Finding Purpose in Pain: The dark side of harvest

It is that time of year. I have my cup of chai tea warming my hands as I sit on my patio looking out at the golden rays of sun slanting across the back yard and highlighting the shriveling vines in my garden which are begs for the fall digging, clipping, and gathering. It’s finally a quiet moment, after the turmoil in the trees this morning of birds and squirrels fighting over acorns. As I look over my garden, even though there is an abundance of vines and green leaves, I notice there is very little to be gathered in. Sometimes life is that way too. Sometimes you end up harvesting an abundance of…hard. 

Lean in close friends, because I’m about to share what the failing seasons of life are trying to teach you…

As the seasons change, our gardens invite us to pause and take a look back, to reflect on what has grown, and what has not. And what God might be trying to show us through it all. Because before we can plant new dreams, we need to do the same kind of evaluation any garden designer does before they begin. Deep breath, friend, because sometimes it can be scary to take a look into our lives at what didn’t grow. IF your year were a garden, what would it look like right now? Would you see rows of thriving plants heavy with fruit? Are you hauling in mountains of beautiful pumpkins and produce for all the cute decor at every farmers market within a 50 mile radius? 

Yeah, me either. 

As I walked around a gorgeous farmers market that was bursting at the seams with pumpkins and gourds of every shape and size last weekend. I planted pumpkins this year. ..They didn’t grow. Sometimes that comparison can be hard. But my little girl was drawn to a small basket of gourds that was tipped over on its side with the gourds spilling out and she was laughing with delight over all the warty, ugly gourds. You know the ones I’m talking about right? The ones we only grow in order to use weird decor? I’m not really sure you can eat them, I don’t know. But maybe your little basket of gourds are warty, scarred, or diseased. Maybe your garden has patches of dry soil, wilting leaves, and empty spaces where something once had promise, but never quite took root? This is the season to walk the garden of your life and take inventory. But do it without judgement. Like a gardener, this is just data. 

Matthew 13:24-30 says

“24 He put another parable before them saying ‘The kingdom of heaven is like a man who sowed good seed in his field; 25 but while men slept, his enemy came and sowed tares among the wheat and went his way. 26 But when the grain had sprouted and produced a crop, then the tares also appeared. 27 So the servants of the owner came and said to him, ‘Sir, did you not sow good seed in your field? How then does it have tares?’ 28 He said to them, ‘An enemy has done this.’ The servants said to him, ‘Do you want us then to go and gather them up?’ 29 But he said, ‘No, lest while you gather up the tares you also uproot the wheat with them. 30 Let both grow together until the harvest, and at the time of harvest I will say to the reapers, “First gather together the tares and bind them in bundles to burn them, but gather the wheat into my barn.”

Now is the time we are going to collect the harvest. Bundle the weeds for burning, which reminds me of the incident 2 weeks ago when I was burning weeds but the mountain of weeds was so high, it took forever to get the fire lit and when I did, it made such a smokey stinky mess, it prompted the neighbor to holler over the fence, ‘everything alright back there?’ to which I replied, ‘yep! We’re good, it's just stinky weeds!” hah!

But after the sorting of the weeds, we’re going to gather the harvest of what was good, and bundle it up and take inventory.

So ask yourself, no really. Get a journal and answer these questions:

What plans failed to bloom this year?

What areas left me feeling dry, weary, or disappointed?

What weeds like doubt, fear, or busy-ness choked out my growth?

Sometimes. The hardest part of the harvest season is facing the truth. That not everything grows the way we hoped. But ya’ll even failed crops carry wisdom. 

One of the ladies I like to listen to on my podcast playlist, Patrice Washington, from the Redefining Wealth podcast says “I don’t take L’s. I take lessons.” (Yes, I’m aware that it also starts with the letter L. But you know what she means.)

Every hard season holds a seed of potential in the form of a lesson. Maybe that hard season is really refinement of you or your purpose in disguise. Maybe it was a goal you never reached. Maybe it was the feeling that you did all the right things, and still came up empty. Can you relate?

You might be tired of living on autopilot, tired of giving your all to everyone else, tired even of chasing purpose, but feeling more lost, the harder you try. This is the pain I see in women who come to the Sonshine Academy. The pain of spiritual exhaustion. It’s a pain I’m familiar with. The pain of working so hard in the garden, year in and year out, and coming up empty handed with nothing to show for it.

Have you ever quoted 1Kings 19:4?

But he himself went a day’s journey into the wilderness, and came and sat down under a broom tree. And he prayed that he might die, and said, “I have had enough! Now, Lord, take my life, for I am no better than my fathers!”

Yeah, me too.

But here is what I tell every woman I work with: There is nothing wrong with you. You are probably just trying to bloom in the wrong place. OR your soil is depleted. 

In gardening, and in life, failure isn’t a sign of defeat. It’s data. Every wilted leaf tells a story. Every dry patch points to a need. 

And sidenote, if for you it’s about the struggle and the feeling that no matter how hard you work, you can never get ahead, then my engineering background is about to rescue you. Let’s think about that loaded, heavy wheelbarrow for a moment.

You see, the struggle and striving to move forward has to happen before any motion can occur. When you get all the parts of a wheel turning in the same direction, before it can move, the moment before it starts to move, it must exceed the push-back force of friction. So if you are in a friction season, where you are feeling the heat of the rub, but seeing no movement forward, just know that this means you are at the pivotal moment before things really start turning. You may have to reach deep down inside to pull up just a little bit more to get the little bit of extra push in order for the forward momentum to exceed the friction. But if you are experiencing friction, that also means that you are, or are about to move forward. A wheel cannot go anywhere without friction. If your life doesn’t have friction, well friend, you’re not going anywhere.

Maybe that might make you feel a little bit better when you hop on social media and you see everyone else's pictures of just how perfect their life is going, how easy their life is. If their life is really that easy and that perfect, and that thriving and abundant, well, it means they’re not going anywhere. 

So instead of judging yourself, let’s get curious. What is your pain revealing?

What did you need to learn about yourself, or what did you learn about yourself?

What did you learn about God and what you truly need?

What do you never want to repeat again?

The answer to the last is a really great insight. You see, often when setting goals, it’s easy to identify what we don’t want. Rather than what we do want. So if that’s the case, great! Start there. Then you can take the opposite phrase to form your goals.

So if there is something you never want to repeat again, what is the opposite of that? What actions would be opposite? What goal would be opposite?

These reflections are the beginning of growth because once we can name the pain, we can start to make a plan with the help of the Master Gardener. And THAT is when transformation begins.

Let yourself feel the ache, the fatigue, the longing for something more. Make space for those feelings to live. 

Why?

Because if we shove it all down and hustle harder or rush past, we miss the depth of living. This honesty is an abundant harvest of its own kind. If you're ready to stop spinning your wheels and never getting anywhere. Feeling the heat of the friction and feeling frustrated by never getting anywhere. If you are tired and fatigued to your very bones, or just coming up empty after doing all the things, then this is your invitation to join me inside the Sonshine Academy. Where we will rebuild the garden of your life from the ground up. From seeds of purpose, to blossoms of joy and happiness with your everyday life, we will partner with the Master to create a life where you look forward to the morning sun and the sound of little feet pattering down the hallway with the energy of 1,000 horses, knowing that you have rhythms and space for whatever the day brings. 

If you want to get started right away with a morning that will change everything for you, then the Morning Rhythm Reset is for you. It’s not just another morning routine printable that becomes yet another item on your to-do list you’ll feel guilty for not doing. It’s a rhythm created in partnership for YOUR life. All for the price of the amount of coffee you consume in 1 day.

Harvest is a time when farmers call in the help to gather the food in before things start breaking down and prep for the next season of planting. It's perfectly normal to need and to ask for help. If that's you, just ask me! I love helping and I am here to lend a hand. 

 

Joyfully,

Aurie