Bloom Where You’re Transplanted

I bought this cute block décor, but realize that its flowery words actually irk me. “Bloom where you are planted” is meant to conjure a visual reminder to flourish within our present season and circumstance, without comparing or competing or striving for what we don’t have. Nothing wrong with that.

But I’m increasingly aware that there can be an unintended false message here, that women especially (or perhaps broader marginalized groups) may internalize to their detriment.

From many of the women I’ve spoken with, especially within the Christian church context, there is this sense that we are meant to be always bending and accommodating to what others want or need. We’ve been trained that godly womanhood is to keep our heads down and be obedient and use our gifts within the arenas that we are given.

The problem, however, is that although our blooming within our sphere can be good, sometimes this is the very lie that the enemy uses to keep us from full flourishing. Our desire to be godly and contented bloomers can keep us from recognizing that some of the soil we’re trying to grow in is toxic and rocky.

What if the soil we’re planted in tainted by culturally imposed patriarchal or racial bias? What if you’ve existed within a soil of abuse? God does not intend for us to try to flourish within those contexts, but to expose and remove that soil.

Perhaps we fail to recognize WHO is planting us. If we’re embracing the constraints of the season and situation GOD has put us in, then the limits will be a gift to us. But if we are embracing a human-imposed limitation, then we let others plant us instead of God. The struggles with people pleasing and insecurity are real, but they often keep us and others from God’s freedom.

Or maybe it isn’t that the soil is necessarily toxic-maybe the soil is rich for someone else and THEIR gifts- but we are a different kind of plant entirely. Maybe we’ve felt awful for not being able to bloom in borrowed soil- trying to be what we think God wants, when all along God wants to transplant us to the soil and situation He has designed us for.

Unfortunately, making the decision to NOT bloom where we are planted often feels selfish. People will make it sound unbiblical, which will cause us to doubt what we know about the soil’s toxicity. People will question your motivations and argue with your biblical rational and you will carry a heaviness about your calling. Deciding NOT to bloom where we shouldn’t be planted requires upheaval of our roots, an arduous and costly transplant, even though that is necessary for real growth.

Do not let the doubt stop you from seeking God’s best soil for your life. It is for freedom that Christ has set you free, and as you walk in that freedom the Kingdom expands and others will see it.

We can’t always control the conditions, the culture, or the family dynamics our first roots and shoots emerged from. But our soil needs constant monitoring, because we need different pH levels in different seasons and climates. And even if God is creating flourishing in your limitations in THIS time, it doesn’t mean you won’t outgrow that soil or require a change in the future.

So as you attempt to bloom where you are planted, always be willing to let God transplant you.

I’m in what feels very much like a transplanting season right now, where I’m finally owning a God dream and pursuing it in the ways that are in my hands. As of this month I’m enrolled to finish an undergraduate program at SNHU, with plans to pursue seminary within the next couple of years. I’m still struggling with the very real doubts inherent in the soil I was planted in originally. Yet I’m also realizing how God has used that very soil to catalyze my journey. (I accept the irony.)

Maybe you can relate?

If so, here are some questions from my own wrestling that may help you pray through whether God is planting or transplanting you in this season:

• What are the frustrations I’m frequently experiencing in my current season?
  • Are these frustrations God’s way of showing me that something is not right or good about the soil I’m currently growing in? (If so, move on to question 2.)
  • Or is God saying to accept the frustrations of these limitations because He is using them to strengthen and grow me? (If this is the case, then ask God to show you how to be present and patient in this season, and return to these questions again when you are ready.)
• What about this soil is toxic or unhealthy for me?
  • Is this soil filled with lies that are not of God? Are there human limitations based on patriarchy, hierarchy, racism (or any human isms for that matter)? Name it.
  • Is this healthy soil for another “plant”, but it isn’t sufficient for my gifts, passions and calling?

• What would true flourishing look like for me outside of anyone else’s expectations or human imposed rules?
  • Whose expectations or rules do you find yourself most following? Maybe it is your own, or a spouse, a parent, a pastor, a friend. Ask God to release you from that grip to be able to hear His voice clearly.
  • Allow the Spirit to give you the imagination to see yourself in the soil that would create flourishing for you and those around you. What does that feel like? Who are you able to give freedom to in this new soil? As best as you can, name that soil and move to the next question.

• What would it take for you to allow God to transplant you into that different soil?
  • Are you afraid to move because you fear that God will not be pleased with you if you make waves? Are you afraid that a transplant will dishonor God because you’ve lived so long in the lie that you can only honor God by staying put? If so, give God those fears. Ask Him to show you the next right step. Allow Him to lead YOU as you step towards what you believe is His truth. Trust that His Spirit WILL guide, correct or convict you if you wander off path.
  • Commit your way to God, and ask Him to show you what is in YOUR hands to do. This is perhaps the hardest step, because it requires us to move out of our comfort zone, even if that comfort zone was suffocating us. Know that God goes before you and will not abandon the work of His hands.

This is not easy work, and yet it is work we will find necessary at multiple stops on our journey. I have not shared so much of my journey to be transplanted because, to be honest, it has felt too vulnerable and I’ve been so afraid to make a wrong step. But I will keep you updated on my seminary story and would love to hear the ways you have taken steps to bloom where you are OR to allow God to transplant you to a healthier soil.