Wednesday, December 31, 2008
Tuesday, December 30, 2008
Monday, December 29, 2008
Greenhouse in 2009!
I can barely contain myself -- I ordered a greenhouse that will be delivered after the first of the year!
A GREENHOUSE!
I have yearned for a greenhouse since I was a sophomore at Michigan State taking "Horticulture for Non-majors" and fell in love with that loamy, fresh smell inside the glass houses. Even though I have had gardens and more gardens since then, I have always pooh-poohed the idea of buying a greenhouse a being 1) too extravagant 2) unnecessary 3) undeserved.
Well prompted by a Costco sale email, I did some (more) research and found that the greenhouse they had on sale was indeed a good one. But I found it cheaper at another site with free shipping!
Details tomorrow, but I can tell you this: I WILL be teaching organic veggie gardening this year at GardenSpirit...and I am SO excited!
A GREENHOUSE!
I have yearned for a greenhouse since I was a sophomore at Michigan State taking "Horticulture for Non-majors" and fell in love with that loamy, fresh smell inside the glass houses. Even though I have had gardens and more gardens since then, I have always pooh-poohed the idea of buying a greenhouse a being 1) too extravagant 2) unnecessary 3) undeserved.
Well prompted by a Costco sale email, I did some (more) research and found that the greenhouse they had on sale was indeed a good one. But I found it cheaper at another site with free shipping!
Details tomorrow, but I can tell you this: I WILL be teaching organic veggie gardening this year at GardenSpirit...and I am SO excited!
Thursday, November 13, 2008
Autumn at GardenSpirit
Camellias.
Until I moved to North Carolina, I'd never really known much about them.
Now they are my favorite fall bloom. And winter bloom. And early spring bloom.
These gorgeous puffy flowers started blooming two weeks ago - Snowstorm, I believe is the name of the cultivar - with double white frothy flowers sprinkled in between the rich glossy green leaves. Ah.... it makes me want to to look at them again just for a moment.
Yes, they are as beautiful as in my mind's eye.
Not that spring and summer flowers aren't beautiful. It's just so unexpected to find something thriving, bursting into life, when everything else had faded. Even the brilliant leaves have passed their prime. The branches are more bare than adorned today. Perhaps that's why I don't love fall the way some people do. I crave the potential of new seedlings and raw earth.
So, today, I will drink in the sassy I-dare-you-to-freeze-my-blossoms camellias. Knowing that we all bloom in our own right and perfect time.
Until I moved to North Carolina, I'd never really known much about them.
Now they are my favorite fall bloom. And winter bloom. And early spring bloom.
These gorgeous puffy flowers started blooming two weeks ago - Snowstorm, I believe is the name of the cultivar - with double white frothy flowers sprinkled in between the rich glossy green leaves. Ah.... it makes me want to to look at them again just for a moment.
Yes, they are as beautiful as in my mind's eye.
Not that spring and summer flowers aren't beautiful. It's just so unexpected to find something thriving, bursting into life, when everything else had faded. Even the brilliant leaves have passed their prime. The branches are more bare than adorned today. Perhaps that's why I don't love fall the way some people do. I crave the potential of new seedlings and raw earth.
So, today, I will drink in the sassy I-dare-you-to-freeze-my-blossoms camellias. Knowing that we all bloom in our own right and perfect time.
Saturday, May 10, 2008
Friday, March 21, 2008
Genesis of GardenSpirit revealed
Finding me, finding you
By Linda Roggli ©2006
I had everything a successful entrepreneur could ask for: a corner office with big windows that offered a view of the treetops, national awards on the wall, great employees and happy clients. So why did I cry every morning on the drive to work, dry my tears in the parking lot, paste on a smile and steel myself for another day?
The “stuck-ness” of life had ensnared me. I knew my company was killing me, ever so slowly. For two years I had fought off the distant urge to close the doors and walk away. But my employees needed me. The chamber of commerce had given me a plaque inscribed “1997 Micro Business Person of the Year” (which reflected the size of my company, not my physical stature). Who else would give my clients the tender loving care and attention that my company did? I had responsibilities, obligations, duties, an image to uphold (and quarterly taxes to file).
I was paralyzed between two equally untenable places: sticking it out, expanding the company, gritting my teeth (a stressed-out acquaintance of mine had cracked a molar doing that). Or leaving it all behind and striking out toward – what? I had no master plan, no inner drive that whispered my life’s purpose in my ear, telling me to get on with it. And I was no kid; I was in my late 40s with kids of my own.
But, if I didn’t know where I was going, I knew, finally, that I had to go.
The end of my tenure on Morreene Road was amazingly straightforward. It took only three days and drastic price slashing to pare my office equipment and supplies down to manageable, moveable volume. When the carnage was over, I sat alone in the dark office, grieving the loss of the business I had nurtured from infancy. And wondered Who I Would Be without it.
For two months I let myself unwind, unfrazzle. Rest.
And then, it started all over. The nightmares that woke me this time weren’t about missed deadlines or editing errors. I was haunted by my sense of failure. No one closes a successful business. Perhaps it wasn’t too late to spin the company back up again, find new office space, market to a new set of prospects.
But did I want to do that? Frankly the prospect of operating the business made me nauseous. At my home office I didn’t have to be cheerful. I could graze along the edges of depression as much as I liked without judgment. My two faithful dogs were delighted to sit beside me no matter how much I moped. But what did I want to be when I grew up?
The vehicle of my awakening surprised me. A friend had invited me to her “graduation” from a well-known personal development organization. The facilitator asked us to look ahead five years, paint a picture of our ideal lives, then tell half a dozen people in the room about our vision.
I was less than enthusiastic. I’d arrived with a massive migraine headache and was in no state to allow dreamy visions to appear. But I grimly played along: my ideal life? Surely it had something to do with gardening.
Working in the garden had become my salvation that winter. Despite freezing February temperatures, I’d been working long hours to reshape the landscape of our yard in preparation for my husband’s 50th birthday. I soon discovered that physical exhaustion chased away my mental demons.
So gardening was on my mind when I reached out to shake hands with the first person that night. “Hi, great to see you again! Listen, I finally have my own garden center on 40 acres. We’ve expanded in the last six months and things are looking even better for next year!”
The more I said it, the less I liked what I was hearing. Running a garden center meant taking care of other people’s plants – watering, keeping them alive, watching for pests that could wipe out an entire greenhouse. And it meant employees. And dealing with the public. Ugh. When I returned to my seat, I knew I didn’t want to open a garden shop.
But what did I want to do with my life? Ah, Scarlett, I’d think about that tomorrow. But tomorrow never arrived. So, in the midst of my migraine, while the leader gushed on and on at the front of the room, I mentally forced my own hand: “What WOULD I like to do with my life?”
I considered: I wanted gardening, something spiritual, something that served women and a place for me to write. Almost instantly four words popped into my head: “Women’s Garden Retreat Center!” I chuckled inwardly. I’d never heard of such a thing. Yet it felt right. I went home energized and lighter than I had been in years. I had a goal, a destiny.
I knew from working with affirmations that I needed a specific vision of my new dream. I imagined a serene place that was self-sustaining. Organic vegetable gardens and a community kitchen. Secret gardens for reflection and calm. Bubbling hot tubs on the property. Frank Lloyd Wright type buildings – simple pine structures with private rooms, pristine white linens and fresh-scrubbed cleanliness.
Women would work in the gardens in the mornings – sweating and letting go of their own mental demons. Then, after a shower and lunch, we’d gather in a communal meeting room for soul refreshment and support. There would be massage and reiki, perhaps facials and pedicures. But everyone would work as well as play. I saw myself in a small English cottage, the caretaker and facilitator, who also wrote books and traveled the world to remind women that their own wisdom is a deep reservoir within them. That they could trust themselves to live their lives fully and passionately.
As if by magic, opportunities to lease land appeared (40 acres, of course). My dream was manifesting itself. Yikes. I wasn’t ready.
So I took a detour. I was invited to publish a small real estate magazine. It fit my skills perfectly and it looked like a financial windfall. It was another deadline business, however, and I soon returned to my frantic schedule. But the publishing company and I were on opposing tracks. It demanded pure profit; I demanded quality. I stayed the course for 12 months before I called a halt to the madness, more exhausted than ever.
Finally, I began to listen to myself again. I was a writer. I needed to write. With the unflagging support of my husband, I set out a two-year plan to complete my manuscripts. I dug in hard: writing classes and workshops, critiques that stung and praise that buoyed. I wrote fiction, essays, went to writing retreats, read in circles.
At the end of the first year, I had a lot of promising beginnings with precious few completions. I was losing hope. Even when I had complete freedom and financial support I wasn’t fulfilling my potential. I revisited the old questions: Who am I, anyway? What am I doing alive on this planet? At this time? In this place?
The answer re-appeared in the form of an email that I quite nearly deleted. The Conversations with God foundation was offering its first retreat facilitator training program. There it was! My Garden Retreat Center was back on track again!
But there was a slight hitch – the program cost more than $10,000. Our bank account wasn’t quite that robust. After a lot of talking, a lot of waffling, a lot of encouragement from my husband, I borrowed against our home equity line, paid the tuition and got started.
The 90-day program was intense – three classes a week, papers, conference calls. The day after Christmas 2002 my classmate and I convened for four weeks of on-site training. It, too, was intense. We were together from 7 am to 11 pm seven days a week. We had one afternoon off – New Year’s Day.
I learned so much during that soul-searching month. I had never been away from home that long since I had been in college; found that I could survive loneliness and stress. I forged friendships that will last a lifetime. I honed my skills in talking about the concepts of Conversations with God. I took courses in spiritual coaching and comparative religions. The thing I did not learn was how to be a retreat facilitator!
The CwG program, however, set me on the path toward “right livelihood.” I enrolled in a certified life coaching training program. Then I became the first person in North Carolina to be certified as a Speaking Circles facilitator – which helps people connect at a heart level. I trained and trained and trained.
My husband, bless him, continued to support me, emotionally and financially. “As long as we can afford it,” he’d say, “Go for it. The world needs you.” So our credit line groaned a lot. And I began to sleep better, wake up with a smile, look forward to each day.
It wasn’t easy. I spent a lot of time agonizing over whether I had made choices that were really in my best interest (or in the best interest of our marriage). But gradually I began to attract coaching clients. I took a bold step and scheduled my first retreat. And I allowed myself to go through the whole range of emotion, always landing back in the space of quiet assurance that this IS my path.
Today the women’s retreats I lead are more spirit-filled and more transformative than I ever could have imagined. It’s amazing to me that living MY dream is about helping other women live THEIR dreams. There is some kind of balance here, a satisfying yin-yang.
I talk to women who say, “I can’t change my life because my (fill in the blank:
husband, job, house, children, clients, church, etc.) would fall apart. I can’t do it. ”
And I tell them, “Yes you can. If I was finally able to let go of my company, with my anxiety and migraines and hyper-responsibility and miles-long To Do List, then you can, too. You are not your To-Do list.”
So if the “stuck-ness” of life has trapped you. If you know in your bones that staying in the place you are right now for another year, another month, another day means shriveling up and blowing away in the wind, you are ready.
Ready to be that woman you thought you left behind. Ready to shuck off the Have To and the Should of your life. Ready to turn around and say “No” to the situations and people who imprison you. Ready to cry and cry until there are no more tears.
Ready to shed your own skin and reveal a sturdy soul skeleton onto which you can rebuild yourself into a woman who is fleshed out and warm. A woman who is full of herself, a woman who glories in the days and nights she lives on this Earth. A woman who looks back from you in the mirror and says “I love who you are!”
It’s your turn.
Get ready to soar.
By Linda Roggli ©2006
I had everything a successful entrepreneur could ask for: a corner office with big windows that offered a view of the treetops, national awards on the wall, great employees and happy clients. So why did I cry every morning on the drive to work, dry my tears in the parking lot, paste on a smile and steel myself for another day?
The “stuck-ness” of life had ensnared me. I knew my company was killing me, ever so slowly. For two years I had fought off the distant urge to close the doors and walk away. But my employees needed me. The chamber of commerce had given me a plaque inscribed “1997 Micro Business Person of the Year” (which reflected the size of my company, not my physical stature). Who else would give my clients the tender loving care and attention that my company did? I had responsibilities, obligations, duties, an image to uphold (and quarterly taxes to file).
I was paralyzed between two equally untenable places: sticking it out, expanding the company, gritting my teeth (a stressed-out acquaintance of mine had cracked a molar doing that). Or leaving it all behind and striking out toward – what? I had no master plan, no inner drive that whispered my life’s purpose in my ear, telling me to get on with it. And I was no kid; I was in my late 40s with kids of my own.
But, if I didn’t know where I was going, I knew, finally, that I had to go.
The end of my tenure on Morreene Road was amazingly straightforward. It took only three days and drastic price slashing to pare my office equipment and supplies down to manageable, moveable volume. When the carnage was over, I sat alone in the dark office, grieving the loss of the business I had nurtured from infancy. And wondered Who I Would Be without it.
For two months I let myself unwind, unfrazzle. Rest.
And then, it started all over. The nightmares that woke me this time weren’t about missed deadlines or editing errors. I was haunted by my sense of failure. No one closes a successful business. Perhaps it wasn’t too late to spin the company back up again, find new office space, market to a new set of prospects.
But did I want to do that? Frankly the prospect of operating the business made me nauseous. At my home office I didn’t have to be cheerful. I could graze along the edges of depression as much as I liked without judgment. My two faithful dogs were delighted to sit beside me no matter how much I moped. But what did I want to be when I grew up?
The vehicle of my awakening surprised me. A friend had invited me to her “graduation” from a well-known personal development organization. The facilitator asked us to look ahead five years, paint a picture of our ideal lives, then tell half a dozen people in the room about our vision.
I was less than enthusiastic. I’d arrived with a massive migraine headache and was in no state to allow dreamy visions to appear. But I grimly played along: my ideal life? Surely it had something to do with gardening.
Working in the garden had become my salvation that winter. Despite freezing February temperatures, I’d been working long hours to reshape the landscape of our yard in preparation for my husband’s 50th birthday. I soon discovered that physical exhaustion chased away my mental demons.
So gardening was on my mind when I reached out to shake hands with the first person that night. “Hi, great to see you again! Listen, I finally have my own garden center on 40 acres. We’ve expanded in the last six months and things are looking even better for next year!”
The more I said it, the less I liked what I was hearing. Running a garden center meant taking care of other people’s plants – watering, keeping them alive, watching for pests that could wipe out an entire greenhouse. And it meant employees. And dealing with the public. Ugh. When I returned to my seat, I knew I didn’t want to open a garden shop.
But what did I want to do with my life? Ah, Scarlett, I’d think about that tomorrow. But tomorrow never arrived. So, in the midst of my migraine, while the leader gushed on and on at the front of the room, I mentally forced my own hand: “What WOULD I like to do with my life?”
I considered: I wanted gardening, something spiritual, something that served women and a place for me to write. Almost instantly four words popped into my head: “Women’s Garden Retreat Center!” I chuckled inwardly. I’d never heard of such a thing. Yet it felt right. I went home energized and lighter than I had been in years. I had a goal, a destiny.
I knew from working with affirmations that I needed a specific vision of my new dream. I imagined a serene place that was self-sustaining. Organic vegetable gardens and a community kitchen. Secret gardens for reflection and calm. Bubbling hot tubs on the property. Frank Lloyd Wright type buildings – simple pine structures with private rooms, pristine white linens and fresh-scrubbed cleanliness.
Women would work in the gardens in the mornings – sweating and letting go of their own mental demons. Then, after a shower and lunch, we’d gather in a communal meeting room for soul refreshment and support. There would be massage and reiki, perhaps facials and pedicures. But everyone would work as well as play. I saw myself in a small English cottage, the caretaker and facilitator, who also wrote books and traveled the world to remind women that their own wisdom is a deep reservoir within them. That they could trust themselves to live their lives fully and passionately.
As if by magic, opportunities to lease land appeared (40 acres, of course). My dream was manifesting itself. Yikes. I wasn’t ready.
So I took a detour. I was invited to publish a small real estate magazine. It fit my skills perfectly and it looked like a financial windfall. It was another deadline business, however, and I soon returned to my frantic schedule. But the publishing company and I were on opposing tracks. It demanded pure profit; I demanded quality. I stayed the course for 12 months before I called a halt to the madness, more exhausted than ever.
Finally, I began to listen to myself again. I was a writer. I needed to write. With the unflagging support of my husband, I set out a two-year plan to complete my manuscripts. I dug in hard: writing classes and workshops, critiques that stung and praise that buoyed. I wrote fiction, essays, went to writing retreats, read in circles.
At the end of the first year, I had a lot of promising beginnings with precious few completions. I was losing hope. Even when I had complete freedom and financial support I wasn’t fulfilling my potential. I revisited the old questions: Who am I, anyway? What am I doing alive on this planet? At this time? In this place?
The answer re-appeared in the form of an email that I quite nearly deleted. The Conversations with God foundation was offering its first retreat facilitator training program. There it was! My Garden Retreat Center was back on track again!
But there was a slight hitch – the program cost more than $10,000. Our bank account wasn’t quite that robust. After a lot of talking, a lot of waffling, a lot of encouragement from my husband, I borrowed against our home equity line, paid the tuition and got started.
The 90-day program was intense – three classes a week, papers, conference calls. The day after Christmas 2002 my classmate and I convened for four weeks of on-site training. It, too, was intense. We were together from 7 am to 11 pm seven days a week. We had one afternoon off – New Year’s Day.
I learned so much during that soul-searching month. I had never been away from home that long since I had been in college; found that I could survive loneliness and stress. I forged friendships that will last a lifetime. I honed my skills in talking about the concepts of Conversations with God. I took courses in spiritual coaching and comparative religions. The thing I did not learn was how to be a retreat facilitator!
The CwG program, however, set me on the path toward “right livelihood.” I enrolled in a certified life coaching training program. Then I became the first person in North Carolina to be certified as a Speaking Circles facilitator – which helps people connect at a heart level. I trained and trained and trained.
My husband, bless him, continued to support me, emotionally and financially. “As long as we can afford it,” he’d say, “Go for it. The world needs you.” So our credit line groaned a lot. And I began to sleep better, wake up with a smile, look forward to each day.
It wasn’t easy. I spent a lot of time agonizing over whether I had made choices that were really in my best interest (or in the best interest of our marriage). But gradually I began to attract coaching clients. I took a bold step and scheduled my first retreat. And I allowed myself to go through the whole range of emotion, always landing back in the space of quiet assurance that this IS my path.
Today the women’s retreats I lead are more spirit-filled and more transformative than I ever could have imagined. It’s amazing to me that living MY dream is about helping other women live THEIR dreams. There is some kind of balance here, a satisfying yin-yang.
I talk to women who say, “I can’t change my life because my (fill in the blank:
husband, job, house, children, clients, church, etc.) would fall apart. I can’t do it. ”
And I tell them, “Yes you can. If I was finally able to let go of my company, with my anxiety and migraines and hyper-responsibility and miles-long To Do List, then you can, too. You are not your To-Do list.”
So if the “stuck-ness” of life has trapped you. If you know in your bones that staying in the place you are right now for another year, another month, another day means shriveling up and blowing away in the wind, you are ready.
Ready to be that woman you thought you left behind. Ready to shuck off the Have To and the Should of your life. Ready to turn around and say “No” to the situations and people who imprison you. Ready to cry and cry until there are no more tears.
Ready to shed your own skin and reveal a sturdy soul skeleton onto which you can rebuild yourself into a woman who is fleshed out and warm. A woman who is full of herself, a woman who glories in the days and nights she lives on this Earth. A woman who looks back from you in the mirror and says “I love who you are!”
It’s your turn.
Get ready to soar.
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