A Wildflower in the Concrete: a Message of Resiliency

A single seed. A tiny hope. Wondering of its purpose. Holding on to the host until just the right moment when it’s time to fulfill that purpose.

It’s gently dropped or ripped away by violent winds and rain. Perhaps it’s jostled from where it safely grew by a passing animal or plucked away by a hungry bird. The seed has developed all the protection it needs to safely make this unknown journey.

Some seeds require a very small window of time to land where they’re intended — waiting for the right conditions — the best case scenario. Some seeds make their way into fertile ground, but quite often, they find themselves on unwelcoming terrain; here — this seed waits.

What follows feels ominous. Darkened skies. Rumbling thunder. Flashes of lightning. Nature readies herself for the storm to come, and what a storm it is. And the seed is plunged into rapid waters, carried away to a place unknown, trickling over rocky terrain — rougher than ever experienced. This isn’t what the seed signed up for: promises of fertile soil, of gentle rains, of warm, of sunny days. This is not fair.

But eventually the rains do stop, and the waters evaporate. And the seed is alone — in a crack on the sidewalk. Waterlogged and weary and full of woe.

As the sun raises her fiery head, her rays slowly fill the darkness with light. Once again, the seed is filled with a warm hope, and it’s time. It stretches its tiny green arms toward the sun, breaking the shell that carried it through the storm. Its feet find the silt and dirt left where it rests. It’s ready.

With hope …

with determination …

with the will it takes to push onward and upward,

it contradicts all common sense.

And it grows. And grows. And grows opening its sturdy leaves to embrace the sky overhead.

It lifts its head, previously too cumbersome to view more than the dirt below. It looks to the sky and smiles.

As a wildflower blooms in the most unlikely of places, you must allow yourself to grow through these tough times.