My kitchen windowsill has 4 little plants growing: a sprouting avocado seed, a succulent in a ceramic bowl, a Jade cutting that we picked up off the sidewalk during a walk home, and a fern I bought from the grocery store.

When I was about 25 I figured this thing out about myself: money and children I can grow, plants and pets, not so much. It’s true. I’ve never been able to keep a green thing alive. I can live off a tiny amount of money, make dollars reproduce and I’ve been raising children since I was a child. Pets? Plants? In my apartment? Uh, no thanks, I can see their benefit, but really it’s just a lot of upkeep.

I had a lot of pride in my little self actualized motto. What I was saying is that I knew how to survive. I had mastered survival. I don’t write very often about what it’s like growing up with a suicidal parent, even though I think about it a lot. It’s too hard. I knew from a young age that existence is not guaranteed. I’m not really able to lay all of it out yet. But what I can say is that my mother did not believe in tomorrow. Every day that she woke up was a shock. She was pretty good with plants and pets. Better with the plants, less so with the pets, but she did better with both of those by far compared to money or people. There is more to this, I know, but really it’s too painful to write out. My point is that I’m in this rut of limited possibility. As a friend said, I’m in a moment of contraction.

So I’m attempting to grow plants in my home. I’m starting small. Seeds and cuttings. Sturdy plants that I’ve been told are relatively hard to kill. I need green to expand both within and around me.

It is at the heart center where the energies of lower chakras (once the needs are fulfilled and satisfied) can be transformed and integrated into a more spiritual aspect of yourself.

This is where you reach beyond yourself and connect with something greater, wider, and deeper.

Green is the color of growth, life, and balance. Through balance you find this center from which you can love, form healthy and nourishing relationships, and give and receive love.

Surviving I can do. Making sure other people’s basic needs are met, I can do. Now I need to grow just a little bit more.