BENGALURU: If you are a gardener, you know that gardens do best when they are properly cared for. You also know the one basic truth: You could plant all the seeds you want, but you cannot really force them to germinate. The one thing we can predict though is that the seed we plant will grow only into itself – a tomato seed won’t become a basil plant.
If you planted tomatoes and suddenly find basil sprouting up, it means that this new plant came up from seeds that were there already in the first place. What does that have to do with love, you ask?
Think of it: You go about doing small things for the person you love. You plant lots of seeds and expect that they germinate into a nice little garden of love. Occasionally though, an action from your side that you expected to have a certain kind of result, ends up bringing something else altogether. A volunteer plant, so to say, that grows up alongside what you planted.
You might have surprised your loved one with a box of macaroons. You expected smiles of joy, maybe a hug. What if you get tears instead? Was it your action that caused this? No. Your action triggered something else – a different seed possibly came there by accident, from somewhere in the past.
Would you get offended that a different plant has voluntarily sprung up when you planted tomatoes? You would likely not.
Can you do the same when there is an unexpected reaction for something in a relationship? Can you see that these may not be about you at all? That they are random seeds germinating – perhaps an old memory, a story handed down by parents, something religion or tradition has planted. Can you then see if this is valuable or not and act accordingly, instead of blaming?
(The author is a counsellor at InnerSight).