I just love how gardening relates to life. It’s been a beautiful, sunny day in the Pacific Northwest and I’ve been puttering in my garden on and off all day. My tomatoes have not been getting ripe very fast and so I decided to work with them a little and see what I could do since we only have about 4 weeks of summer type weather left to ripen as many tomatoes as I can. I got my pruning shears out and went to work. The tomatoes are all over the place and outgrew their super-sized, jumbo tomato cages many weeks ago. The plants have tons of foliage, 100’s of baby green tomatoes and lots of flowers for future tomatoes, but few tomatoes are ripening. I started by cutting back the tops of the plants, then I leaned over inside the tomato cages and pruned out lots of leaves. Next I cut back every branch that had flowers, but no baby tomatoes. I cut and cut until I could see through the cages. For my efforts I created a huge pile of green limbs, many with lots of little unripened green tomatoes still attached, and lots of leaves next to the now not-so overgrow plants. I know that with more air circulating around the tomatoes there will be fewer diseases and the fruit (baby tomatoes) will ripen sooner.
I think this is exactly how coaching helps us. Sometimes we get a little overgrown with all kinds of things that don’t help us work on what we want to happen in our lives. Sometimes we get distracted by our phones, Facebook, Netflix – or by feeling very busy – but not getting much done. We have all leaves and blossoms, and not very much fruit. Sometimes we need to get to work pruning away those distractions so we have space around us to actually concentrate on bringing our plans and dreams to fruition. For many women those dreams include losing weight and making our bodies healthier, clearing the clutter that we live in, doing more meaningful service, starting our own business, or anything else we’ve always wanted to do, but haven’t found the time.
I am a life coach for empty nest women who feel stuck and want to move toward the goals they’ve always meant to get to – but haven’t. I can help you identify your hidden dreams and perhaps prune away the things that are stopping you from producing what you want to become and share with your family or the world. Message me, I may be able to help you see things that may need pruning in your life.
I am Jennifer with JennieB Coaching and I help food, flowers and people grow.