Sunflower Spirit Message: Rise, Stand Tall, And Never Feel Small Again

Good morning, Happy Monday, and welcome to August! Today is an exciting start to the new month as I roll out my huddle-affiliated podcast. I am daring to step outside my comfort zone as I forge ahead on my mission to expand my year-long Vocal Media project, hoping to reach more people. Am I nervous? Yes, but the time has come to take the show on the road (so to speak).

Today, nature's nurture comes from the sunflower, and a spiritually guided message prepares one for a brighter future.

My cover image features a tall sunflower with another mighty one set to bloom just above. Taken in my landlord's garden, this picture spoke to me before I snapped the photo. Standing below this (estimated at least 10-12 feet tall) beauty, I felt like I was lost in the landscape under such a glorious giant. Below the golden wonder, sat a group of much smaller sunflowers, but their beauty was by no means diminished by their taller counterpart.

Then the story unfolded...

"I felt like I was lost in the landscape under such a glorious giant,"- my words written above spoke to much more than a reflection of my physical self standing in a garden.

Small, I've often felt small in this world, and this goes far beyond my barely 5'1" posture. And although my most recent personal development has afforded me miles of growth compared to a few months ago, I couldn't help but recall my past while the mighty sunflower spoke to me.

From being often bullied in grade school as the bony, scrawny one to being the continuously cast aside weird teen, feeling smaller, feeling less than my apparently better peers was a long and arduous journey. Shy, I was not, but a lack of empathy and understanding from what would have otherwise been friends silenced my voice in too many ways to count.

"Otherwise would have been friends", meaning if I had fit in with the status quo.

But I didn't because I chose not to follow the crowd.

Sitting here for a moment, like I did under the sunflower, a message speaks:

Rise, stand tall, and never feel small again

Moving onward...

Adulthood and freedom from the rearing hormones of undeveloped minds didn't always pan out to my higher expectations of what maturity was supposed to mean. The world, I soon discovered, was much like sitting at the lonely old desk in a classroom, where lessons scribbled on chalkboards didn't amount to much in the walk of everyday life.

Textbook to applicable efforts felt lost to me, and I often felt like my truest sense of self meant going at it all alone.

Dare I, how dare I fight to keep hold of the hand of my true being while the world waved me onward "Do it this way, Don't do that, Be like this, and Don't be like that," albeit subtle, not so subtle gestures.

Never quite fitting in and never quite caring, while still longing to find a sense of belonging, has made for much disappointment and heartache along the way, but I follow no one and nothing- nothing but the sun.

As I wrapped up my photo session for this post, lingering feelings of inadequacy and insecurity from a recent job displacement prompted by a knee injury started to feel like excessive weight. A mighty sunflower commanded my full attention, while spiritually, I felt a tug at my being. If the sunflower could talk, it would say: "Let it all go. Those feelings do not serve you. Better days are on the horizon."

Rise, stand tall, and never feel small again.

🌻🌻🌻

Sunflower Spirit Message Elaborated

While I briefly described a personal occurrence above, I feel a nudge to elaborate for you, the reader.

Rising to the occasion and walking tall might feel awkward or out of place, especially if one has been long conditioned to do otherwise. It could feel like pushing boundaries, stepping out of a comfort zone, or taking a leap of faith. Well, it's a yes to all of the previous stated, but keep in mind that you weren't born to remain pushed behind a line, put here to always be comfortable, or meant to remain at a standstill.

If you've ever felt small, whether it was directly imposed upon you by peers, elders, societal expectations, workplace pressures, etc- or a feeling that comes from self as a result of insecurity (which is likely traceable to a situation, person, or event), then you know how suffocating this feels to your existence.

Your higher self not only doesn't want you to feel small, but wants you to understand that you NEVER were in the first place.

The challenge: uncondition the condition and create a new rendition of self.

Sit with this fact for a moment, and consider your alter reality:

Real talk- sunflowers follow the sun. Heliotropism describes young plants' sun-tracking abilities- facing east at dawn and slowly rotating their heads as the sun moves across the sky. The behavioral changes are much like our human inner clock.

The obvious benefits of the sun are warmth, sustaining life on earth, but this benefit speaks only about the physical, not the spiritual.

Spiritually, the sun represents light, the light of the divine, a light that resides in every being.

Nature finds a neat little way of reflecting the sun, sharing its message in the sunflower plant. Unlike the sun, you can reach out and touch it and feel its vibrancy in your soul. Perhaps this earth-based intermediary is a comrade you didn't know you needed. Maybe, just maybe, its glow-up is the show-up you need right now at this very moment to stop crouching, sitting on the sidelines, remaining "small". Maybe, right now is the time for you to rise up, rise to the occasion, and then erase the embedded equation.

Summation:

All those adverse reactions to your existence, words negating with persistence, down-in-the-dumps comments, naysayers' torments, familial fixated, generational downloaded, rearing-rejected, explained society protected, culturally respected- oft meaning nearsighted, ignoring spiritually heightened- they are all lies, whether meant or intended, even innocent- they are all lies.

You are, not now nor have you ever been, anything close to small.

Sunflower spirit has spoken.

Rise, RISE, RISE

🌻🌻🌻

Podcast Debut

Well, well, well, the day is finally here. I got the darn smoke detector fixed and have finally completed day one of my YouTube podcast-style channel. Be forewarned, folks, this is just the beginning. No fancy schmancy equipment, so don't expect a pro's hand here.

As for the journal, which I published on Amazon, it was temporarily removed due to some necessary edits regarding book details. KDP has some strict guidelines, and things have changed since I published with them five years ago. In the future, I will share links to the journal on my channel.

Yes, I published before using one of the few fictional stories I published right here on Vocal, turning it into a children's book. Here is the book, and below is the original story.

And, finally, the YouTube Video debuts the Monday Morning Huddle podcast style. 👆

Have a happy Monday and see you next week!

PS: No script in the video. It's just me yakking away, raw and unfiltered, minus edits and whatnot!