The Lesson Revealed
Hello, fellow lovers of all things green,
It’s funny how often we think we know what gardens and nature are teaching us, only to discover later that they had something else in mind all along.
For more than a decade, I’ve been working on a book inspired by the wisdom my brother Bill shared before he passed away. You may know the story.
Marred with fungus yet still radiant.
It was during a particularly difficult season of my life. Out of the blue, Bill called. Never had he phoned in the middle of a workday, but he sensed my sadness.
I felt comforted by my soulful twin’s listening and the familiar sound of his breath. Bill asked if I had water nearby.
“Watch a leaf move through the water,” he said. “None of us has control over the current—a parallel to the ebbs and flows in our lives. Our goal is to trust and live calmly and serenely rather than resist the flow, like a leaf in the water.”
After our call, I walked along the Paulinskill River and watched a leaf dance through the current, lingering briefly near rocks before continuing downstream. As I followed its journey, peace came over me.
It was time to let go.
Bill’s wisdom became what I call The Lesson of the Leaf. It helped me through a divorce and later through losing Bill himself, followed by the long goodbye of our mother with dementia.
A Shift in Understanding
The Lesson of the Leaf began as a story about healing. Over time, it revealed a deeper truth: we were never meant to grow alone.
For years, I believed the book was about healing from loneliness and loss. Certainly, those themes weave throughout its pages. Like many people, I’ve experienced seasons of feeling alone, even while surrounded by family, friends, clients, and faithful four paws. But while revisiting years of columns and podcast episodes recently, something surprising emerged.
The focus shifted.
Or perhaps it finally revealed itself.
Observing nature and tending gardens can help heal and grow our lives. That is true. But perhaps the deeper lesson is how they do so—by reminding us that we are part of something larger.
We are part of a whole. Part of one Garden of Life.
Nothing Grows Alone
A forest may appear to be a collection of individual trees. Yet beneath the soil, roots and fungal networks share resources and information. A tree standing alone is not truly alone at all.
A lesson carried by the current: we may drift through different seasons, yet we remain connected to something larger than ourselves.
Leaves seem to separate when they drift from branches in autumn. Yet as they decompose, they return nutrients to the soil that sustains the very tree from which they came. And so they remain one with the tree. The cycle continues year after year.
Plants we admire in our gardens depend on relationships, too. Pollinators, soil microbes, neighboring plants, sunlight, water, and seasons all play a role.
Nothing grows by itself.
Neither do we.
As I reflect on fourteen years of writing this column and sharing discoveries through the podcast, I realize the same lesson keeps appearing.
The lesson was never only about healing.
The lesson was about remembering that we belong.
What Belonging Means
Belonging doesn’t mean life unfolds as we wish. Gardens experience drought, storms, pests, and unexpected losses. Relationships change. Seasons end.
Yet nature continually reminds us that we are part of something larger than ourselves. That is why time spent amongst the trees restores our hearts. The woods don’t ask us to prove our worth.
A rescue dog grows to trust us and love us. They don’t care about our degrees or accomplishments.
Neither does a garden.
They welcome us into a relationship.
Sometimes nature leaves reminders in plain sight: love and belonging may be closer than we realize.
During the final days of his life, after years of studying philosophy, spirituality, Tai Chi, and the natural world, Bill shared what he believed was the most important thing he had learned.
“I figured it out,” he said. “It’s all about love.”
It occurs to me that this is another way of saying we belong.
Our living world has been whispering the same message for centuries.
We are connected.
We matter.
We were never alone.
Thank you, kind readers and listeners, for sharing the Garden of Life all these years. It matters.
Garden Dilemmas? AskMaryStone@gmail.com or tune in on your favorite Podcast App.
Prefer to Listen?
This story is also a feature in this week’s episode of Garden Dilemmas, Delights & Discoveries, with additional reflections from the screen porch:
Related Blog Posts & Podcasts
Forest Bathing Helps Loneliness – Blog Post
Ep 34. Forest Bathing, Willowwood Champion Trees
Overview of the Lesson of the Leaf– Blog Post
Ep 180 Overview of the Lesson of the Leaf
From the Screen Porch
After recording this week’s podcast, I realized my voice had become emotional. I decided to leave it that way because the realization itself was emotional.
We do indeed belong.
Jolee and I are on one of our many woodland walks. Nature has a way of reminding us that we belong.
And I’m grateful for you, kind readers and listeners, who have shared this journey with me through fourteen years of columns and 255 conversations from the screen porch.
Speaking of growing, I began phase two of my vegetable garden this week. Green beans, zucchini, cucumbers, and sunflowers are now planted. The cucumbers may climb the sturdy sunflower stems later in the season. I love when those kinds of partnerships in the garden work out—one plant helping another thrive.
Meanwhile, despite my best intentions, I haven’t gotten around to mowing the lawn.
The clover seeds I sowed where construction disturbed the lawn are beginning to sprout, and the taller grass is helping shade the soil and hold moisture during this dry spring.
It struck me that there may be another lesson there. Sometimes growth happens because something else creates shelter. Young plants benefit from the protection of larger plants. Forest seedlings begin their lives beneath the canopy of mature trees—not because they are weak, but because they are growing.
Perhaps people are like that, too.
At different times in our lives, we find ourselves sheltered by kindness, wisdom, encouragement, and the love of others until we are strong enough to stretch toward the light ourselves. And then one day, we become the shelter for someone else. The cycle continues.
Just like the leaves.
Just like the forest.
Just like the Garden of Life. 🌻
