“It is better to be a warrior in a garden than to be a gardener in a war.”
- Miyamoto Musashi
“I deserve it all” is repeated like an affirmation in the chorus of Kendrick Lamar’s newly released song “Man At The Garden”. In this chorus it seems as though he is not only reminding himself of being deserving of the things he has in life, but also reminding us all that we are deserving. But what is this “all” that we deserve?
I was left pondering this and thinking that is it the material things? Is it the pain and suffering? Is it the joy and happiness? Is it the sorror and grief? What is this “all” that we deserve?
Bad things happen to good people. Good things happen for bad people. Things happen.
We get injured for seemingly no reason at all.
We gain two new clients. We loose three clients shortly after.
A CEO is shot down in the streets of New York. Thousands of people across the country die and suffer because they cannot get the coverage that they paid for, from his company and others like his, because they put profits over people.
Our back hurts when we run or golf. Our shoulder hurts when we play pickleball.
Some of our children grow up, get married, have children, give us grandchildren and live a long life. Others have their life cut short from school shootings, stray gunfire on the streets, or US bombs dropped by Israelis on their homes during a genocide.
I just found out this morning that the grandfather, Khaled Nabhan, who became grandfather to so many after losing his granddaughter Reem last year to Israeli bombardment has fallen victim to the continuing genocide. He referred to Reem as the “Soul of his soul” as she was the daughter of his daughter. And as I write this another school shooting has happened this morning in America.
Do we deserve any of this?
What is this “ALL” that we deserve?
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There are some real bops on this album, but I think the reason that I keep coming back to Man in The Garden is the same reason I often found myself returning to his song “Father Time” from the album Mr. Morale & The Big Steppers. My soul seeks to comprehend the artistic overlaps of life and science, and my mind craves expansive thought provocation.
I had written an essay in July about cultivating and nurturing growth through gardening. It seems no coincidence that this theme would find itself in front of me again, especially as over the last few days I’ve had conversations with new clients about cultivating an environment along with the work and time that it demands of us.
I don’t believe in coincidences. I am reminded of something a colleague said to me years ago. He said that he believed there’s like a cloud of ideas surrounding us and that many of us are open to ideas.
Some of us choose to take those ideas and give them to the world, freeing us as a conduit to accept more and disperse more. Those of us who operate from this space of abundance expand our capacity to receive more.
Others of us choose to hoard and hold onto ideas trying to keep them all to ourselves. We think that we must hold onto them, hide them and operate from a place of scarcity. This is what we’re taught.
This all feeds into the ways in which we approach not only our lives, but our training, our coaching and more.
But at what point did some of us begin to operate so deeply from a position of scarcity, constraints and limitations?
We are born into a world of abundance. As babies we have endless potential for movement, growth and learning. At some point we reach peaks and then begin the process of slowly or rapidly dying.
Our movement constraints begin as soon as we decide we no longer sit and play on the floor and would rather sit on a sofa or chair at the television, computer, classroom, etc.
Our minds begin the process of being constrained as those who have come before us teach us “the way” things are done. You’re not supposed to do it that way. We’ve always done it this way. Not all traditions and norms are beneficial to humanity’s growth and longevity individually or as a species. At some point, many of us even stop learning new things.
Man At The Garden sends me back to a line that Kendrick Lamar says in the beginning of the song Euphoria:
“I ain't thinkin' about no reaper*****, I'm reapin' what I sow, okay”
This sets up Man At The Garden as a song title and continued thought because it tells us the thought process. We reap what it is we sow.
We cannot stop the things we perceive to be “bad” from happening. All we can do is nurture the type of environment that enhances potential for positive outcomes while helping mitigate potential negative ones.
I knew I had gophers in my yard in the past. So placing gopher wire in certain places, protecting newly planted trees with gopher baskets, placing lots of flowers and plants they don’t like and placing my vegetables in raised beds were basic mitigation steps.
For these reasons I have less gopher issues. I deserve all the things that came with doing the work to cultivate this better outcome.
If your garden is your body then what steps are you taking to nurture the potential for better outcomes?
Do you strength train to increase and maintain muscle tissue and bone density?
Do you do aerobic exercise to improve cardiovascular function?
Do you do high intensity exercise to improve maximal capacity?
Do you do targeted and specific mobility work to address blindspots in your training and activity that can lead to pain and discomforts?
In the end, nothing that we do happens overnight. Nothing will ever be made perfect. There will be ups and downs throughout our lives and we’ll face many challenges.
I’ve been on a journey this past year that has presented me with no shortage of challenges. From losing my father, to finding out that we’d have another child to nurture, grow and attempt to successfully navigate towards independence, it’s been a year with no shortage of ups and downs.
We have to remember that our gardens are never complete. It takes time, energy and resources to amend. There will always be more work to do and something to attend to. We are fooling ourselves if we think there will ever be a day where we can finally sit and rest without continuing to do all the little things to maintain. We’re also delusional if we believe there’ll ever be a point of perfection. There’s no such thing as “pain free” in life. We can only control what we can and we must do the work within our gardens to lessen the impacts of unexpected changes in weather, effects of time and forces we have little control over.
So grab your shovel and get to work.
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