Don’t You Dare Go Near That Broccoli!

Last year I tried growing lavender from seed. I had dreams of floating through the garden in a pretty summer dress, stopping to give the lavender leaves and flowers a little squeeze and inhaling its ludicrously ravishing scent.

I don’t know if it’s just me, but the scent of fresh herbs makes me dizzy with delight.

So I sowed plenty of seeds in small pots and waited. And waited and waited. Not a single one of those seeds germinated. I was so disappointed. My lavender dreams were dashed.

This year I tried again. After a full month there was still nothing. Not even the tiniest green speck breaking the surface. I’d given up hope and planned on emptying the pots out onto the compost heap the following day.

Then the very next morning, as I scrutinised the various pots of earth on the windowsill, I noticed the first green leaves of a lavender plant. Tiny. Delicate. But there.

A few days later, a second seed germinated.

I felt like the queen of the whole wide world! If I were a queen, I’d definitely have a crown made of lavender.

Even though you know the seed has done exactly what it’s designed to do, somehow you’re still shocked when it happens.

What, you mean I can put this fleck of a black seed in this tiny pot of earth and it will become a lettuce I can eat?

You mean I can put this creamy white, silky smooth seed in another pot and it will become a plant that will climb and climb and produce green beans galore?

Gardening teaches you a lot about living. Sometimes, like with that first year trying to grow lavender, you do the work and sow the seeds and nothing happens. It’s disappointing and the disappointment can be hard to handle.

Other times, seeds germinate and grow into sturdy young plants, only to be decimated by those slimy slugs as soon as you plant them out in the garden. You wake up in the morning, skip outside to see how things have grown overnight, only to find that your entire crop of Romanesco broccoli has disappeared. (Successfully growing a Romanesco broccoli might be my number one gardening goal.)

But then there are the times when everything works. The seed germinates. The plant grows. The slugs keep their distance. The vegetables grow. You eat. Life is good.

All of this got me thinking about how ‘failures’ and disappointments, especially ones that are repeated over time, can erode our confidence, wear us down and lead to giving up on even trying.

You get your heart broken one too many times and give up on love.

You pour your heart and soul into a business idea that doesn’t work out and you decide you can’t do business.

You’ve been trying for months to master a new skill but can’t quite get it and you decide it’s just not meant for you.

When things don’t go as we hoped or planned, it’s natural to need a period of recalibration. We need time to heal, regroup, reflect and learn.

But wouldn’t it be oh so tragic if ‘failing’ stopped us from trying again? Stopped us from ever sowing another single glorious seed of possibility?

Imagine all the marvellous things we might miss out on if we stopped trying? If we thought it wasn’t worth sowing another seed?

Maybe there’s a point at which, in any story of failure, we need to shift our attention away from what went wrong last time and towards imagining how it might feel if we try again and succeed.

If we don’t allow ourselves the pleasure of envisioning a scenario where things go well, we’re unlikely to try again. And if we don’t try again, we condemn ourselves to living inside the story of our past failures.

So go ahead and imagine a beautiful relationship. Go ahead and imagine the business that works out. Go ahead and imagine the delight of mastering that new skill.

Oh, and imagine a garden brimming with lavender and you in your pretty dress and a crown upon your head.

Love and courage,

Leah