I’ve spent the better part of the day gardening. The mulch was delivered on Saturday, and after a busy weekend of sporting events and other kid-center activities, I thought I’d use my quiet Monday to spread it around. The garden path and the area surrounding it shown in this photo used to be grass until I pulled it out of the earth at the end of last summer.

I garden because I love plants and Nature. I love being outside with my hands mingling with the earth. I garden to heal. Today, while I was mulching my new garden area, I tugged the unwanted weeds out of my path. While working on the grass that likes to return each year with my Vinca, I was reminded of the tenacity of energy–that unless we dig out the roots, it will return anew.

Any gardener will be familiar with this concept. We can mow down new growth, we can nip its buds and we can give it a good trampling, but unless we dig deep and pull out the roots, the growth will most likely return in time. I believe all healing must lead to the root, and that this is why dis-ease in its myriad forms returns or consumes. Unless we get to the origins of the growth and heal or remove it, the energy will persist.

Last night I dreamed I was back in college, moving into a basement room in a dormitory I once lived in called “The Tower.” The tower was much taller and larger than it was in reality, and my little basement dream room was crumbling around the foundation and windows. There were large gaps where the cold air was seeping through, and no adequate light for which to share the space with houseplants.

After reading my previous posts, you will know that I have been healing, layer by layer, the energy of my past. Through this process, I have had to return to my roots, which are meant to provide stability–a strong foundation for the structure of the self, and the family. I have been digging up my roots, and the old foundation that once sustained life as I knew it, is crumbling. It was, after all, not a healthy life. I was ridden with dis-ease and secrets and suffocated by silence.

My tower is crumbling at the base. As I shed the fiery crown of patriarchy that ruled my early life, I see the gaps left behind in my foundation of self. The stability of the old structure has been compromised, as it makes way for the new, true self to emerge. The holes need to be filled with the energy of the true self. The green growth needs to be nurtured and coaxed out of the shadows.

I have, in essence, chosen the path of the orphan, but one can say that we all travel a similar path to healing the true, whole self. We must shed the roots that tangle and regrow unwanted energy in order to grow the complete being of our individual truth. It is the path of life that we are all on, it’s only the nature of the roots that differ.