I bought a Swiss Cheese plant when I moved into my new house. Homelessness had preceded this relocation and I felt very, very sad about where I was ending up. There were lots of things I was grateful for, but the overriding experience was one of loss for everything that had gone before.
The plants were an attempt to create beauty in the midst of, what I perceived to be, a lot of ugliness. I was delighted when the cheese plant put out tender new leaves but they were short lived. The brown shrivelled leaves didn't surprise me; I was of the opinion at the time, that everything I touched turned to sh*t. I thought it highly likely that the whole plant would follow suit.
Part of my self-care routine was to walk along the beach every day, whatever the weather, even when the wind was so strong that it could hold me up when I leant on it with all my weight. On these days I would be propelled at a run one way, and bent double into the blast, inch home. As I was held by the wind, the fierceness and majesty of the natural world soothed my wounded spirit. I had too few inner and outer resources left to meet more than my most basic needs and I was grateful to the wind for reminding me that it's ok just be held.
Beach-combing has been my abiding love so, lacking any horticultural knowledge or the capacity to acquire new skills, I adorned the base of the cheese plant with pretty shells. There seemed to be some kind of fungus cohabiting the pot which was, I suspected contributing to its failure to thrive. I made an effort to, in between the self deprecating thoughts, to remember to express gratitude to my green friend. Regular bathing in magnesium salts and pine essence was another of my daily self-care rituals as I tended the pain that had brought me to my knees. Warm water triggers the body's production of oxytocin, the love hormone, in the same way that a hug would. In my lonely state, this was exactly what I needed. My plant added a touch of spa to my drab bathroom and I remembered to thank it for helping me recall the luxury of a steam room or the serenity of an outdoor pool.
Another flourishing of new leaves appeared, and this time they unfurled. They were delicate and glossy and the most beautiful verdant green. I was filled with awe as they graced my space signifying new life and abundance. I also felt deeply unworthy to receive this gift of nature. I had done nothing to deserve it. The unfolding of my life had been so bleak that it was hard to accept even the offering of a tender leaf – something simultaneously ordinary and magnificent. I was disconcerted by this discomfort; it revealed a pathetic sense of self worth that was almost certainly responsible for the disastrous condition of my life. The delicacy of the new leaf reminded me to treat my heart tenderly. Blame is further vandalism of the soul and I did everything I could to avoid fuelling that particular inner anarchy.
Instead, I allowed the awe to seep into me. The magic of the leaf as it emerged on tender stem in a tight whorl that gently untwisted itself into a glossy platter cast a glow about the bathroom. Krishnamurti has much to say about meditating on nature. If we allow ourselves deep contemplation, the natural forms around us speak to the soul. He questions,
Have you ever actually seen a flower? I doubt it, because we do not really look at a flower; what we do is immediately to categorize it, give it a name, call it 'a rose', smell it, say how beautiful it is and put it aside as the already known. The naming, the classification, the opinion, the judgement, the choice – all those things prevent you from really looking at it.
Krishnamurti, Public Talk 1 Paris, France - 05 September 1961
I realised that my state of brokenness was exactly the right condition for meeting the new leaf with the grace that Krishnamurti is describing. I could barely remember what type of plant it was, I could just look and in looking I saw its wonder and beauty, transcendence, even.
Awe came to me as a gift like a torch amidst the rubble.
Even now when I look at the cheese plant, there is a sprinkling of fairy dust.
Last Sunday my Course in Miracles group was reading the section that includes, "Your worth is established by God. ... nothing you do or think or wish or make is necessary to establish your worth. This point is not debatable except in delusions." (ACIM, chapter 4).
How does this sit with you as you read it? Many of us carry unconscious wounding that makes confronting ourselves as divinely worthy, deeply painful. I cried when I read it, I cried after the meeting and I cried for most of the following week. Even though it is not an idea I am unfamiliar or in disagreement with, at this juncture in my life, it was discombobulating.
"The ego has built a shabby and unsheltering home for you, because it cannot build otherwise. Do not try to make this impoverished house stand." (ACIM, chapter 4)
"Humility is a lesson for the ego, not for the spirit. Spirit is beyond humility, because it recognises its radiance and gladly sheds its light everywhere." (ACIM, chapter 4)
I thought of the Monstera and how its tender leaf had revealed something transcendent to me when I felt especially worthless. Can I touch that same radiance within my own being while the worthless chimera is cavorting through the mind? It seems to me that our irrefragable luminosity is best approached by ignoring the ego's shabby constructions. Without the succour of our attention, they die and the death rattle frightens the ego and makes us feel very wobbly. I think this is what the psalmist is referring to when he describes the valley of the shadow of death. It is a path we must traverse but we are ambushed by nothing more dangerous than shadows. Krishnamurti exhorts us to look unflinchingly at death to find out what it is. As I look through the tears, I perceive a light, a torch amidst the rubble as the ego's house of cards implodes.
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