Look Closer for Hope

A couple of weeks ago, I became inspired to feng shui my house. The biggest area that needed improvement was my front door. Your entranceway is supposed to be “the mouth of Chi,” where you welcome in opportunity. Since my front door is also in the north, that’s the career area of my home. According to the feng shui map, I was supposed to put something blue there. Looking at sample photos of post-feng shui front doors, they all had big pots of beautiful, green plants next to them.

“Hmm,” I mused out loud, as I looked around my house and yard. There was a blue pot of mint in the garden out back, but it was three-quarters dead from this summer’s heat. That was not the energy I wanted for my career space, never mind at my front door. But I didn’t have anything else. This would have to do until I could get something better.

I lugged the big pot to my front porch and set it down next to my front door. Carefully and meticulously, I pulled out all of the dead, brown stems and picked off all of the yellow, spotted leaves. It still didn’t look completely healthy, but it looked a lot better. I sprinkled some shiny, turquoise glass beads into the pot, gave it a good watering, and left it alone.

I never did go get a replacement plant; too much has been going on logistically and emotionally over the past two weeks. Specifically, I’ve been struggling with hope. As I launch my new career, I have to work hard every day to stay optimistic and patient. Each solo Saturday night, I breathe out the loneliness as I remind myself that my true love will arrive. With the upcoming presidential election, I’m choking down fear for this country’s future. And Superstorm Sandy makes me fret about the effects of Global Warming and whether there will even be a habitable Planet Earth in the not-so-distant future.

This morning, I checked on my mint plant. As I stood looking at it from a few feet away, it looked even more yellowed and dead than before. “Oh, great, that does not bode well for my career space,” I fretted. But then I noticed two fresh, green shoots with new, bright leaves amongst the death and decay. I bent down over the plant and looked into the middle: the entire bottom of the soil was carpeted with tiny, burgeoning mint leaves, all fresh, healthy, and bright; some of them just barely poking through the soil.

I smiled. From the outside, things looked hopeless. But when I took the time to look closer, all I saw was new growth and promise. I picked away more of the dead stems and leaves to make space for the new shoots. With each withered piece I pulled out, I assigned to it something “dead” and no longer helpful that I wanted to clear out of my own life, including unsupportive people and my own negative thoughts and attitude. I watered it again and gave it a pat. I was eager to see how my mint plant would look in another two weeks.

So, if your life feels bleak right now, and you’re starting to lose hope, perhaps you just need to stoop down and look closer. The best of what’s to come may still be beneath the soil.