Fruit of Independence Day!

Happy July 4th everyone! As I type, I'm kicking it in the backyard sanctuary with Martin Luther King Jr's book, "Stride Toward Freedom," on my left and my journal on my right, and bloggin' it up in the middle! It's a good 4th so far. July's theme was the suggestion--fruit. This theme came up after we went on a wildflower walking meditation as a community. The flower fruit was popping and we were fortunate enough to soak it up in that moment in time. Brainstorming this theme of fruit, I'm pondering two aspects:

1) Fruit happens when natural order guides it into being. Natural law is always in the director's seat--for instance, take our lovely wildflower friends, no one plants them, waters them, or cares for them in any way, shape or form except creation/natural order (wind, rain, soil, sunshine, insects, etc). There is a natural cycle to the bearing of fruit.

2) Fruit happens when conscious effort has been applied. Wait, didn't I just say creation rules? Yes, indeed, and we are agents that either help it along or hinder it. No rain? Go get the watering can! If within us, with diligence and effort, we move towards goals, be them material, personal, or spiritual, our thoughts, actions and words will precipitate the development of fruit. Take one of my favorite Freedom Series peeps, Martin Luther King, Jr., by his non-violent ethics and sheer determination to uphold these principles, a nation and its people were transformed. He had conviction the fruit would ripen, even though with his efforts it had only begun to take seed.

This is a deep theme, ya'll! Be heartened, for it's summer and we're going to pop whether we like it or not and yet...I'll be getting up and finding a watering can if someone is in need. It's my day of independence as I commit to look closely at what I'm allowing to ripen without interference and what I'm consciously helping along or arresting based on my thoughts, actions and words. I feel a blessing coming on...

~By Their Fruits
Plant the seed, watch it grow--
Poison Oak or
Sunflowers?