“You can choose to bloom where you are planted,” my wise neighbor said to me. I was 22 years old, a new mother, living in a place far from home, and experiencing an enormous dose of culture shock.  This one simple idea changed my life, and I’ve never forgotten it.

Decades later, as we navigate a global pandemic that has many of us “planted” in our homes, we still have the choice and the opportunity to find new ways to bloom. As a life and relationship coach, helping my clients “bloom where they are planted” pretty much sums up my work. Using modalities that complement my coaching expertise (such as EFT, Human Design, NVC, Tarot, Magic, and Energy Leadership) my clients learn how to nurture themselves, break old patterns, and come into full bloom.

In the I Ching there is a Hexagram traditionally titled “Oppression” – which sounds daunting – but the real message of this Hexagram is that regardless of our exterior circumstances (which may indeed be oppressive) we can tend our inner world until it blooms into a place where we find comfort, security, peace, and confidence. We find that any problem we are experiencing has a solution.

One of my favorite I Ching books is The Occult I Ching by Maja D’Aoust. In this book, Hexagram 47 is called “The Secret Garden”. This idea of our own inner secret garden is a metaphor that is very alive in me, and I was delighted to see it in this version of the I Ching.

You can indeed bloom where you are planted – where ever that happens to be; because the blooming happens on the inside. When you’ve got your own secret garden blooming you will experience a powerful serenity, delightful synchronicities where your needs get met easily and problems find solutions in an effortless way. It feels like magic.