Life Lessons from the Flower Garden: Pruning

Hi there! I’m back with more “Life Lessons from the Flower Garden” and today we’re talking about pruning.

A lot of flower plants require some level of pruning, or selective cutting, in order to thrive and encourage new and healthy growth:

Some plants just drop their own dead flowers. 

Some you gotta give a little shake to get the dead flowers off

For some plants, you have to cut off the dead flower to encourage new ones to grow. 

But some plants will just kinda keep growing out or up. They’re full of flowers, but they’re really leggy and gangly. 

In this case, you have to cut a perfectly lovely flower in order to keep the plant as a whole as healthy as possible. This can feel counter-productive. Don’t you take care of the plant to have flowers? Having flowers is a sign of a healthy plant, right?  Yes, but it will be healthier, more efficient with its energy, and eventually, give you more flowers if you can prune some of these “gangly” flowers. 

So in order to optimize your bloom, you have to be checking in on all your plants frequently to see which flowers, dead or alive but gangly and ready to be cut. 

So take a moment to check in on your life garden. Whats getting your sunlight?  Where is your time and energy going? Is there anything that’s clearly no longer working for you that’s ready to go?

How about something “gangly” that  on the surface looks like is working, but is actually draining energy and preventing you from becoming your best and fullest version of yourself?

Sometimes the best way to let something grow is to let something go.

PS…I know it can be hard to cut those gangly flowers! Just do a little at a time, and don’t worry… You can put them in a vase and enjoy them at home, or make a little flower crown so they’re not going to waste!

(PSS… thanks to my mom for teaching me what to prune and when. I had some pretty gangly plants last year haha!)