The Analogy: Consolidating Your Beliefs

Life is like potting up a plant.

If you pot up a plant by putting in some soil, then the plant, then filling up the sides with soil you get a droppy plant with no security for its roots. The plant will fall over, the roots will sometimes stick out the top, and as a general rule you will not have a very happy/healthy plant. You will also end up with lots of leftover soil that doesn’t go anywhere except for heaped up on your pot/plant and sometimes even covering part of the plant up!

The proper way to pot up a plant is to put in some soil, then the plant, then fill up your sides with soil. Then you need to pat it all down, then put some more soil in, then pat it down, then fill it up again. You will end up with a plant that stands up tall, who’s roots are well grounded and able to work through the soil. You won’t have any left over soil, and your plant will be happy and not hidden by anything!

How This is Like Life…

This is like life because if we go through floating around never stopping to think “What DO I think about this?” or re-evaluating our beliefs, ideals, goals or purpose, then we can run into a bit of a problem. Our roots won’t grow, they won’t become extablished. We will be easily picked out of our pots by small children, and we will get covered with all the extra soil which is life.

Life will just HAPPEN to us, and we won’t make a good go of it, we might get overwhelmed or loose direction.

Why Are You Telling Us This Talia?

Lately I have had to consolidate my life a little. Think about why I think what I do. What do I stand for? What do I agree with?

This has mostly had to do with work. What do I believe about eLearning, what do I believe about assessment. Why do we assess the way we do. What is valid assessment, what is best practice for eLearning? etc. etc.

I’ve had to think about it at home too.

What do I think about God, what purpose has he given me, when/how much time should I spend with him etc.

And also with the future. What are our plans, what are our time frames? What do we think about pregnancy, birthing, parental roles etc.  What do we want to do with our lives? Should I continue with my Masters? Should we move overseas, should we move to Tasmania, should we stay here? When should we do all of those things if we do do them? Will we ever be able to buy a house? Is financial security important to us? What is more important- children/our legacy or money/house. What does the future hold? Will all our dreams come true, or will we have to pick? If we do have to pick, which dreams will we choose? Who will have to compromise, and what will we be happy to compromise? What attitude do we need to have to make our marriage and our future together a success?

And as all of you Australia are (hopefully) aware, we have an election happening on the 21st of August, so I have to think about who I want to vote for, who do I want running the country (this is one of the main reasons for the whole moving to Sweden thing…), and which party’s belief’s best align with mine (this is what I’m having the most trouble with).

So yeah… heaps of stuff to think about lately!

My plan is to think through all these things that have risen to the surface in the last few weeks and decide on a bit of a plan for each of them. Do you want me to share them, or keep them to myself? I would love to know what you think about all these different things- it might give me a bit of a broad view so I can make the right decision for me!

All You Need Is Love...

So here’s a bit of tour of some of the new things in our garden!

Two types of lavender...

Lavender… one of my favourite smells…

Cute baby capsicum!

Capsicum… aren’t the cute?!

An itty, bitty watermellon!

Watermellon… Oh so tiny!

Cherry, Gormet, Yellow and Black Russian!

Many varieties of Tomato… These flowers will become little cherry tomatos!

The lemon (lemondae variety) is nearly ready to flower!

Lemon Tree… can’t wait to see what these flowers are like!

Zucchini flower... yum!

Zucchini… perfect for making lots of zucchini soup!