The word that changed how I see everything…

For as long as I can remember, I’ve been fascinated with language and words.

A while ago, I learned a new word that often pops into my consciousness: salience.

Salience is defined as what is “noticeable, or important,” or simply what stands out to you.

If you think of your life as a garden and self-reflection as the act of observing your garden, what is “salient” would be what things stand out to you in your garden— blooming flowers 🌸, overgrowing weeds 🚜, sprouting seedlings 🌱, etc. 

Lately, I’ve been thinking a lot about what stands out in my life— specifically, the things that catch my daily attention and subsequently the “commentary” that comes with them.

It didn’t take me long to realize that what stands out to me in life is often what’s WRONG 😵‍💫 in my world:

• I’m not spending enough time with my kids

• I’m not spending enough time on my businesses

• what I don’t have for the new baby

• the piles of laundry

• the piles of dishes, etc.

It was like, everyday, I’d look out at my garden, only see the weeds and overgrowth and then storm clouds of overwhelm would start rolling in.

Then, I realized that what I focused my attention on, plus the thoughts/feelings that came after it, led to what I could only describe as suffering.

 But, as Martha Beck said in her amazing interview on Huberman Lab podcast,

 “We did not come here to suffer.”

I’m learning that suffering doesn’t actually help to nourish the beauty in my garden. What helps is the time I take to focus on them and participate in the activities that nurture them.

It’s when we shift our attention and recalibrate our salience, can we truly see and appreciate the beautiful garden that is already present and available to us.

To take it a step further, it’s also not about what we see right now, but about the faith we have in the process—the trust that those seeds will grow and sprout when the time is right.

So today, I invite you to take a moment and look at your own garden.

What are you focusing on? The flowers, the weeds, or the seeds that have yet to sprout?