A quick note to those awaiting my next religion post: it is in process. Look for it this weekend.

You have all experienced it one way or another: whether it is a flower garden, vegetable plot, or lawn, weeds appear without any effort by you. And they grow taller and more quickly than your baby plants. In the photo above, my babies are carrots. You can see their dainty, fern-like tops. But the taller and more vigorous grasses are choking them out.

You are not interested in a crab-grass salad, so you carefully pull them out. But as careful as you are, you will inevitably pull out one of the carrot babies also. How could that happen? You were so very careful!

So instead of pulling, you decide to cut the weeds out. And that works great. When you are done, your little patch of carrots is standing proud. As it turns out, the weather is rainy so you don’t have to go out and water for a week. When you return, to your horror, the weeds have returned.

I’m sure you know what happened. When you clip off the top but don’t pull out the roots, the weed will regrow. So it is vital that we get the root out of the ground. All you can do is try again to pull out the roots. Yes, there may be some loss, but hopefully, you will gain much more than you lose.

Can you see the parallel with your own life? We all have weeds that want to choke out the productive things in our life. Those weeds may be videos, internet shopping, a bag of chips, or even a person you call a friend. If anything is keeping you from living the life you want to live, you need to do some weeding.

Before you start screaming at your computer screen, not all videos, internet use, snacks, or friends are weeds. Some of them may be salad greens. But that is for you to carefully determine. When you do find a weed, however, it’s time to look under the ground.

What is under the ground? Roots, of course. Maybe a couple worms too, but they are your good friends. The picture to the left shows two types of grass weeds. (I drew lines to help you see the soil level and the extent of the roots.) The short plant spreads out quite a bit above the ground. It consumes a lot of space for desirable plants. But it has very shallow roots. It is easy to pull out.

The tall plant has just four slender leaves. It takes up very little space, is dainty, and actually complements the baby carrots. But its root goes as deep into the soil as its leaves extend into the air. Trust me, if you don’t pull it out early it will grow out of control.

I have found the same to be true with life’s weeds. Some are easy to eliminate; some are deeply rooted. But in all cases, their roots have to be pulled out to keep the weeds from growing back. And when you find a weed with deep roots in your life, you may have to do some digging to find the bottom of the root. You must dig very carefully because there may be good things growing around it that you don’t want to uproot.

After the weeding, my babies looked dreadful. This may be how you feel after you pull some weeds out of your life. Tired. Listless. Hurting. Thirsty.

But look at what happens with time. Like the carrots, your life will flourish. Sure a weed or two may grow back, but with time you will get better at removing them altogether. And there are two other intruders to note. The first is the mushroom. He’s not bad if you just let him alone. His “roots” actually help the soil of your life thrive. He will pop his head up from time to time but won’t hang around too long.

The last infiltrator is the seed. We don’t even realize they are planting themselves in our soil from distant weeds. Even though you have carefully removed all the weeds from your life, new ones will inevitably pop up. The process never ends in this life, but if you are attentive and pull them while the roots are still shallow, weeding will become easier and easier.

Do you have a weed story you would like to share? You can comment below or send a confidential e-mail to info@JDRockel.com. Happy weeding!