Ten Tips for Living a Fruitful Life From A Backyard Gardner

September 4, 2019 –

This article is not about radishes, peas, tomatoes, and corn. While these vegetables are tasty, if grown in your backyard, this article takes ten small steps I learned from backyard gardening and applies them to living a fruitful life.

  1.   PREPARE THE GARDENING SITE. The superior garden is the results of excellent preparation. Success and happiness are the results of much homework. Focus on preparing yourself for the next opportunity. “Sow righteousness for yourselves, reap unfailing love. Break up the unplowed ground for yourselves, for it is time to seek the Lord until he comes and showers deliverance on you.” (Hosea 10:12).
  2.   READ THE PLANTING DIRECTIONS ON THE SEED LABEL. A well-conceived set of directions for achieving personal satisfaction comprises two major components—your attitude toward life and your attitude toward others.
  3.   WEEDS AUTOMATICALLY GROW; YOU MUST CARE FOR VEGETABLES. Don’t defy this quirk of nature. Pull the weeds. Extract the naysayers from your project and don’t let them control your emotions.
  4.   DON’T FORGET THE FERTILIZER. Plants need nutrients. Do everything possible to strengthen yourself. Enthusiasm, like fertilizer, is worthless left in the container. You must spread it 
  5.   DON’T EXPECT THE SEED PLANTED TODAY TO BURST OUT TOMORROW. Growth is a process. Imagine the frustration and disappointment if you only think of the present. There is a future, and with it comes the reward of our efforts today. 
  6.   THE SEED YOU PLANT IS THE CROP YOUR HARVEST. Carrots produce carrots; radishes, radishes. Many people never a connection between what they do and what they get. The Bible says, “Do not be deceived: God cannot be mocked. A man reaps what he sows. (Galatians 6:7 
  7.   SMALL SEEDS CAN PRODUCE A LARGE CROP. Small incremental actions can form the basis of significant results. The ability to convert small steps into big achievements is the secret to inner happiness and outward success. “Though it (mustard seed) is the smallest of all seeds, yet when it grows, it is the largest of garden plants and becomes a tree, so that the birds come and perch in its branches.” (Matthew 13:32, NIV)
  8.   GARDENING DOESN’T TAKE MUCH TIME, AND THE BENEFITS ARE WELL WORTH THE EFFORT.“A garden” wrote Gertrude Jekyll “is a grand teacher. It teaches patience and careful watchfulness; it teaches industry and thrift.”
  9.   USE PLANT MARKERS, SO YOU’LL ALWAYS KNOW WHAT YOU PLANTED. Happiness begins with short-term goals to measure progress. Without markers to guide, there is a tendency to wander from the target. As with vegetables, you don’t want to be surprised by the outcome.
  10. GET GROWING. The underlying success steps to gardening and living a happy life is execution. The way to grow a garden (or business) is to quit talking and get growing. Success is the fruit, not the seed.