The Importance of Compost

In a culture fascinated with productivity, completion, neatness, and basically keeping everything on and running and growing 24/7, it can feel a little abnormal to let things die.

Or to let them simmer. Or to let them take the back seat. To let fields lie in fallow, to let the moldy onion rot into new soil. In contrast to “always on” culture, nature moves in cycles. And every part of the cycle plays a role, has a purpose, and is a wonder in its own right.

Being able to transform confusing or difficult or painful things be opportunities, rather than relegating them to simply ” ___ ” is powerful. One of the favorite concepts I learned in regenerative agriculture is that there is no waste, there is only a lack of imagination.

You can turn anything yuck into anything yum – and you’ll find, that’s actually the course of nature. Oftentimes, there’s nothing even for you to do. Just put the rotted stuff on the compost and let it decompose into nutrients for your new flowers one day next spring. It will. Trust.

💩 doesn’t need your help to break down and find new life. There are bazillions of invisible bacteria and fungi and bugs and other microscopic creepy-crawlers that will enjoy the 💩 out of what you release. Let those beings live and let them do what they’re made to do. What you think as 💩 is a gift for someone else: including the weird, yucky, sticky, even evil things that seem to have no place or purpose. Switching your perspective from seeing it as a burden or liability, to seeing it as an opportunity or an asset – whether for you, or for someone else who’s into that, makes all the difference. In nature, there are no rules to follow; there are only roles to fill. Energy is neither created nor destroyed, it just takes a new shape. If there’s an energy in your awareness you don’t value anymore, give it the opportunity to show you what it can become.

One response

  1. […] Sometimes we think we know how something should be but then when we go to make it we find out that’s actually not right at all… and what a WONDERFUL thing to discover, right? Sometimes we can change the scaffolding around the thing we are growing, just ever-so-slightly, and that mini course correction puts us exactly back on track. Other times it’s better to scrap it altogether, then let whatever is still alive grow back fresh. Either way, we should never underestimate The Importance of Compost. […]

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