Good enough? Really??

Dear One,

I have a habit of never feeling like I am doing enough.  Another form this habit takes is “I’m doing it wrong”—whatever it is.

I know the roots of this in my childhood.  I could never do enough to ease the suffering of my parents, who had endured and lost so much in the Holocaust. I could never be good enough.  Having my preferences and my own will seemed to make things worse, made them “suffer more”—or such was their message to me.

I do not fault my parents who, I now understand, were burdened with their own survivors’ guilt.  On top of not blaming them, more good news is that I am learning not to fault myself.  I still can experience the default of not enough.  And while I can’t always snap out that habit, instantly, I am learning, thankfully, to witness and reset.

A primary practice that blunts the attack of these familiar, harsh thoughts—these parts of me—is a new habit that transforms the bitter in these attacks and brings sweetness into the moment, a practice that softens the sharp edges.

Enter self-compassion.  What feels like a blow gets headed off by a caress; blame turns to compassionate witnessing.  I am not talking about pity here, which is a very different energy than compassion.

I could write a lot about the transformative power of self-compassion and compassion for others.  (I probably will in future love letters. 😉)  My memoir Angels on the Clothesline embodies the practice of compassionate presence.

Right now, I want to address why a blue hydrangea in a letter headed off with the words:  “Good enough?  Really??”    

I bought two hydrangea plants a number of years ago that came with a plant pedigree promising profuse bloom year after year.  After the first year of blue hydrangea blossoms, the following year yielded maybe three blooms.  Not a single bloom in the subsequent—I have lost count of how many—years.  Zero yield despite proper (I am pretty sure) pruning and feeding the plant with the acid-loving nutrition it thrives upon.

But this summer, one of my two, now five-foot tall, expansive hydrangea plants recently yielded one climactic, GI-NORMOUS, PERFECT, GORGEOUS BLOSSOM.  See below.   Bigger than any yielded by either of my hydrangea bushes.  Ever.

Still, you may wonder, what does this have to do with good enough?  I explain more below its photo…

Amazed and grateful, I kept visiting this blossom on its bush for days.  Then right before Rosh Hashanah, I decided to clip its stem and bring the stunning bloom inside to keep me company where I could regard it for the duration of the usually ample, cut-flower life of an hydrangea bloom.  It is in a vase that I move from my bedroom to my work space, sometimes bringing it into the kitchen and to my dining room table.

All this time that I have been appreciating this flower with awe and gratitude, something has, in its own way, been blooming within me, an understanding… 

What if this one flower is enough?  What if this single blossom with its divine petals in their soothing-to-my-soul color is plenty.  Is enough.  No faulting the bush for not making more.  For not producing more sooner.  For failing me.  For failing to live up to its potential.  What if this one blossom is quite enough and I can enjoy it with no limit to my pleasure.

I can allow this blossom in this season to lead me to the endless reservoir of joy within me, to bathe in its gleaming, refreshing waters.

I don’t need a bouquet.  I don’t need a cluster.  Maybe next year there will be another bloom or many.  Maybe never again.  No way to know for sure.

What if I completely enjoy what is here, this bloom?

What if I allow this bloom to remind me of the surprising moments of full bloom in my life—a recent one being the birth of my memoir, from seed to full bloom.  What if for now that is quite enough?  Can I allow myself to revel in the bloom of this book, even if it is not a widely-known-or-recognized bloom like this gift from my blue hydrangea, which only I have truly noticed (until this love letter).  😉

Can I choose to say Good Enough?  In Yiddish,  “Geneeg.”  In a Passover prayer-song, “Dayenu.”  Enough that I woke this morning, opened my seeing eyes and walked into the day— even got to walk on the bank of a rushing stream.   And as if that were not enough, I now get to connect with you this way, as I tap out these thoughts and feelings…

To affirm enough and good enough does not mean that there’s no more learning, no more growth into an even fuller bloom of myself. Celebrating enoughness doesn’t mean that my roots are not reaching deeper into Love, or my branches—my aspirations and understandings—are not still reaching towards the sun, towards and into the Light.

Can I sit quietly and enjoy this blue bloom?  And the bloom that I am, as I am.  Perhaps a little bug-hole in one of my leaves.  A brown spot.  A curling, wilting petal here and there.   Transiency, a given.

Perfectly imperfect.  Imperfectly perfect.   Me.   This letter to you.   You, too, chances are.

Thank you for receiving this blossom and this letter.  This flowering moment meeting yours.

With so much love and respect,
Ani

“Angels on the Clothesline is an exquisite invitation into self-compassion. Ani Tuzman brings us into the heart of the child she was, growing up in the shadow of the Holocaust. We see through the eyes of a girl whose spirit, despite the burden of trauma in her life, is not diminished, but shines ever more strongly. Ani’s story inspires us to recognize the invincible light we each carry and to look for that light in each other. At this time on our planet when we need the healing power of love, Angels on the Clothesline is a stunning guide.”

—MARCI SHIMOFF, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Happy for No Reason and Love for No Reason

G'Mar Chatima Tova

I close with this customary greeting whose literal meaning is: "a good final sealing."  I will add to that:  May you know the love of which you are made.  What better than to know this? 

With gratitude,
Ani