Just yesterday I discovered that the English name for a flower that in Germany is called “Mondviole” is honesty.
This name is so very fitting in many ways:
Like honesty this flower is never the first thing to be seen: it is rather small, the flowers are not big and showy, but it is always present by its wonderful smell. When looking at its flowers, the first thing that comes to my mind is simplicity, delicacy and strength combined with absolute clarity – and that is what honesty is about for me.
Being totally honest regardless of how confronting this may be for me or another person, will bring the most amazing simplicity. If I am honest, I create the basis for trust in myself and this reflects to others, allowing them to trust themselves, trust me and open up. On this open basis of honesty the most amazing changes can blossom, just like the flower ‘honesty’.
When I am totally honest and open, I feel very delicate and vulnerable. Not only is this delicacy a wonderful beauty in itself, but the vulnerability I show is in fact incredibly powerful. I have come to experience, when I show all of me, including my vulnerable side, I do not have fear, because I do not hide and do not try to protect my seemingly weak points. I do not see myself as small and less.
The strength that comes from this is such a different reflection to the world than the small anxious version of me that said to the world “I am a victim, come and bully me, because then I can lament and hide away from all I do not want to take responsibility for.” A clever trick I have exposed by being honest with myself and allowing myself to feel and show all the beauty and wisdom that is there deep inside of me, just waiting to be shown again.
Like the wonder of this small intensely fragrant flower, honesty for me first and foremost is beauty.
If it is brought to a situation or to life in general, there may be massive changes. Sometimes there may also be struggles at first, that on the surface do not feel so very beautiful, but in the end they are just the masking of the full beauty that is to peel away underneath. The beauty of a changing life, of eyes lighting up, letting true joy, love and stillness shine out into the world again.
What a marvellous reflection nature can be.
By Michael Kremer, Personal Assistant, Buchholz, Germany
Related Reading:
My Connection with Nature
An Amazing Journey with Honesty and Expression
Writing in a Journal and the Power of Honesty