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Mental Crop Rotation

When farmers grow the same crop too many years in a row, it can leave their soil depleted of minerals and other nutrients that are vital to the health of their fields.

To avoid this, farmers will often alternate the crops that they grow because some plants will use up different minerals (such as nitrogen) while other plants replenish those minerals. This process is known as “crop rotation.”

So the next time you find that you need to step away from a project to work on something else for a while, don’t beat yourself up for “quitting” that project. Give yourself permission to practice “mental crop rotation” to maintain a healthy brain field.

Because I’ve found that when that unnecessary guilt and pressure are removed from the process, a good mental crop rotation can help you feel more energized and invigorated than ever once you’re ready to rotate back to that project.

Remember that if you want to do more of something, you have to do less of something else. It's that time of year where people set goals for the new year and they have plans and hopes and it's always focusing on what they want to do more of. More studying, more exercise, more crafting, more socialising, more making things from scratch. Okay, great. What are you going to do less of in order to have the time and energy to do more of those things you really want to do?

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You don't have to force yourself to bounce back so quickly. I read something recently that said "when you come in from a rainstorm, you don't expect yourself to be dry and warm right away", and it really resonated with me. It's okay to take time to dry off and warm up. Take the time you need to process what happened to you.

Give-away shops

I'd like to tell you all the story of Jan's give-away shop.

The story:

Jan was a guy who lived in my hometown. Financially speaking, he was well-off: he owned the house in which he lived alone, and had gathered a lot of stuff throughout the years.

One day, Jan realised all of this stuff wasn't making him happy. He decided to move to a small apartment and to get rid of most of his possessions.

Jan also realised the privileged life he led: he owned much more than he needed, and was able to move on the fly just because he felt like it.

All of this made Jan decide to open up a give-away shop. He moved everything he didn't need to his living room, simply opened up his front door, and told everyone they could come and pick up whatever they wanted for free.

His friends declared him an idiot: humans are selfish, they said, and would just take his valuables and sell everything they'd gotten from him. They were wrong. Sure, some people did this, but they were only a small part of those who came.

Those who had less than Jan (including yours truly) came by and found things they needed but had been postponing to buy because they couldn't afford to. Others came to pick up things they could use for their charities, or for the classrooms they had to teach on a too low budget.

The biggest surprise was how Jan never ran out of things to give away: rather than taking things, a lot of people started donating items they didn't need anymore!

Objects weren't the only thing people donated: Jan quickly amassed a team of dedicated volunteers to run the shop for him whenever he was absent.

And that's the story of how my town got its first give-away shop. Unfortunately, the shop doesn't exist anymore: they closed down after about five years because Jan eventually had to sell his house.

His shop has left an important impact on my town: inspired by his shop, we now have a thriving freecycle community, town hall frequently hosts give-away markets (flee markets where everything's free), and individuals have been putting up give-away cabinets, fridges, and libraries all over where people can leave their unused goods, leftover food, and unread books for others to enjoy.

The take-away:

Not all of us are as privileged as Jan: if we were, we wouldn't have much need for projects like these. However, we can still learn from his story!

If you've got an unused cabinet lying around, why not turn it into your own give-away corner? If you work in event planning, maybe consider hosting a give-away market some time. Do you work at a library or a community centre? Those are the perfect spots to put a give-away library or a leftovers fridge: just make sure to keep an eye on anything food-related and to clean out expired goods when necessary.

Another popular variation on this idea are plant cuttings corners and seed banks. These are a great way to share native plants with fellow gardeners to improve the biodiversity in your neighbourhood.

If this post has inspired you, try petitioning your town for projects like these: they're often welcomed because they don't cost much to set up and can have a big positive impact on both your community and the environment.

(Image source) [ID: a small outdoors wooden construction with a see-through plastic roof containing a cupboard with toys, cookwares, and shoes, a hanging rail with clothes, a shelf with books, a bulletin board, and a box and a bag. The text "Give Box: sharing is caring" is painted at the top of the shed, and purple flowers and red hearts are painted on its sides.]

On of the less intuitive things about love, I've found, of any kind, is the importance of needing things.

I didn't realize it until recently, but I've always seen love as something requiring sacrifice, selflessness, patience, and generosity- to ask for nothing is to be the best person I can be, small and quiet and never in the way, always happy and helpful, self-sufficient and present when desired.

It's only as an adult, now, that I'm beginning to see the selfishness of wanting nothing.

I cut my friend's hair in my kitchen the other day. They wanted a trim and I had the skills, so I offered, and was genuinely excited when they stopped hesitating over "bothering me" and took me up on it. It was a peaceful afternoon, and we had tea and chatted for an hour or more.

My brother and I shared popcorn at the movies a while ago. When I came time to pay, I pulled my card out like a wild western sheriff and slapped it on the machine before he could fight me for it first. The satisfaction was delightful.

Someone called me crying on the phone the other day. Kept apologizing for disturbing me at work, talking about how they were bothering me on my lunch break. I was telling the truth when I told them that really, I was flattered and honored and relieved, knowing that if they were hurting I would know, that I didn't have to worry in silence. It felt good to hear them slowly come down, and to know that they knew it would be better soon, and to hear them laugh wetly on the other end. We're getting together for a visit next week.

It's hard to need things, if you've trained yourself not to. It's hard to want things, when you don't know how to want anymore. Trusting people is difficult, and so is relying on them, but I don't know where I'd be without the people who rely on me.

I've heard a lot of people say, "Nobody will love you unless you love yourself". I've had a lot of thoughts about it. It's not right, but it's not wrong, either, I think.

"Nobody will love you unless you love yourself"... I've always taken that to mean, "You will not be lovable until you develop a positive view of yourself as a person".

Now, I think it's sort of inside-out.

"Nobody will love you unless you love yourself"... because nobody can show their love to you in a way that you can accept until you treat yourself kindly, and learn what you need, and what you want, and how to ask for it, and then give that vulnerability away.

Love, for me, is someone I ask for a ride to the airport. Whether they end up doing this or not is irrelevant.

It's not needy, or selfish, or taking up energy. It's giving the gift of being wanted, and needed, and thought of. It's giving someone the security of being part of someone's life.

Story time:

In middle school biology, we did an experiment. We were given yams, which we would sprout in cups of water. We then had to make hypotheses about how the yams would grow, based on descriptions of yam plants in our books, and make notes of our observations as they grew.

Here’s what was supposed to happen: we were supposed to see that the actual growth of the plant did not resemble our hypotheses. We were then supposed to figure out that these were, in fact, sweet potatoes.

What actually happened was that every single student in every single class lied in their notes so that their observations perfectly matched their hypotheses. See, everyone assumed the mismatch meant they had done something wrong in the process of growing the plant or that they had misunderstood the dichotomous key or the plant identification terminology. And, thanks to the wonders of a public school education, everyone assumed the wrong results would get us a failing grade. We were trying to pass. We didn’t want to get bitched out by the teacher. Curiosity, learning, science - that had nothing to do with why we were sitting in that classroom. So we all lied.

The teacher was furious. She tried to fail every student, but the administration stepped in and told her she wasn’t allowed to because a 100% fail rate is recognized as a failure of the teacher, not the class. It wasn’t even her fault, really, though her being a notorious hard-ass didn’t help. It was a failure of the entire educational system.

So whenever I see crap like Elizabeth Holmes’s blood test scam or pharmaceutical trials which are unable to be replicated or industry-funded research that reaches wildly unscientific conclusions, I just remember those fucking sweet potatoes. I remember that curiosity dies when people are just trying to give their superiors the “right” answers, so they can get the grade, get the job, get the paycheck. It’s not about truth when it’s about paying rent. There’s no scientific integrity if you can’t control for human desperation.

Now the ash dances with the snow....

Lil winter dragon stickers ♡