Weeding is the perennial chore, but perhaps the most essential, as weeds compete for the resources that our ornamental and edible plants need to survive and thrive – weeds deplete water, nutrients and in several cases even light. I think of it not so much as a tiresome chore but as vigilance in my intent to have a healthy and awesome garden – and by awesome I don’t just mean beautiful, I mean awe-generating.

The old Gardener’s proverb of ‘One year’s seeding, seven years weeding’ reminds us of how important vigilance is when it comes to keeping on top of the pernicious. So too with our prejudices and false or flawed assumptions – about ourselves or about others. Weed those with equal care and let your soul and higher spirit flourish. Weed those negative opinions and unhealthy beliefs with equal diligence and let the resources of your mental energy and ‘better self’ go toward cultivating more compassion, more loving kindness and stronger interconnection.

To weed negative thoughts is to let them be uprooted, not let them root down deeper. We can acknowledge the negative thought, let it come to the surface, recognize it is negative and let it be discarded. Just as we have practiced letting thoughts arise and pass in meditation, so too with negative thoughts in our daily life, we simply won’t attach ourselves, feed it or favour it. Let it come to the surface, exposed now to the light and reality, divested of your energies and concern.. they will wither on their own. Even the stubborn, repetitively sprouting ones will eventually succumb.