[12/20/11] Do your own thing.

This is what I've been seeing each morning as Diane and I finish our run:

Yes, this is a tree blooming right smack in the middle of wintertime. All the other trees are bare and dreary looking.

It sits on the boundary of Diane's property.  I don't notice it when we begin our run because it's still kind of dark-ish.

But boy, do I notice it when we get done.

And I think it's amazing!

As I've been driving around our town, I've been looking for other blooming trees. I haven't seen even one.

Which I think makes this one even more amazing.

While I was taking these pictures one morning after our run, Diane's neighbor came out to get her newspaper. So that she didn't wonder why this strange and sweaty woman was taking pictures of her house, I told her I was taking pictures of the blooming tree because I thought that it was so interesting that it was blooming in the dead of winter.

She told me that this little tree blooms three times a year.

What? Three times a year? 

Diane and I have been running together for over a year and this is the first time I've noticed this tree. Yes, I did notice it in the spring, but pretty much everything in Georgia blooms in the spring.

And I love that. It's like a beautiful re-birth after the doldrums and dreariness of winter.

But to not even notice this three-times-a-year blooming tree before?

Sad.

I have thought a lot about this little tree. When I was teaching seminary, and now that I'm teaching the young women at church (and as I do my own studying), at the end of every lesson I try to help the youth (and myself) apply what we've been learning: "What are you going to do with what you've learned? How will what you've learned make your life better?

Because if we don't do anything with what we learn, we might as well have not learned it. At all.

Here's what I've learned from this little tree:

~Do your own thing. Even when the whole "world" around you is doing something different.

~Do what you know is right for you, even when the rest of the "world" is doing something else. Stick to what you know to be true.

~Don't follow the crowd.

~Take time to notice the beauty around you. Sometimes I get so hung up and focussed on what's going on in my life, that I know I miss some amazing and beautiful things around me. I need to take my blinders off more often.

Because I know Heavenly Father puts "little blooming trees" all around me in many different forms to bless me and bring me joy.

And I'm so thankful for that.