Heart felt living and lessons learnt

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flower 01 || cityhippyfarmgirl

I was on a roll this week, a subtle heart-felt living roll. Speaking from the heart and acting on it, that’s how I generally try to live most days, well, until I was stopped quite abruptly mid roll by a small girl with a tiny flower.

So what do I mean by the term heart-felt living? To me it means running with the emotion; acknowledging them, the words, or the feeling that’s inside of you at the time. Letting it free, writing it out, speaking the words, acting on it (and sometimes seeing what becomes of it). Most of the time, absolutely nothing becomes of it, but you feel good for having done what was in your heart at the time.

A card sent, an invitation to dinner, a tiny message of thanks and enough honest hugs to squash into a basket, that’s how this week was looking.

I like doing this, I like living like this, and as I get older I feel like it’s an almost missed opportunity if I don’t. There is rarely anything to lose by not acting, and only to gain. A smile, a word, an email, a gesture, a new friend, an open opportunity, a free mind, the possibilities are quite endless, just as the follow on effect from these actions.

flower 02 || cityhippyfarmgirl

So how was a lesson learnt from a small girl wielding a tiny flower?

My girl has always given small bunches of flowers to her friends, both big and small. She’s done this from when she first learnt to walk. Since moving, that day-to-day list of social interactions for her and her posies of flowers have shortened…a lot. I knew that, I knew she missed her people.

So lately, sometimes she would start to give simple items of a drawn picture or a picked flower to people who caught her eye. Someone who had lingered with conversation or a friendly shop keeper, (I also got rather a lot of them.)

This week, an important conversation between one of my other kids stopped me from giving my undivided attention to the flowers being slowly added to in my hands, and repeated requests to give some flowers to the ‘shop seller’. I muttered no, and at the end I unthinkingly upturned the whole pile as we got up and headed to the shops. A tiny gasp was heard and a wash of guilt dripped over me.

With shopping basket full, we stand at the shop counter waiting. She turns to me whispering whether she can give the ‘seller lady’ a flower? In her small hand is holding a tiny perfect flower, one left, from the pile I had unthinkingly upturned earlier. I smile and nod and she gives it to the lady.

Oh thank you sweetie! Oh that’s so kind!…I’ve had such a bad day, and you’ve just completely made it for me! Thank you.

As she places the delicate petals behind her ear, my small girl beams. The shop lady beams and I let another little wash of guilt slide on over.

So what was my lesson learnt?

Heart felt living, definitely not just a solo act that adults take part in. Kids, I think do it instinctively, and then it’s slowly seems to be taken away by us adults (who might even be  unknowingly, trying to bring it back into their lives.)

Now that I’m paying a little more attention, In different ways I can see that it’s just as important to others around me as well.

So here’s to heart-felt living. To more impromptu dinner invitations and stopped conversations on the street. To hastily scribbled tiny notes of thanks, beaming smiles and happily, to more bunches of tiny little flowers to kind hearted people who catch your eye.

flower 03 || cityhippyfarmgirl

 

 

20 thoughts on “Heart felt living and lessons learnt”

  1. What a beautiful reflection Brydie on this sunday morning. One I’m definitely taking on board. The pictures of the flowers are -as always- stunning. They complement this story perfectly. Thanks for sharing this with us on your blog. Irene

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    • Thanks Irene, I think if your girls were a little closer there would be tiny flowers being cast in your direction as well.
      (The flowers are my first zinnia I’ve ever grown, watching them unfurl has been quite lovely.)

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  2. Just lovely ♥
    I read this post twice Brydie (also so I could look at your incredible photos again)! Your daughter sounds like a little darling. You’ve reminded me of the beauty of mindfulness, and the importance of a good old brain-shake now and again, to dislodge the unnecessary clutter that sits up there sometimes!

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  5. “Out of the mouths of babes…” Stevie-boy and I threw ourselves into a Permablitz yesterday. Listening, learning, working alongside people we had never met but whom, by the end of the day, we felt a distinct camaraderie, sharing lunch, taking cues, forging community and most importantly, feeling our way towards commonality. I guess we are all feeling our way towards commonality and we often forget that we are all doing this. Your beautiful daughter does it instinctively but most of us have to relearn that honest yearning to engage with, and delight a stranger. If you only learn one lesson this week, month, year. I think it just came from your daughter Ms Cityhippyfarmgirl 🙂

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    • Constantly learning Ms Narf, I think on a daily basis which is a pretty damn good thing too.
      That’s great your permablitz went well yesterday, you’ve made me think…I wonder if there are any happening in my new ‘hood’? Having yearned to be involved in them for years now, maybe, just maybe it might be the time? Off to look…

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      • I think the value of a collective group of relative strangers working together and forging community is incredible. The end results are nothing short of empowering for everyone involved. We are off to another one in April, and every Permablitz that we attend is another chance to help someone do something that they couldn’t have done easily themselves, to learn something from the designers that volunteer their time and energy to create a plan with the hosts and to learn HEAPS in the process (for the volunteer workers). We learned how to make a bush level out of sticks and a rock and some baling twine. How to box lash it all together and how to use that level to create contours and swales and redirect water flow passively from rainfall, to fruit trees. Twas very enlightening. I think the most powerful thing that we all got from the day was the power of community and how much a collective group of like minded people can achieve together. It would also make a most AWESOME blog post. Still writing mine up 🙂

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  6. Hi Brydie, I have read your blog for years and even though your words compel me to come back time and time again I’ve never left a comment. But today your words made me cry big heart full sobs, maybe its hormones or maybe its the most simplest acts that has pulled at this mumma’s heart strings today?? I think it might just be the latter today, thank you for sharing xx

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    • Bec I’m thrilled that you left a comment after all this time, and if my words struck a cord with you even better. It’s funny this post, I almost didn’t publish it for lots of different reasons. Honest words on the internet can often feel a little too exposing sometimes. I’m not pleased I made you cry, but I’m pleased that my words resonated, and maybe your reaction was just perfectly… heart felt?
      (I also really hope you comment again some time :-))

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  10. A lovely reminder of the kindness we all want. Your story gave me a little flower from far away. There are little purple crocuses poking their tiny heads up in my garden, if I could I’d give your little one a flower, a smile, and a big thank you!

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  12. That is beyond beautiful! Thank you for the reminder Brydie. I have been so consumed with getting to the end of an awful work situation, I have forgotten to show love and gratitude like your little one giving a flower. Noted! 🙂

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