It's all coming together, FINALLY! lessons from growing my business and my garden

I've been learning so much from planting a garden, my first ever. The unseen events that happen underground for a while before the miracle pushes its way up to the air. That a garden takes time, a few passes through all the seasons. The rock garden area I created by the honey locust tree, was planted with grass (an exotic luxury here in New Mexico just because it takes extra watering)--and lo and behold, is filled with insects and crawly things.

This former New York City girl is just amazed by it all, even though of course I've always known about seeds...it's different, way different, to experience the miracle of growth.

The songbird garden, planted with amaranth, cosmos and other plants that birds like, has become a gourmet banquet for grasshoppers and crickets. I guess the word got out to the neigbhorhood.."Pssst..over here, she's got stuff we like". It's new for me, not having had pets for years, and no children, to feed living creatures, even though I am asking them politely not to eat the roses and so far they are listening. I talk to the devas (Nature's Intelligence Agents) and they are cooperating.

Today I spied a hummingbird hovering around the purple morning glories (what an apt name for those royal flowers!).

So, I built it, and they came!

What does this has to do with my business? I do a process called co-creativity where I partner with Nature to help me bring things into form in the easiest and best supported way. Maechelle Small Wright, one of my teachers of co-creativity, provided guidelines for creating a garden--one in soil, and also for soilless gardens, which could be almost any project or undertaking, like a business.

I can see similarities between the garden and my business, where many seeds in the forms of intention have been planted. In their own mysterious way, when I "water" them and give them soil, light and air, these seeds are now growing fast and beginning to blossom and unfold.

Seeds are programmed to become plants, I don't have to tell them how to do it, just give them the right support and let them do what they were designed to do. Yes, there is the mystery of right timing, the perfect coming together of all the ingredients, and care and feeding--but teh cycle of planting, growth and maturity has its inherent rhythm and order.

Soon it will be time to harvest, and withdraw energy from what is now finishing, and make plans for the next cycle.

What is blooming, what is ready to be harvested, what is dying out and needing to be removed, in your business, relationships or personal habits?
Where is the fertile ground, where is the fallow ground, and what do you want to grow in your next cycle?

Your personal and business New Year's contemplations

I received this set of questions from marketing coach Debbie Bermont. (Her site is http://www.outrageousbusinessgrowth.com)

Enjoy answering the questions for yourself. I love to keep my New Year's review and intentions in a journal and look back at them at the end of the year, or even beyond that.

Another fabulous thing to do is to assemble images from magazines and catalogs, draw, paint or collage your answers. If you are a visual or kinesthetic learner you'll especially enjoy the process.

Personal questions:

What fills me up and lights up my life?
What keeps me centered?
What would make this year FUN?
What new activities would I like to include in my life this year?
What do I want more of in my life?
What beliefs can I release in my life that no longer serve me?
What relationships should I release that no longer serve me?
Who should I reconnect with in 2010?
What kind of contribution can I make in the world this year?

Business questions:

How do I want to position myself in the marketplace?
What skills do I need to learn this year to make my business grow quickly?
What team do I need to put in place to expand my business?
What kind of exposure do I need to grow my business? Where will I get this exposure?
What one thing can I change about my business that will make the greatest impact?
What old patterns of behavior have held me back in my business in the past that I'm ready to release? What new behavior will I replace it with?