My neighbor is harvesting his corn. It seems like he is the last farmer in the area to pull his corn in this year. All day I hear the combine in the field, and I can feel the weight of the trucks filled with corn as they rumble down our road.
This is always a bittersweet time of year for me. I love the harvest time, but I’m aware of the end of lush green growth of summer, and also of the bitter cold that is just around the corner.
However, I do love the rhythm of the farm season.
I’m always excited to see the seeds being planted in the spring; this speaks of promise and potential to me. There are still remnants of the winter cold at that time, but I can feel the ground warming up and becoming receptive for new growth.
Then, the shoots come up, and the long days of summer stretch out. I love to watch the corn stalks grow, until they tower over us on our walks. The corn cobs become full and ripe.
It takes a long time for the corn to dry on the stalks, until the moisture content is sufficiently low for harvest. There have been years where there is snow on the ground while the combines are in the fields. The dry brown corn stalks are an unmistakable sign of fall and impending winter.
I’ve lived in farm country for thirty years now, so the rhythm of these cycles is close to my heart now. I feel the cycles because they are all around me.
I feel like I go through similar cycles of dormancy, incubation, growth and harvest. We all do.
I’m in a harvesting time of life right now. It feels like one long cycle of growth is winding down, and ready for harvest, but I’m not quite clear what it is, or what the harvest will be, yet. I’m just aware that I’m resonating with the activity of the season that is all around me.
For those of us who write, or paint, or create in some way, there seem to be distinct cycles that we go through, of learning, growth, creating, and then harvesting, or sharing our work with others, so they can benefit from our creating.
Farmers know when to harvest, because they test the moisture content of the corn.
For us in the creative arts, it may not be so clear when to harvest. When is the learning, growth, and production complete, and ready to be shared with others?
Harvesting is an acknowledgement of completion, and it requires letting go.
We benefit from harvesting the fruits of our creative flow, because in harvesting and sharing, we create space for some new creative cycle to begin. Harvesting and sharing complete the cycle of creative flow.
So, as the combine rolls through the field, and the trucks rumble down the road on their way to the grain elevator, I’m asking myself: what, in me, is ready for harvest? And I’m open and ready to be surprised at the answer that bubbles up from within, because the wisdom in me often knows that things are ready to be shared before I think they are.
For any of you who share your gifts with others: What, in you, is ready to be harvested and shared?
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