I am really enjoying sitting in the pasture and watching the chickens. It’s amazing just how relaxing it is. I bought a $17 plastic adirondack chair that I have sitting by the coop just so when I go I can easily sit for a moment. It’s a nice quiet break.
I was thinking while I was sitting there the other day about how great it was that I was already collecting eggs fairly regularly despite my lack of knowledge or experience with chickens. As I watched them scratching around being chickens it occurred to me that chickens do what chickens do. They scratch, they eat (constantly) and they lay eggs. They do what God created them to do. All you have to do is keep their area clean, feed them well, and get out of the way.
I think lots of things are that way. Take a zucchini seed for instance. If you put this small oblong object in the ground and keep it moist for a few days, a big plant emerges from the ground and you’re drowning in zucchini. Same thing with bees. If you just stand aside, they make honey. (Now, it may take a bit of skill to get them to do it in such a way that you can harvest it.)
People are like that too. People do what God designed them to do if you just get out of their way. Sure, give them the conditions they need to thrive. Keep their soil moist. Feed them well. Then just get out of the way.
On the other side of the coin, it’s very hard to make someone be what they aren’t. Like trying to grow tomatoes Alaska. We lived in Alaska for 10 years while I was growing up. For years my Dad tried to grow tomatoes. It just doesn’t get hot enough for tomatoes in Anchorage. Cabbage, on the other hand, thrives there. You can’t make something consistently perform in a manner inconsistent with how they are put together. Tomatoes need some heat. No matter how fertile you make the soil, it won’t make up for the cool temperatures.
People are made how they’re made. So are plants, and so are animals.
Do you agree? What conditions do you need to thrive? Do you remember a time you tried to force something or someone to perform in conditions they weren’t made for? How’d that go?
See you in the comments.