The Other Way

When I was a little girl, I used to loll on my bed looking up at the ceiling when I was supposed to be getting up and getting ready for school. I used to wonder about things, looking up at that blank expanse of nothingness, untainted by nail holes, finger prints or scuff marks.

I used to imagine what it would be like if the whole house were to be upside-down, and we would walk on the ceilings, having to step up over a little bit of wall to cross over into another room, and how you could curl up around a skylight and be closer to the moon.

I thought of this the other day when client of mine shared that she had seen a picture of the most breathtakingly beautiful Christmas tree float across her Instagram feed. She described an evergreen tree that had been tipped upside down, exposing its vast intact root ball having it look like the roots were growing up toward the ceiling. Instead of decorating the boughs of the evergreen, the roots were decorated with lights and bejeweled ornaments and tinsel, all in gold and silver and red. She marveled at how something so beautiful could be hidden plain sight, until someone thought to turn everything upside down.

That what I feel like I’m doing in this book—bringing some light and attention to what is often not seen because it’s hidden, below ground. Not to suggest that the ceiling is better than the floor, or the root system contains something more interesting and valuable than the traditional evergreen boughs do—but to suggest that we might be only seeing half of the whole.

What I’m doing here is taking a stand for more of our conversations to hold space for the “and” to be considered. Because I don’t know about you, but I’m so damn weary of the either/or world we’re living in—that dualistic thinking thing that limits our vision and keeps us smaller than we are.

Root bound.

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