What’s Your Generous Offering?

Recently, I sat outside on my meditation bench at the edge of the woods. The morning temperature was cool but not cold. I was enjoying the early morning light and a little reading with a cup of coffee. Suddenly, I heard what sounded like rain through the trees. I looked up and the sight caught me by surprise. It was not a rain shower that was happening, but a leaf shower.  Hundreds of maple, sweetgum and oak leaves were cascading down, many of them twirling like helicopter blades, all brought on by a slight breeze. This became an event, and this event captured me. 

Just a little bit of wind. So many leaves.  All of them were at that very subtle place where all it took was that little breeze, and for another year, they let go of the branches on the trees that they had been living on and working with for what I estimated to be the last 10 months or so. 

These leaves had been green for most of that time. They had been working the sunlight every single day, turning it and some carbon dioxide into life sustaining food for the trees which in turn created and extended expansive root systems all through the forest, communicating, caring for, feeding and protecting other trees and plants in their community of living beings. Now, with light drawing shorter every day, these leaves have stopped their work. They know that they are finished. They have let go. They cover the forest floor where over the next few months, they will slowly become compost and offer yet another kind of nourishment to all the living beings in the community. 

This is the kind of generosity that comes from being true and authentic to who we are. I think sometimes that the deepest and best forms of generosity emerge when we come to that place of being exactly who we are and embracing that every day. When we are unhindered, who we are and what flows from that becomes our generous offering to the community. 

~Bob Patrick