Shake the tree

It’s time to shake the tree. Tree shaking can be a very tidieous process but necessary nevertheless. You need to shake the tree once in a while, to rid all the dead leaves and branches that have long withered and no longer serve a purpose. Yet, you do not want to damage the tree in any way, sometimes the dead branches still do offer support, sometimes the healthy leaves need to be pruned too, to make way for more growth.

It’s a delicate process, deciding on what to prune and what to keep. Deciding on how you want the tree to grow, and how you want to shape it. Deciding on how it’s grown thus far, and if you like the current results. Never quite knowing if the pruning will yield the desired results further down the road.

But yet, there is only so much you can do, pruning and shaping and shaking the tree. The natural elements have their influence too, the sun, the wind and the rain. The fertility of the earth around, the other trees. They all play a part in contributing to how the tree has grown so far, and how it will further develop — but it’s totally beyond your control, and it’s totally unpredictable.

But they too have an important role to play, to challenge the tree and to shape it, to nourish it and to bend it. To give the tree character. To strengthen the tree, deepen the roots and yet mildly sway it.

It’s necessary to do the tree-shaking exercise periodically, to clear the unwanted and to cultivate the neglected. So that the tree can continue to strive to be the best tree in the forest. The tallest tree to provide a view, or the broadest to provide the shade. The thickest to protect from the storm, the most colourful to brighten up the woods.

There are many trees around, but what makes this tree different and so very special, is that it’s my tree.

Final words: We all need a dream. But yet, whatever it is, there is no single purpose to life for everyone. There is no meaning to life except what we attach to it — we get as much out of it as we attach to it. We need to each define our own reasons for living, for being. The sportsperson lives to play the perfect game, the software engineer who wants to develop the killer app, the painter who wants to paint the perfect piece, the musician who wants to play the perfect score, all driven by passion to be more than just alive.