Hi Everyone

The last few days I’ve been sitting under the tree wondering if I have planted the seed of fire or bottled it up. Or perhaps I have planted it but not tended it well? Digging it up looking for just the right garden, the right crack of light to fit through.

Words from the Lord’s Prayer: “Forgive us… as we forgive” and the ask that we love our neighbor as ourselves… arise. Words that feel less like a request and more like a mirror. A mirror I’m not sure I want to look into, knowing how I struggle to love myself. What if the soil of the self is dry, cracked, and hard?

I know the truth of the interconnection of the web of life: that what we do to earth, what we do to others, we do to ourselves. And yet, I also know how difficult it is to forgive myself, to offer grace inward.

That tension led me to the story ‘The Seed and the Soil’, the soil of self-love, and the rain of kindness. It’s not a solution, but perhaps a way to walk with the question.

The Seed and the Soil
In the quiet valley nestled between two hills, Teacher Zahir tended a small patch of earth behind his hut. It was not part of the two gardens he was known for. This soil was dry, cracked, and stubborn. Yet each morning, he knelt beside it, pressing a single seed into the ground and whispering something no one could hear.

One morning, Layla, the young seeker, returned to Zahir. She bowed and asked,
“Teacher Zahir, why do you plant in soil that does not grow?”

Zahir smiled gently. “Because the seed is forgiveness.”

Layla frowned. “But the soil is barren.”

Zahir nodded. “Yes. It is the soil of the self, untended, hardened by years of judgment and silence.”

Layla sat beside him. “And you believe the seed will grow?”

Zahir looked to the sky. “Not by force. But even dry soil softens when the rain comes.”

Layla whispered, “And what is the rain?”

Zahir closed his eyes. “Kindness. Patience. The quiet act of loving what we are, even when we do not understand it.”

Layla touched the soil. It was still dry, but not as hard as before.

Layla’s Reflection: The Soil Within
I sat beside Teacher Zahir today, watching him press a seed into dry earth. I asked why he bothered, why plant where nothing grows?

He said the seed was forgiveness, and the soil was the self.

I didn’t know what to say. I’ve tried to forgive. Others, yes, but myself? That soil feels too hard, too tired. I’ve buried things there I don’t want to name.

But Zahir didn’t speak of force. He spoke of rain, of kindness, patience, and the quiet act of loving what we are, even when we don’t understand it.

I touched the soil. It was still dry. But maybe not as hard as before.

I wondered: If I have not forgiven myself, have I ever truly forgiven others?

And deeper still: What I’ve done to myself I’ve done to others…

Maybe the rain has already begun.

A old story brushed off

The Dervish, the Market and the Wind of Grace
A dervish entered the market, humming a song no one understood.

A merchant shouted, “Your song offends my silence!”
The dervish bowed and kept walking.

A scholar said, “Your bow offends my dignity!”
The dervish smiled and kept walking.

A beggar cried, “Your smile offends my sorrow!”
The dervish wept and kept walking.

A child tugged at his robe and asked, “Why do you keep walking?”

The dervish replied, “Because the market is a mirror. If I stop, I become the reflection.”

The child asked, “And what do you see in the mirror?”

The dervish said, “Everyone shouting at their own echo.”

Later, the dervish sat beneath a fig tree at the edge of the village, listening to the wind.

A warrior passed and said, “Your silence mocks my battles.”
The dervish opened his eyes and whispered, “Then let the wind carry your sword.”

A poet passed and said, “Your whisper offends my verses.”
The dervish smiled and whispered again, “Then let the wind carry your rhyme.”

A widow passed and said, “Your smile offends my grief.”
The dervish wept and whispered once more, “Then let the wind carry your tears.”

The same child returned and asked, “Why do you whisper to the wind?”

The dervish replied, “Because the wind does not argue. It carries everything, swords, rhymes, tears and returns them as rain.”

The child asked, “And what does the rain say?”

The dervish said, “It says nothing. It simply falls.”

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When we look to the universe, we are indeed smaller than small, yet through forgiveness become bigger than big. Forgiveness is one of the few human acts that bridges this gap. It is a portal through which the finite touches the infinite. In forgiving, we momentarily step into the role of the divine, not in arrogance, but in humility and grace. Forgiveness as the dervish points to need not be a debate or a defense. It is a whisper to the wind, a surrender that allows pain, pride, and sorrow to be carried, softened, and returned as something nourishing.

Layla’s Last Season

Layla’s days were growing quiet.

The garden she had planted, part wild, part tended had grown into a place of peace. Children still played beneath the branches, the wind still carried stories, and the soil still held secrets.

She sat beneath the tree she had once planted with trembling hands. Now its roots ran deep, its shade wide. She looked out over her garden and smiled.

Though it was small, it was big enough.
Though it was simple, it had enough for everyone.

She remembered the faces of those who had come Sami, the restless student; Mira, who planted in spirals; the old woman who wept beside the thorns. And she remembered Zahir, her teacher, who had once walked between two gardens: one walled, one open.

In the stillness, Layla heard a voice beneath the silence.

It laughed.

And in the laugh, she heard Zahir’s warm chuckle… gentle, knowing, amused by the way of life, how a garden teaches.

In that moment, something shifted. Not a thought, not a conclusion, but a realization deeper than knowing.

Zahir had never tended two gardens. It was always one.

The wall and the wind, the order and the wildness, the questions and the silence… they were not separate. They were threads in the same tapestry. Her garden, too, was part of it. Not apart, but a part.

The web of life shimmered before her, not as an idea, but as a presence. Everything connected. Everything belonging.

Tears welled in her eyes, not from sorrow, but from the sheer beauty of it. She laughed, and her laugh was not hers alone. It joined the voice beneath the silence, the eternal chuckle of her teacher, the wind in the jasmine, the song of the soil.

Layla’s cry and laugh became one.

The wind stirred the leaves. A vine reached toward the sun. A bird sang from the wall. And Layla, the gardener who had once asked what compassion and freedom was, now rested in it.

Epilogue:

Long after Layla’s footsteps faded from the soil, her garden remained. It did not grow larger, but it grew deeper. The roots of her tree reached into the memory of the valley, and the wind carried her laughter like a song remembered.

Travelers still came to feel what she had felt. They sat beneath the branches, touched the soil, and listened for the voice beneath the silence.

Some planted seeds.
Some wept beside the thorns.
Some built fences, then gently took them down.

And all who came left changed, not by answers, but by presence. They learned, as Layla had, that freedom is not found in choosing between wildness and order, but in the courage to create something that holds both. That wisdom is not taught but grown. That the garden is not a place, it is a way.

And if you listen closely, in the hush between wind and leaf, you may hear a laugh… gentle, knowing….

And it welcomes you.