One Bite At a Time

Contour Lines 16

Summer draws to an end,

The apples are ripe,

Soft grass underfoot.

Growth came quickly,

The fruit abundant,

Tree collapsing under success.

A shift in energy is apparent. What I thought I could get done this season, I didn’t.

But that doesn’t make what was accomplished any lesser a victory.

Success that comes too quickly can be unsustainable.

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My son bit into his first apple today. He’s had the fruit before, but this was his own apple that he picked from our trees and bit into - as a parent it was pretty inspiring to watch the toddler have this new experience.

He hated the peel. Took little bites and spit out, making a “blech” face every time.

But once all the peel was gone, he took a big bite of just fruit, and was delighted.

I’m reminded of how when you have the capabilities, you can take a big bite out of something. Sure, you might bite off more than you can chew, but you’ll get through it. Are you able to bear the cost?

When something is new, perhaps it’s better to start small, chisel away at the parts you don’t like.

Regardless of how much you can handle at one time, of how many actions it takes - you still get to the fruit in the end.

If I look back 3 months, 6 months, even 9 months, I’m miles farther down the path I wanted to be than I would have expected given where I was at. I realize - I’ve been focusing on where I want to be, and not giving myself any rest until I’ve got there.

It’s been exhausting, with spans of time here and there that brought excitement, clarity, and peace of mind.

It’s a disjointed perspective, where in the moment it feels I’m nowhere close to my goals, yet so much farther than I thought I could make without stopping. Turns out, it was never a matter of if I could make it, as much as needing to get better at gauging distance.

And now, when the next part of the journey looms like a mountain up ahead, I’m going to have to take it a bit slower to make sure I get to the top with enough energy to enjoy it.

Why not charge forward, and continue to have exponential growth? Surely the success will rejuvenate me, and not burn me out?

This apple tree might have had the same thought were it sentient.

Last year, our apple trees hardly produced any fruit, whether due to drought or some other reason I don’t know. This year, interestley correlated with my own personal growth, we had the most apples we’ve seen in close to 5 years.

It was too much. The weight of it’s success, what the apple tree was cultivated and born to do, caused it to snap.

Not the entire tree - but a part of it. And this is the case for us as well, whether as an individual or a group.

Sometimes we see small victories, and use that momentum to propel ourselves further and quicker. But we end up in territory that we aren’t ready to navigate yet. Often, we make it work.

Sometimes it’s too much.

I’m not advocating for slow growth at the risk of stagnation.

I’m urging intention, and perspective.

Perhaps if I had payed more attention to the apple tree, I would have seen I needed to prune some of the branches out so they would be evenly balanced.

Perhaps if I hadn’t set the timelines for my goals so short, I wouldn’t have to put forth as much effort and time balancing my workload.

However you grow, make it sustainable.

One little bite at a time.