Have you ever felt you don’t know where the last 6 months have gone?  You ask yourself “where did the time go?”, “where have I been racing around to?”…ploughing through work, being bombarded, exploding wardrobes, comfortable accommodation, mobile phones, iPads, night clubs, family events and weekends away – it all just seems like one big blur sometimes!

Have you ever felt like you just needed some space or time out?  Life without space can become chaotic and it is not only your own space that gets compromised.

Most often than not we as individuals are unable to personally allocate or locate space for ourselves and we unconsciously go treading into other peoples space often treating it with disrespect. Sometimes all we need to do is just be clean and de-clutter our lives to find the space.

We all need space to grow, just like in a Garden we plant trees and flowers a particular distance apart to prevent overlap, clutter and distress. Space encourages growth may it be for a plant or for us as human beings.

At our monthly meet-up in April we used the metaphor of a garden to represent your inner space, relating to an earlier compassion series where we spoke about intentions and planting seeds of personal intention. To enable your seed to grow in your garden, you will need to identify your fertilizers and Weeds.

Your fertilizers are positive actions or people who will uplift and nurture your growth. Your weeds or rubbish are things that are preventing you from growing. Take a pen and paper and by yourself or with a friend (always helps to have a co-gardener) Plant or locate your seeds of intention and identify your weeds and your fertilizers. For example my intention is to make more personal time for myself, a Weed for me would be my inability to say No when asked to do things or hang out.  A fertilizer would be to be more time managed. So from there my action plan would be learn to respect myself by saying No when I really cant do something and learn to find a gentle way of saying No. Secondly, perhaps get a diary or calendar to schedule my days and allocate downtime for myself.

It starts with your own inner space – taking the time even if its just 5 minutes a day to just breathe, take a break and stop, get off this conveyer belt we call life and just breathe. Start cultivating your inner garden, clean up any rubbish or dirt, pull out the weeds, identify what is good for you and what can be improved.

If we are able to create the space between ourselves and emotions/ reactions we can soon be what we call observers. Where we can observe our actions and responses and become more mindful and ultimately more accepting of where life may take us!

Our next Compassion series will be about protecting your Garden from external impacts.