The Courage to Become: Lessons from the Garden

Do you know anyone who gardens? Are you a gardener? 

My great-grandmother was. Inez was a die-hard gardener—a stout German-Irish-Dutch woman with wrinkled skin, short white hair, and a mean little dog named Cesar. She rarely smiled (for anyone, not just me). Once, when I was a child, I tried to hug her and Cesar bit me. I still have the scar. 

For Grandma Inez, gardening wasn’t a hobby; it was a way of life. She grew cabbage, beets, tomatoes—the staples of her self-sufficient world. It was all so ordinary, so routine, that as a child I dismissed it. Gardening, I decided, was for old ladies with weathered hands and small dogs. 

Now, standing firmly in what I like to call the matriarch phase of my own life, I see how small-minded that judgment was. 

The Wisdom of the Garden 

Gardening is profoundly complex. It requires patience, attention, timing, and a deep relationship with cycles of life and loss. Healthy seeds need nutrient-rich soil, the right balance of sun and shade, water and rest. The gardener tends, but the magic—the transformation—belongs to the seed. 

Because the seed must choose to open. 

It must decide to become. 

That simple truth changes everything. 

The Seed Is the Hero 

The older I get, the more I realize that the same is true of us—leaders, parents, partners, teammates. We can create the conditions for growth: the right culture, the right encouragement, the right tools. But the act of becoming—the decision to grow—must come from within. 

To crack open, to leave the well-known darkness of the soil, is an act of courage. It’s a declaration: 

I want to be seen. I want to be known. I want to be valued—and valuable. 

That’s not just about personal development; it’s about leadership. Every time we choose authenticity over fear, responsibility over resentment, or curiosity over control, we are breaking through our own soil. 

Why We Stay Buried 

If this metaphor holds—if people are like seeds—then what keeps us buried? 

Is it fear? The comfort of the familiar? The illusion of control? 

We tell ourselves we’re waiting for the right moment, the right leader, the right environment. But in truth, the conditions will never be perfect. Growth has always been uncertain. The difference is whether we interpret that uncertainty as danger or as invitation. 

Choosing to Grow 

What if, starting today, you made a different choice? 

A choice to narrate your own story. 

 A choice to behave as the person you aspire to be. 

 A choice to open, even when it’s uncomfortable. 

The gardener may prepare the soil—but only the seed can decide to grow. 

And maybe that’s the quiet wisdom my great-grandmother understood all along: that tending the garden wasn’t about control, but about faith—faith that even in darkness, something beautiful was waiting to become.