Separate Together

I was on a field trip with my son yesterday and I saw something that made me pause and think. Yes I know many things do that to me but humor me. We were at a nature preserve hiking on the trails and learning about various scientific aspects of nature. We learned about rocks and their formation. We studied trees, plants, insects, and animals in the wild.

While we were walking on a particular trail called “California Trees” I noticed something very strange. These trees were enormous. Not young ones. They had lots of foliage and seemed full and healthy. They had been there a while. No that is not what was strange. What I was bothered by was how they grew in relationship to where they grew.

Follow me on this.

Trees that were alone grew full and round. They had branches popping out on all sides and they had branches that were long and had full foliage on them. This is what we expect to see when we look at a tree. Just like when we pick a Christmas tree we want one well shaped and full all the way around. These lonely trees were just like that.

Now the trees that were growing right next to each other were not full and round and robust. When you stood in the middle and looked directly up you could see there were almost no branches growing inward toward each other. None of any significance. The only strong branches were outside growing away from each other. Now I could see how a person could look at that picture and say “see, they are each doing their part, complimenting the other. Together they are single full tree.”

I say no. They look like they had their backs to each other. They hardly touched. There was no real physical connection. There was almost no intertwining or sense of intimacy. They looked like they were stunted and were only allowed to grow where the other was not interfering. Like two halves of an unconnected puzzle. It was sad to see.

Too often we live like that. Each of us there in the house doing what we know we should do to make things look full and rounded out. Taking up slack and doing our part. Merely existing in close proximity to the other half of our partnership. Not fully involved with each other. Just doing what we need to in order survive. Missing out on so much.

Why is that? Why do we allow that? Why do we sit idly by while our lives roll on with so much less than we deserve from our relationship? Or have we just gotten tired of trying to make that deep heart-felt connection? Or are we tired of being the only one still concerned with the state of the relationship?

HEARTWORK: Brainstorm this idea yourself. Take a look at how your branches are growing. Are they reaching toward your partner in an attempt to grow together or do they grow away from them? Analyze that answer. We will be back to revisit this idea.

brainstorminglife@yahoo.com