Six months ago my garden stopped. Or so it seemed. Leaves turned brown and dropped off. Flowers vanished. Vines ceased producing fruit, withered, and crumbled. Newts, butterflies, moths, dragonflies; even the neighbour’s cat – disappeared. For five months or so I stood on the patio looking out over a brown, crumpled, lifeless trapezoid (our garden is not quite rectangular).

It was empty.

It was spent.

I sometimes wondered if this vine, or that fruit tree would ever spring back to life – would it survive the “down time”.

The “visual” of my garden in that down time, was deceptive, for underneath the surface things were happening. Trees were resting, and preparing for the spring. Newts were hibernating (at least I think they hybernate), eggs were maturing, the ground was renewing its richness. Things were happening in the quiet of “down time” that were not immediately apparent.

Here we are some six months later and the fruit trees have blossomed, and are covered in little fruits and leaves. Lettuce, beans, and melons are sprouting reaching ever higher preparing to put on their annual show. Newts have returned to the pond in droves, and are in full mating show. The fish have lifted themselves from the bottom, shaken off their winder slumber and are zipping around demanding food and looking to mate in a few weeks time. Bamboo shoots are popping up left and right, mint is spreading, bay is flowering, irises have produced long stalks with promising buds. The active life has returned to the garden.

And so it is with one’s spiritual life. We go through periods of intense activity, engagement, interest. Then something throws a switch and shuts it all down – or so we think. We become emotionally detached, even a bit depressed, wondering, “where did it all go?” But it comes back.

Perhaps the trick is to learn to cultivate a less enthusiastic, more consistent “sense” of spirituality, so that the “garden” produces year round and not just in the few months of spring and summer. A skill which I think is much more difficult than it appears – on the surface at least.