We have a rain barrel that sits solidly underneath a corner of where our roof comes together, creating a small waterfall. During the rainy season, especially, we have to release the plug on it, or else the rain barrel often overflows to the point that I wonder if the poor thing is likely to burst and to break. The rain barrel needs a constant release, in order for it to do its intended job. When the rain barrel is full with stagnant water, it isn’t helping anything. The heavy, full rain barrel starts sinking into the earth, making it impossible to move and it attracts biting mosquitoes and other poisonous pests. In reality, the rain barrel can’t possibly hold it all in. When the rain barrel is full, it just cannot take one more drop of water in. It’s too much to expect of it, to do so.
Sometimes I think that it would be more appropriate to keep the plug of the rain barrel open at all times, so that even on the days in which the rain barrel is overwhelmed by a cascade of water from a big, torrential storm, the rain water can flow through it, and soften and dissipate into the packed Earth below and also evaporate into the ocean of air surrounding it. And when the rain barrel has a big release of what it is holding in, that often turns out to be the best thing for the plants and the shrubs surrounding it. The green life takes the rain barrel’s tears, and they transform them into nurturance for their own growth. And what is really grand, is that after this cycle happens, many times, one can see a beautiful rainbow, right by the rain barrel. This is a frequent experience, because the sunshine always, always comes back. The sunshine dries the rain barrel inside and out. In their own ways and in their own time, both the sunshine and the rain cleanse the rain barrel, so that the rain barrel is always freshly ready and prepared and open, for what it was made to do.
“Allow the power to flow through you. Don’t try to capture it. You wish only to borrow it.” – G.G. Collins
“What comes out of you, doesn’t make you sick; what stays in there does.” – Edith Eger
Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.