you feel hostility toward.

As I was doing this meditation, it struck me how you send the meditation first to yourself.

I had an epiphany then as I looked at all the places in myself where there was not peace, love and compassion.

And I realized: I can change the world. From the inside out.

How?

The more peace, the more love, the compassion I cultivate within myself (especially the parts of myself that aren't very peace-like...like the judgmental and grudging-holding part...or the part that snaps at my husband), the more peace and love can take root in the world.

I so believe we are all connected to all being through our hearts. (Change yourself, change the world, my meditation teacher Donna Mitchell-Moniak says.)

So as I keep blooming open to more love and peace within, I create more love and peace in the hearts of flowers the world over.

Of course, there is more inner work to do. (Maybe a peace treaty between the warring parts of myself is in order?) And I might still shut down sometimes.

But my commitment to remember to keep blooming open, again and again and again.

big love,
Shannon

P.S. Local friends: I have two spaces left for this Saturday's Flowering Wisdom: Bloom Bigger in Your Life class. You'll learn how to flower more fully in all areas of your life. If you are called to join us, please contact me by noon tomorrow (Friday, May 6, 2011). It's going to be beautiful and a chance to root even more deeply into peace and love.

P.P.S. If you haven't been around my website for a while, have you seen my new book, Flowering Wisdom: Inspiring Thoughts on Life, Love and Blooming Big? It's a compilation of photos and words that first appeared on this blog. Thank you for taking the time to be here. Your presence allowed this book to be born. {grateful, grateful}

I've learned a thing or two in my 15 years of gardening.

Like:

You need regularly tend to your garden for it to fully bear fruit.

Weeding allows space for the plants you actually want in your garden to grow.

New seedlings need a lot of care and attention at the beginning so that they can fully thrive.

I have been noticing in my life garden that there was a very special seedling that I given some attention, but not enough for it to really take root and blossom.

Looking at it over the past six months, I found it was wilting and stunted in its growth.

It's a project that so speaks to my heart, feels so very "me" and, most importantly, I can see it making a difference for others in the world. (I don't have it all figured out yet, but it will be a kind of guidebook/resource for spiritual seekers.)

As much I've loved inspiring writers through coaching, classes and the like, I'm ready to step into being an inspired writer myself by turning my attention over to my own writing once again.

I had a wonderfully clarifying intuitive healing session with Hiro Boga two weeks ago.

In an hour, she clarified what had been a big ball of stuckness for more than six months.

(yes, she's that good.)

Before our session, I just couldn't see how the new project fit with the Inspired Writer business. Did I launch two separate websites and blogs? Integrate the two into one? Add a third just for flowers?

Aargh.

I felt lost and overwhelmed.

My own intuitive journaling was pointing me in the right direction (let the Inspired Writer go, I wrote back in January). But it didn't clearly come together until my session with Hiro.

As we talked about the new project and The Inspired Writer (this blog and my business), she suggested putting the Inspired Writer on sabbatical so I could focus on my own journey and on figuring out what this guidebook-thingy will look like.

No blog. No website. No writing coaching. Just time and space to create and allow this tiny seedling of a project to grow into something bigger.

Immediately, I could feel my body relax and excitement ripple through my body.

Last week, I wrote about ideal conditions.

And my ideal conditions include space for reflection, research and my own creative cocoon.

While I do like to offer what I create into the world eventually, the initial process is always more fulfiling to me when it's internal, personal and private.

So, starting next week, my intention for the next six months is to explore, write, create, dream and experience what this guidebook wants to be and who I need to be to shepherd it into the world.

So, this might be the last Flowering Fridays ever…or not. I'll see what develops.

No matter how this unfolds, I will always be deeply grateful for the gift of this writing space, for the flowers and to myself for giving my reflections a place to take root.

I have been able to share in these 71 posts all kinds of big and little moments in my life.

I have been able to share how it was to be with my mom when she died, what our house move brought up in me and how I'm learning how to trust and allow and see the beauty that's ever-present. (And how I forget. Often.)

I have so appreciated those of you co-travelers who have taken the time to read my missives and make comments.

I carry your supportive words, love and encouragement with me into this new chapter.

I do plan to keep in touch through periodic newsletters to share discoveries of new resources and updates on my journey.

(If you want to keep in touch, please sign up here. As a thank you, I will send you a Meet Your Writing Muse guided audio meditation.)

I also plan to post on Twitter (@inspiredwriter) and on Facebook. Follow and friend me if we aren't already connected.

It seems fitting that for the first week of spring I am allowing the shoots of this new project to receive the full sunlight, watering and attention it deserves.

As the flowers are boldly emerging in my yard here in Wisconsin, I too am ready to step into a fuller bloom of myself by honoring and tending to this seedling.

I send you so much love and gratitude for being a part of this journey.

And I send you my wishes that you will continue to bloom. grow. shine. in the garden of your life, too.

Tell me, what tender seedling are you nurturing in your life right now? What's your best advice for navigating the seedling stage of a project?

************

Image: Daffodil, poking through, front yard, March 25, 2010

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Flowering Fridays is a weekly look at flowers through the lens of what they might teach us about flowering fully in our life. Past editions are here.

"Instead of resisting any emotion, the best way to dispel it is to enter it fully, embrace it and see through your resistance." — Deepak Chopra

Image: Purple (swoon!) raunculus plant, bought last week at grocery store, March 2010

I wonder how the flowers know the ideal conditions they need to bloom.

You don't see any daisies or irises out this time of year.

Oh no, they are still snuggled safely under their winter blankets, quite content to allow their bold, early-blooming friends be braze the finicky winds of March.

But the tulips and daffodils, well, this is their season. I imagine them peeking out in the brisk Wisconsin air, and bellowing, "Man, this weather rocks."

I think part of what makes flowers so beautiful is that they know their ideal conditions and honor them.

The columbines bloom best in moist soil, under the dappled shade of trees.

The poppies, prima donnas they are, love to be in full sun.

Lilacs are pretty flexible in any soil, but they need regular pruning to bloom their best.

Knowing their ideal condition is what helps these flowers grow and bloom fully.

I'm giving two presentations tomorrow at the Fox Valley Power of the Pen Writer's Conference — one called The Magic of Your Muse: Creative Flow and the other on Social Media for Writers.

The background for both is around identifying your ideal conditions — how do you like to work? what kind of environments do you flourish in? what support do you need to really thrive?

When I talk with writers, I'm never one to advocate a one-size-fits-all approach.

Instead I see myself as a seed giver of possibilities, asking some questions and sharing some ideas so that the writer can then identify what will work best for them.

Like all the flowers that exist, there are myriad ways to be a writer. Each unique. Each needed. And each perfect that person.

Some writers are early birds. Some need a deadline. Some love coffee shops. Some need a writing buddy.

There is no right or wrong way. Only the way that works best for that writer, based on natural inclinations and preferences.

What's interesting is that sometimes writer (and you and me) get the misguided belief that our preferences are wrong. That somehow our innate desires are wrong.

But imagine what would happen if the tulip waited to bloom until August when it's so hot and dry.

It would wilt over in a heartbeat.

Sure, it sometimes take creativity to find ways to meet our ideal conditions.

I'd love a little studio in Paris with large windows that look out on market and a park about now.

(And I truly believe if I really, really, really wanted it I could make it happen. But Wisconsin is our chosen home for now.)

So instead I'm meeting the part of my ideal condition that needs lots of light and outdoor beauty by putting my desk in the sunroom, surrounded by windows and looking out at the woods and the river that flows belows.

What's important here is that we honor our inner-knowing of our ideal conditions as part of our unique essence, and then get creative and committed about about making space for them in our lives.

I am enrolled in a really powerful six-week teleseminar class with a wonderful and very talented coach, Laurie Gay, called Guerilla Weight Loss.

I was drawn to her class because I was tired of hating my body and obsessing about what I could and couldn't eat. I missed truly savoring food, and noticed (some 18 pounds later) how much I used food to comfort me as I grieved everything that has happened over the past six months (this, of course, isn't a recent pattern, just one that I turned to in my moment of pain).

I am learning a ton about feeling my feelings, really noticing my hunger and fullness and discovering how to feast on life instead.

This week some of our homework was around identifying the conditions that are ideal for "thinness."

For me, I identified a close circle of friends, time for play, purposeful work, sunlight and outside time, self-love and exploring as thin-producing.

Staying inside, working until 2 a.m. when my body wants sleep, self-loathing and making no time for reading as downright oppressive.

I so believe we each have a customized "sweet spot" of conditions — the right soil, amount of sunlight and water and environment — in which to thrive.

Whatever it is you want to "bloom" in  your life, think about the ideal conditions you might allow yourself to nurture your dream most fully.

Tell me, what are some of your ideal conditions in which you thrive?

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Image: Tulips my sweet husband brought me last week, March 2010

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Flowering Fridays is a weekly look at flowers through the lens of what they might teach us about flowering fully in our life. Past editions are here.

Help us to be the always hopeful

Gardeners of the spirit

Who know that without darkness

Nothing comes to birth

As without light

Nothing flowers.

— May Sarton, from the poem, The Invocation to Kali 

*****

Image: Baby's Breath, December 2008

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Wisconsin Writers:

I'm so pleased to be presenting again at  Fox Valley's Power of the Pen Workshop this Saturday, March 20. I'll be presenting two workshops: 1) Social Media for Writers and 2) The Magic of Your Muse: Creative Flow. There are other great offerings, too, including one from Judy Redbird Bridges and full day workshops on March 27 (Very reasonable fees, too!) Full details here.

It's a short and sweet message for today:

Whatever your dream is, bloom it big.

Nurture and water it with loving attention.

Know that its beauty is needed.

Know that even though others might have dreams like that look like your flower, it's not your flower.

Your unique flower is yours, and it's so very needed, too.

(Just trust me on this. Especially when the doubt comes up. Or the fear.)

If you have a seed of desire in your heart, give it the fertile soil in which to take root and sprout.

Image: Hyancith, February 2009

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Flowering Fridays is a weekly look at flowers through the lens of what they might teach us about flowering fully in our life. Past editions are here.

"If we fail to nourish our souls, they wither, and without soul, life ceases to have meaning.... The creative process shrivels in the absence of continual dialogue with the soul. And creativity is what makes life worth living." — Marion Woodman

What will you do to nourish your soul this week? What will you create from your life? 

Image: Dahlias in Rhinelander, August 2008

***

Attention Milwaukee, WI-area writers:

I'm honored that one of my favorite people and great writing teacher Judy Bridges invited me to be on a Get Published in 2010 panel (with some great authors) this Thursday, March 11 at 6:30 p.m., at Redbird Studios in Milwaukee. Details for the event are here.

People from a planet without flowers would think we must be mad with joy the whole time to have such things about us. — Iris Murdoch, A Fairly Honourable Defeat

While I love flowers, I don't pause often enough to marvel at the true miracle it is to live among them. Or to appreciate the profound offering of love, beauty and joy they are to our life.

To think of a tiny seed or sprout, buried in dirt, struggling to grow leaves and stalk and then blossom into flower kind of blows my mind.

And then to see all the amazing variety of colors and shapes and fragrances and sacred center of flowers....well, it's like magic, and fairydust and sparkles on the grandest scale.

But the truth is I usually give the flowers a cursory glance.

Oh, I appreciate flowers. And I sometimes pause a while to really take them in.

But I don't really, truly appreciate the miracle the flower is in my life.

Or really any of life in general.

I don't often pause to appreciate the miracle of the sunset and sunrise each day. Or how the seasons change without any effort by humankind. Or how birds are so perfectly designed for flight.

The miracles, the beauty and the love are all around us. All the time.

The key, of course, is to be conscious enough to really notice and appreciate.

I am in Cleveland, Ohio, this week, cleaning out the last of the stuff from my mom's house with my sister.

It has been a bittersweet process, but this time it feels more sweet than last.

Yesterday, I was cleaning out my mom's office.

In the past, I could get into a story that my mom didn't really love me or that she wasn't proud of me.

And yesterday I saw the printouts and newspapers clippings from the launch of my book, Everybody Loves Ice Cream.

I saw the biography she wrote when she went into treatment for her addiction to alcohol and prescription drugs where she talked about how her kids were her pride and joy.

I saw photos of my mom — a young mom, just 18, having gotten pregnant her senior year of high school — holding me as a young baby, cuddling me with such love.

I remember having a conversation with my mom a couple years ago when I shared that I felt like a mistake because my parent didn't intend to become pregnant.

All I could focus on what that I wasn't wanted.

And my mom, gently, said to me, "Did it ever occur to you that you were so wanted?"

Um. No, until then, it hadn't.

I'm so thankful for the healing I've done on myself (and for the healing my mom had done in her recovery journey), that I was able to have those kinds of conversation with her before she died.

And I'm even more thankful that healing conversation with my mom continues as I clean out her stuff.

Part of the gift of my mom's death is that I'm getting even more deeply the love that's always been there.

The miracle of the gift we are to one other. That up until now, I have not fully appreciated.

Like I've done with flowers. And like I've done with the people who flower the garden of my life.

My intention is to really appreciate the miracles that are always there — the flowers, the people, all of life.

I think of this quote from Einstein:

"There are only two ways to live your life. One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as though everything is a miracle."

I'd love to live more in this space.

It's where the joy and love and wonder is.

And all I have to do is shift where I'm looking.

Tell me, what are the everyday miracles you are noticing?

P.S. The opening quote I received as one of the free month of "ME Time" emails from Karen Wallace at The Calm Space.  I'm loving these short emails with their simple steps for finding time to nurture yourself, and the site itself is an oasis of serenity.

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Flowering Fridays is a weekly look at flowers through the lens of what they might teach us about flowering fully in our life. Past editions are here.

Image: Orchid at the Mitchell Park Domes, Milwaukee, December 2008

Last week, I was listening to a recording of Patti Digh's portion from Jen Louden's wonderful Virtual Retreat.

And on the ca Patti read a poem included in her inspiring book, Life is a Verb: 37 Days to Wake Up, Be Mindful, and Live Intentionally, called God Says Yes by Kaylin Haught.

I love this poem. Both for the sweet way God is talking. And for the reminder the answer is always, always yes.

I so easily forget that.

But what freedom and joy and expansion could be accessed if we recognized the "yes" that is always available to us.

To life: Yes!

To our heart callings: Yes!

To being kind to ourselves: Yes!

Even to the rough spots: Yes!

What would happen to our life if we lived like the answer is always "yes"?

Tell me, what in your life will you give a "yes!" to today?

P.S. Have you seen the movie, Yes Man, with Jim Carrey? "The world is a playground. Somewhere along the way everyone forgets this."

Direct link to trailer here.

Image: White mum, November 2009