Prefer or Tolerate

One of my ways of keeping sane (or driving myself crazy a different way maybe) is a Bonsai practice. As someone with artistic tendencies and a wide ranging knowledge of plants that began when I was a child, it is a practice and a hobby I am well suited to. It is easy to spend 30 minutes a day wiring, weeding, feeding, tending, watering and it certainly is a different pace from real estate.

I was watching a video about applying the artform to our beautiful native pohutukawa, and the host was saying how Pohutukawa prefer coastal conditions and like salt spray. Most plants do not like being blasted by salt, and will tell you so by curling up their leaves and dying. Not so for our beautiful Pohutukawa trees. But I got to thinking, do they prefer the salt, or do they tolerate the salt.

Because when I go down to the coast, the trees right on the water are twisted and gnarled, and often there is more grey dead wood than bright green leaves.

As you go back from the waterline, the trees become less tortured looking, fuller, and greener. And at this time of the year, if you were going to start counting flowers, surely a sign of good health, the trees with more leaves have more flowers.

So does our New Zealand native Christmas tree prefer salt, or does it just tolerate it?

My question to myself and my challenge to you is to decide whether you are tolerating or preferring your circumstances.

You have the ability to move around, a Pohutukawa doesn’t.

If you are in something or doing something and you are simply tolerating it, maybe you are not thriving. We want to thrive in ‘25. We are out of the economic doldrums, and this creates the opportunity to make change. The changes may well have outsized results. Make 2025 the year to use your ability to move and start heading towards preference. You might just find yourself with a bit more vigour and a few more flowers at this time next year.