The other day I drove past a beautiful field of poppies. At least it seemed so, but when I stopped to look at it,  it became clear that it was actually a field of wheat, with poppies growing up through it. It reminded me of the parable of the weeds among the wheat, in the gospel of St Matthew. In the story the servants notice that someone has planted weeds in among the wheat, weeds that are almost impossible to distinguish from the real crop. The Master’s instruction is to leave them grow together, until the harvest, when they will be easily divided.

Normally this parable is interpreted in a way that refers to the judgment at the end of time. However, it can also be a wisdom that applies to our life now. There are many areas of our life which we would like to change, which we feel do not contribute to our overall growth. We can be unhappy with aspects of our body,  of our job or our relationship – whichever “weed” we think is ruining our field. Our attention is often drawn to that aspect of our life, and it becomes the focus of our happiness or unhappines.

And we often notice that out desire or our instinct is to fix ourselves, rip up these “weeds”,  remove them immediately from our lives. We find ourselves believing that things would be better if this or that was changed. We notice that it is not easy to accept ourselves, that we almost always want to change ourselves.

However, the parable points us in another direction, and gives two insights. The first says let the weeds and the wheat grow together. This goes against our normal instinct which is to turn away from the things that disturb or scare us, and says let us start by tolerating or accepting them.  The second draws our attention to the fact that we are always imposing conditions: it must be this way or that way, or we can’t be happy. These conditions can lead us to look elsewhere for happiness, and not realize that the all we need is already in our lives right now. Even with the weeds.

When we start meditation, we often think that somehow we are going to improve, which is a subtle aggression against who we really are: its a bit like saying “If I jog, I’ll be a much better person”, “If I had a nicer house, I’d be a better person”. “If I could meditate and calm down, I’d be a better person”. Or we find fault with others. We might say “If it weren’t for my husband, I’d have a perfect marriage”…. But loving kindness towards ourselves doesn’t mean getting rid of anything…Meditation practice isn’t about trying to throw ourselves away and become something better. It’s about befriending who we are already.

Pema Chodron, Comfortable with Uncertaintly