Introduction

A tale of two trees

Oak trees are always the last to lose their leaves. I never noticed this phenomenon until I began a daily practice of sitting still. It all began with a whim. One sunny November afternoon while I was walking my dog, I decided to stop and sit on a park bench. The bench, a simple, dark green metal lattice seat, was new. It had appeared at the edge of the walking path earlier that summer, fastened onto a freshly poured slab of concrete, a bronze memorial plaque fixed beneath it. The spot overlooked a small ravine, a couple of oak trees, a Scotch pine, and a trickling creek. In the summer the grassy hillside is speckled with black-eyed Susans, purple coneflower, and Queen Anne’s lace, but by the time I first sat on the park bench in late autumn, the wildflowers had died off. All that remained were patches of crisp tallgrass, windblown stalks, and a dry streambed.

As I rested there for a few minutes with Josie sprawled at my feet, I decided I would make this bench-sitting part of my daily routine. I vowed I would stop at that same spot along our walking route every day, and I would sit for five minutes. I would sit in silence, I determined—without music or a podcast in my ears; without dialing my mother or texting my sister; without snapping photos with my camera phone or scrolling through Instagram or Facebook. I would simply sit in silence for five minutes. I figured it would be good for me to take a tiny breather in each hectic day.

The first afternoon I sat on the park bench, I looked at my watch after two minutes and then again after four. When I shifted my weight, I felt the chill of the metal seat through my jeans. I crossed and uncrossed my legs, bent down to pet the dog, and stared at the ravine as the cool breeze blew strands of hair across my face. Turns out, five minutes on a park bench sounds short in principle but is a surprisingly long time in reality.

The next day during my five minutes at the bench, I took a cue from Josie, who sat still, ears pricked, nose quivering. I looked at what she looked at; I sniffed, trying to smell what she smelled. When she twitched her ears, I turned my head too, attempting to hear what she’d heard. I noticed a little more of my surroundings that second day, like the fact that the leaves of the burr oak on the edge of the ravine still clung stubborn and tenacious to the branches. Unlike the maples, birches, elms, and ash trees, which had dropped their leaves like colorful confetti more than a month ago, the oaks were still fully dressed, their dry leaves scraping together in the wind like sandpaper.

I also noticed something about myself on that second day. Sitting on a bench right there in the open alongside the path, I realized I felt unexpectedly and oddly vulnerable. It felt a little foolish to be doing nothing but staring into space, feeling the slippery softness of the pine needles under my feet, listening to the leaves. I was grateful that section of the path is not well traveled. I didn’t want to see someone I knew, or even for a stranger to notice me and think I was some kind of crazy lady, sniffing at the air and shuffling my shoes. It was already obvious to me on that second day of sitting that the quiet and stillness made me uncomfortable, although I couldn’t put my finger on exactly why.

I wasn’t at all sure what I was doing there, just sitting. All I knew was that I felt compelled to do it, even though I didn’t particularly like it, and even though I knew, after only two days, that I would resist it in the coming weeks. At the same time, I knew this sitting in stillness was something I had to do. Somehow I knew that the stopping—the interruption to my daily routine and my incessant push to get from Point A to Point B—was important, maybe even imperative.

Turns out, I learned over the weeks and months of sitting in quiet solitude that I am a lot like the oak tree that clings so fiercely to its leaves. I suspect a lot of us are. We, too, clutch our camouflage—the person we present to the world, to our own selves, and even to God. We, too, are unwilling to shed our false selves, to let go, to live vulnerably and authentically. We are afraid of what might happen if we drop our protective cover, afraid of how we could be seen or perceived, or how we may see or perceive our own selves. We are leery of what we may discover under all those layers. We spend a great deal of our time and energy holding tight-fisted to our leaves, simply because we are too afraid to let go, too afraid of what, or who, we will find underneath.

Sitting in silence every day helped me see that my “leaves” of choice are busyness and productivity, drive and efficiency, achievement and success. I used those “leaves” to insulate me from my own deepest self, because, although I didn’t realize it consciously, I was afraid of what was underneath. I was afraid of who I would find if I began to prune away my layers of self-protection. And so I clung with an iron grip to my false self, to the false identity I’d meticulously crafted over the years. I was busy, productive, and driven. I pushed myself to accomplish, achieve, and succeed. That’s just who I am, I often told myself. That’s just how I was made.

I suspect I’m not alone in my tendency to hide. Perhaps you, too, are clinging to your own array of brittle branches and desiccated leaves—using your false identity or even your daily routines and bad habits to hide from something. Perfectionism, workaholism, procrastination, consumerism, materialism—even substance abuse and addiction—are all different kinds of “leaves,” different methods of self-protection, different ways we have of hiding and avoiding.

Perhaps you, like me, are evading something. Perhaps you are estranged from your truest, deepest self. And perhaps you, like me, haven’t the foggiest idea how to prune away your deadwood and begin to dismantle the structure you’ve built over a lifetime. My hope is that this book will help you begin that process. My hope is that you will join me on the journey toward uncovering the uniquely beautiful person God created you to be.

Two years ago on a warm June morning, my husband, our two boys, and I met Marsha, a volunteer guide, just inside the front gate of the Portland Japanese Garden. We were at the end of a ten-day vacation to the Pacific Northwest, and I was eager to introduce my family to this special place that I had discovered years before on a work trip. As we followed Marsha across petite wooden bridges, along winding paths, and over stepping-stones set into spongy moss, I remembered how the garden seemed to wrap its visitors in a shawl of quiet. We spoke in whispers as we strolled, a lullaby of flowing water melding with the rhythmic crunch of gravel beneath our shoes.

Marsha paused beside a large Japanese maple poised regal and elegant like a grand dame on a small, moss-covered hill, and as we waited for the rest of our group to catch up, I gazed at the tree. Its delicate chartreuse leaves fanned like antique lace over an elaborate network of dark limbs and branches that spread like veins beneath the canopy. When the stragglers joined us, Marsha explained that a particular Japanese gardening technique called “open center pruning” was responsible not only for the sculptural appeal of this maple, but also for the uncluttered space and serenity in the garden as a whole.

When a Japanese gardener “prunes open,” Marsha explained, he or she cuts away not only dead branches and foliage, but also often a number of perfectly healthy branches that detract from the beauty inherent in the tree’s essential structure. Pruning open allows the visitor to see up, out, and beyond the trees to the sky, creating a sense of spaciousness and letting light into the garden. It also enables an individual tree to flourish by removing complicating elements, simplifying structure, and revealing its essence. The process of pruning open turns the tree inside out, so to speak, revealing the beautiful design inherent within it. Sometimes, Marsha said, the process of pruning open requires a major restructuring—cutting back limbs and dramatically altering the form of the tree—while other times, only a gentler, more subtle reshaping is necessary.

Our group continued on with the tour, but I held back, reluctant to leave this one captivating tree. I circled it, snapping photographs, trying somehow to capture its enchanting beauty and gracefulness. There was something mesmerizing about the tree, the way its limbs and branches spread like an elaborate scaffolding beneath its intricate canopy of delicate green, the way its roots, gnarled and exposed, gripped the mossy hill. I yearned to lean my body against its twisting trunk, to soak up the wisdom I sensed coursing deep within it.

Eventually I ran to catch up with my family, but even after the tour had ended, I found myself still thinking about that one tree. In the months that followed our visit, I thought a lot about the practice of pruning open, and I’ve since come to understand it as a beautiful metaphor—one we can look to for guidance in our own lives and along our own spiritual journeys.

The practice of pruning open is not an easy one. In both gardening and in life, it’s a skill that takes discipline, insight, and years of trial and error, and in many ways, it goes against the grain. Metaphorically speaking, pruning is the antithesis of contemporary western culture. It is the path toward smaller, rather than larger; toward quiet, rather than loud; toward slow, rather than fast; toward simple, rather than busy; toward dismantling, rather than building; toward less, rather than more. Pruning may not be a popular practice—at least according to what our bigger-better-faster-more society values—but it is an essential one, not only for trees, but also for ourselves and particularly for our souls. It is only in moving toward smaller and less—in cutting back in order to open up—that we uncover who we are at the very center of our God-created selves.

The truth is, God does not wish for us to stand stubborn like the autumn oak tree, cloaked in a façade of protection, our truest, most authentic selves obscured beneath a tangled bramble of false security. Rather, he desires us to live like the Japanese maple tree, our true essence revealed and flourishing, our true self front and center, secure and thriving. God yearns for us to live wholeheartedly and truthfully as the unique, beautiful, beloved individuals he created us to be. Most of all, God’s deepest desire is for us to know him, to root our whole selves in him like a tree rooted by a stream, and to know his deep, abiding love for us. God yearns for us to live in the spacious, light-filled freedom of Christ and to know ourselves in him, through him, and with him.

As you let go of your false self, branch by branch, leaf by leaf, and layer by layer—as you finally begin to relinquish, open up, and allow God to prune you from the inside out—you will grow in ways you never imagined: in your relationships with loved ones; in connection with and love for your neighbors; in your vocation; in your heart, mind, and soul; and in intimacy with God himself. Your true, essential self, the you uniquely created by God, is there, deep inside you, hidden beneath layer upon layer of leaves clinging fast. Like the elegant Japanese maple tree, a spacious place is waiting to be revealed, and exuberant life is waiting to unfurl and blossom.

Pruning open is the way in.