Dinner, peach and cherry salad. An offering of sorts to the peach tree whose fruit, dried before it reached its full bloom.
The previous year the fruit’s harvest came in the form of two and half baskets of peaches and a couple of lessons to hold on to.
1. Embrace the journey, it’s all a process.
2. Prune the limbs in your life. Look at each area and assess what no longer works.
What had happened was… I had branch snap due to the weight of the peaches, meaning the limbs weren’t pruned and supported in a way that would carry the weight of the fruit produced. Additionally, the peaches needed more time on the tree to become sweet and ripe.
At that time, I was reminded, support early on in a process matters, from community to the systems we establish for ourselves.
The night I made this peach and cherry salad… I wrote
“Tonight, I feel withered, like my peach tree—dry on the inside. Why is it only when I finally slow down to care for myself that storms, in this instance, a breakdown in communication come blowing through?, I was feeling withered kind of like my peach tree’s journey this year.
The break in communication left me asking myself
“When am I going to see the tangible results of the work I’m doing?”
Bushy leaves and withered peach pits are all I saw this year.
I checked in early spring, admiring a blossoming tree filled with tiny peach buds ready to make their way into the world. I trimmed a few branches late spring, anticipating the weight of the tree’s budding fruit. “I won’t let it weigh you down this year” I thought. Remembering the limb I tried save last year.
I vowed I’d be prepared this year.
Yet, early summer I forgot to check on her and so the heat ravaged her budding fruit unbeknownst to me. Drying each peach pit up one by one.
My peach tree needed me to do my part. When the rain didn’t come to quench her thirst, I didn’t have her back with a hose or gallons of fresh water. When the 90+ degree heat beat her down on consecutive days, I didn’t recall the joy, her fruit had provided in the previous season. She wasn’t top of mind.
Today I think about what practice I want to put in place so that my peach tree is a priority. I have its back in each season. How can I ensure that she blooms and produces fruit each year?
I’ve taken the first step to research the necessary practices that my peach tree needs in each season and placed reminders on my calendar for the task the need to occur.
Nature often is my greatest teacher, reminding me of relationships, particularly the one I have with myself.
Through metaphor and reflection, I ask these questions:
- What results or fruit are you looking for?
- What practice do I have in place to tend to the seeds I’ve planted?
Our part in the practice is necessary to see it through to bloom.
It doesn’t require perfection, but it might require slowing down, listening and determining what practices need to be nurtured and prioritized in our life.
These stories I share are meant to be a compass, to help you connect to what feels genuine and true to you, to share a bit of the process of my current practice of integration.
A process I use as a guide is to pause, listen and practice. It has been the catalyst for almost everything I have been able to achieve in my life.
Pausing has looked like journaling, taking walk and talks and being coached. Creating space to pause has allowed me to cultivate a relationship with myself that fosters awareness, observation, reflective inquiry and integration. In this space I’m learning to listen and tune in to what I see or hear so that I can explore, learn and cultivate practices that nourish.
Here are a few prompts and practices that could help you cultivate the relationship with yourself:
Pause :
- What does pausing look like to you?
- What’s important about pauses?
- What area of your life might benefit from from a taking an intentional pause to listen more closely to what you need?
Here are a few ways to pause if this concept feels unfamiliar to you
1. Journaling: Use the prompts to free write for 5-10 minutes. Write whatever comes to mind. If you get stuck or wander off say just that and keep writing.
Text within this block will maintain its original spacing when published
Journaling is like listening to oneself and whispering at the same time. – Elmhurst
Allow yourself the space to hear what is ruminating without judgement or expectation. If you veer from the prompts, it’s okay. Allow yourself to let go of what’s lingering on your mind and gently return to the prompt.
There's beauty in the rambling
Space to sloth through
Sift through uncertainties
The Hard to articulate
Here we find comfort in the ambiguity
We find a thread
To Tug – Follow- Pull- Be lead by
Introverted idiosyncrasies
- Walk and Talk: Take a walk in nature and voice record your answers to these questions. Walk before you begin to talk this through with yourself. Here is a ted talk I listened to, Olemzpaa mentions how walking nurtures creative thinking.
Ted Talk : Want to be more creative? Go for a Walk!
Listen
Listening is a skill that is honed. Learning to filter through the noise versus your intuition can take time.
- What themes did you notice? Did you repeat a specific word or phrase multiple times? What is important about that phrase?
- What did you learn from what you wrote or said?
- What obstacle did you encounter during this process?
Practice
Practice is about implementation and integration.
- How can you make practical what you’ve learned?
As a coach I often walk my clients through this process and hold space for them to create practices that come from within. Why? I believe the best advice often comes from within. Allowing ourselves pause and listen helps connect the dots. It cultivates space to hear, talk through and find a thread to pull and cultivate a practice that supports where you want to go and how you want to be.
Next year maybe I’ll write about the practices I put in place to support my peach tree.
Hi, I’m Chris, a writer, coach, and story-keeper I explore the subtle lessons that arise in everyday moments. Through personal narratives, reflective inquiry, and everyday practices, I create space to slow down, listen and explore gentle practices with curiosity and connection in mind.
My work blends my studies that center all things food, nutrition and public health, while learning to weave in my personal experiences rooted in self-care and creativity. My desire is to inspire you to nourish yourself deeply.
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