What is a Flower Worth?
Presence is lemon drop yellow petals with kisses of pink on the tips
Presence is a funny practice. I've been practicing presence as an all day sort of thing lately. Working to be present with life as it comes. That is the true practice. To be here for it. All of it. Looking life dead in the eyes and saying "what's next? I'm ready". And I found it can be brutal there sometimes. Some thoughts can run you away from yourself faster than a youtube commercial. Thoughts are a barrage of who knows what. Always seeming to want attention and analysis and examination. Our focus holds onto thoughts and allows them to dictate so much about our personal narrative. Presence is allowing me to hold onto something other than the thoughts. I'm able to hold onto the breath. I'm able to hold onto the moment.
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Did you know daylily flowers only last a day? It seems obvious after hearing it! Their big bright gorgeous blooms only last a single day and then they fade.
Wednesday morning I looked out our front window onto garden and I saw their lemon drop yellow petals with kisses of pink on the tips and I burst into tears. Tears for everyevery. Tears for the world and all it's minute beauty - which may or may not even be noticed by a human in their entire existence. And what is a flower worth if a human's gaze never meets theirs? If nothing is purchased in their name? Is it fruitless? Does the flower matter even if we never engage?
I watched them and thought about how for some reason I have just been scared shitless to be who I am in the world. it's torture. it's all i want. To be free from my mind and this prison I keep myself inside. Fucking day lilies. Reminding me of how short this all is. Wanting to let life take me like the wings of salsify seeds on the breeze of tomorrow. How do I allow myself that level of trust? How do I allow myself to free fall onto the invisible-to-me? I don't know how tightly I cling and to what. All I want is release.
Exposing ourselves to the impermanence of life gives us access to our own vulnerability. Of witnessing the slow changes of what we want to assume is permanent. We allow ourselves to feel the excruciating fragility of a day's flower. And somehow in that moment, a flower is our teacher and guide. A flower knows a better way.
The more vulnerable I get, the more balanced I feel internally. I know I live each day with the fullness of my integrity. I show up ready for the excitement and joy while also accepting and allowing that I am human. I make mistakes. I don't know everything. I get hurt feelings. I have rage inside me at times that makes me question what means to be human. I wail with grief at the conflicts we put ourselves into for absolutely no reason at all.
We choose how we are with the world. You can choose to be soft and yielding, like Nature. Like the day lily making every moment of her short celebration count. And really, who I am to judge her perception of time durations. A day to a day lily might feel like a full human life does to me. What timeline does a daylily live?
With Earth as my guide. I practice being soft and yielding. I practice presence.