We have been gifted so many plants from friends over the years, by splitting root (lily of the valley, hosta, hydrangea) or rizome clumps (tiger lilies, irises), separating shoots (lilacs, raspberries) and transplanting runners (strawberries, strawberry begonia), as well as accepting seeds (hollyhocks) and whole seed heads (echinacea). Many of these plants have grown big enough that we can now share and provide a never ending supply of joy to others. And we know how quickly animals can multiply, the smaller the faster. One mouse pair could theoretically produce about 5000 mice in a year.

Nature is just so amazingly abundant that I’m not quite sure how we humans ever came up with this idea of lack and not enough which so permeates our culture (“not enough time,” “not enough money,” “only 2 left,” or “get it while it lasts”). Perhaps we are so disassociated from nature that we no longer understand its principals. Nature gives so freely, it doesn’t hold on. It sends its seeds so liberally into the wind by the gazillions. Abandoned farmland reforests all by itself over the years. A garden rewilds and overgrows so fast if you don’t constantly pull the weeds and mow the lawn.

The difference between nature and our human behavior is our lack of generosity. We hold on, tight and tighter. We stash our money away and get rewarded for it with interest. During the pandemic we horded toilet paper and meat and created actual shortage. No wonder then that we live in a culture of stinginess, lack, and miserliness. Instead of living and modeling abundance, we live and model lack. Perhaps things would be different if we got rewarded for giving our stuff and money away

To experience abundance, we need to emulate nature’s generosity of giving. Be like nature. The more generous you are, the more generous the world around you becomes.