the illusion of scarcity

The first day I arrived, I was so happy to see all of the flowers on the trees and bushes. I love flowers. Great! I will have many flowers here. And then the little cousins came over and went straight up to the all those flowers and picked them all. I held myself back from asking them to stop. I hadn't been here for 9 months already, so I guessed they had gotten used to just coming and picking flowers whenever they needed them for the daily offerings. But all I could think of was that now I won't have any flowers for the offerings I planned on preparing tomorrow.

The next day when it was afternoon and time to prepare the flower offerings, I was surprised to see that I had enough flowers. Ha! Cool…I guess they didn't pick all of them. So I picked the minimum amount needed and left the rest so that I would have for tomorrow too.  But suddenly the auntie came walking over and casually picked the few flowers that I had purposely left for the next day! I thought that I had no right to tell her not to, and anyways it was too late, she had picked them in a moment. But instead of taking them, she just tossed them onto the basket of flowers I had just picked…for me. Oh gosh, what a waste…I could have managed with less. And now I won't have any for tomorrow.

But this morning I awoke, and found a slew of new flowers on all of the branches and shrubs that had been barren yesterday. I sat here looking out at the garden today trying to understand how it can possibly be that I pick all the flowers, and more grow? Before my very eyes! The same thing happened with the red hot chili peppers…I need about 10 a day to make spicy sambal for lunch. There are about 4 pepper plants that have chilis on them. As I took ten for lunch, I realized that if I keep doing this everyday, I will only have enough for 2 more days. What a pity…what can I do? But I decided to live for today, and just make the sambal that I need for now and figure it out when the time comes…at most I will buy them in the market. But when I went to pick another ten today….there were tons more new ones already on the bush!  And I realized that it is my illusion of scarcity. It has nothing to do with reality. Mother Nature is gives on demand, like a nursing mother. The more milk her babe needs, the more her body produces. My work is to treat Mother Nature with respect, gratitude, water her, give her the best conditions, and to make something of value and beauty and purpose out of her. She is there for our pleasure and wants to be in a relationship with us. Fear, worry, greediness, desire, are not part of the equation. She wants us to want her, to need her, to use her, to be in a relationship with her. She is abundant. We are allowed and even invited to live in abundance.