Learning patience from my lawn mower

August 7, 2025

I like mowing the lawn. I spend a lot of time thinking, writing, facilitating groups, reading, and working on the computer, so it’s a relief to do tasks like mowing the lawn, stacking firewood, and shoveling snow, where I can see my progress as I go and don't have to come up with something new. 

Contrary to what most people assume when I mention this predilection, I don’t have a riding mower. I like making smaller and smaller shapes of uncut grass as I walk, noticing the details of what kinds of grasses and weeds grow where, where the ground dips and where it rises, what wildflowers / weeds I will choose to mow around, so the insects can continue to enjoy them. You don't get detail like that if you're driving a vehicle.

This spring I bought a new mower — battery-operated and self-propelled. It’s much easier to go up the hill my house is on, now that it’s the lawn mower, not me, that’s making the effort.

There’s one thing I don’t like about my new lawn mower, however, and that is that it’s hard to back up. When I’m mowing under the bushes, say, I can’t just move in a straight line. I have to tunnel under the bushes and then back up the mower, so I can go straight again. But in order to do so with this mower, I have to let go of the handles that drive it forward, let it roll a couple more inches on its own, pause, and then back it up . Otherwise, the wheels lock and I have to drag it backwards, which is a difficult, hot, and heavy task.

At first I was so annoyed with this idiosyncrasy that I almost returned the lawn mower. But since I like it in other ways, I decided to see if I could make friends with this feature. I decided to see if it could teach me patience.

Patience is not a virtue of mine. I get impatient easily: with slow drivers, people who talk (what I deem) too long, redundancy, grammatical errors made by media people who should know better, and having to read through a lot of useless instructions (“Open the box. Remove the packaging.”) before getting to the information I want. 

So, I’m trying to learn from my lawn mower. Every time I have to back it up, I allow it to do its little routine, and while that’s happening, I simply attend to it. I let it go forward without shoving it. In the pause it needs before I can back it up, I myself pause. 

Have I noticed a great change in myself?

I can’t say that I have, at least not yet. I haven’t started taking advantage of this small spell of non-action to do anything high-minded, like reflect on spiritual matters or focus on my breathing. Still, I like to think that some hasty, eager part of me drops into that space, like the petal of a hibiscus flower floating to the grass. And that I am, on some level, more serene.

That's an example of what I mean with the motto of this blog: grabbing the Great Now from the tiny now. Lessons may arise wherever we look.