Journal Potuguese Release - February 2024 - Flipbook - Page 82
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in an active, dynamic position. In the words of Freire: “To hope is to get up, to
hope is to go after, to hope is to build, to hope is not to give up! To hope is to
move forward, to hope is to join with others to do otherwise…”
Everything we plant in life has a time to come into being. It is in this position that
it is up to us to hope like the farmer. It is at this moment that I usually write and
deliver poetry to people.
4) Celebrating the Harvest
As important as preparing the soil, planting the best seeds, and knowing how to
hope is, to perceive the field producing and harvesting. Celebrating this moment
means recognizing the strength of the whole process. In the words of Freire
(1996): “Joy does not come only when finding something, but it is part of the
search process. And teaching and learning cannot happen without the search, the
beauty and joy” (p.160). As an educator, Freire talks about the process of
'teaching and learning' which, in this text, we metaphorically call 'sowing and
harvesting' – and which, as such, applies to the most different processes in life.
The harvest reveals the power of wonder – the revealed 'beauty' – which forms
the basis of the preferred story: the one that reveals the preferred identity of the
person we’re talking to. Realizing that one is capable of transforming soils
previously taken over by weeds into gardens full of 'beauties' reveals the capacity
of each one, individually and collectively, to sow dreams and harvest realities.
I now present two stories of therapeutic processes in which the Gardening
Narratives metaphor was used. It is important to say that both were authorized to
be published and that, to maintain secrecy, the names were omitted or modified.
Another point to be highlighted is that, like any process, nothing happens linearly
or following a rule. The fluidity and organization required in a written text are not
found in the same way as the dynamics of interactions and dialogues which are
more based on simultaneity, dynamic responsiveness and continuous
reorganization. In the words of Freire (1992): “An event, a fact, a deed, a gesture
of anger or love, a poem, a canvas, a song, a book never have a single reason
behind it. (...) That's why I was always much more interested in understanding the
process in which and how things happen than the product itself” (p. 18). So, I
invite you to understand the process and I hope that the essence of Gardening
Gardening Narratives and Writing Stories
Journal of Contemporary Narrative Therapy February 2024 Release, www.journalnft.com, p. 7191.