Early this morning as we entered the park in ‘Magic hours’ (the time for hotel guests only), we walked through the gates to be greeted with a scene of 4 gardeners per beautifully manicured flower bed. Some were working the outside small shrubs, pulling out little weeds, deadheading and picking up brown leaves. And in the middle of the bushes we saw just the tops of heads as the men worked the middle of the densest part of the shrubbery. 
It reminded me so much of one of my favourite epiphanies of personal growth – the concept of mental gardening: The practice of rooting out the weeds of the mind, the bad thoughts and the negative emotions.  
However the book I am reading at the moment is also helping appreciate that it isn’t just the pulling out of weeds that is necessary. To make a beautiful garden, one of beauty and of plenty, you have to fill the space in between the weeds. 
Not only with physical experiences and pleasures but for someone such as me who has such an active and incredibly vocal mind, then positive verbiage, words and language that can fill the void of the banished negative self talk. 
Completing each chapter’s ‘self love gym’ I have been given daily tasks to complete, example Phrases, scentences, declarations in all honesty, to repeat over and over in my head. I have been given the task of recognising the power of body language and the impact that has on my mindset.
And today I read the chapter on shame. And how I can rewrite my shameful thoughts and hard wired harmful beliefs into positive memories and create new empowering beliefs. 
I like best the bit about dancing shame away… The minute it happens.. Break into dance until you laugh! Push out the shameful memory and laugh at the smallness of it all… 
So back to my thoughts about the 4 gardeners: 2 to weed out around the periphery and 2 to plant in the core of the flower beds. In my mind as I work to rid my headspace of the suffocating, stifling, unnecessary and harmful thoughts, I need to replace the space with beauty, love, light, bright and powerful ones.