There are many biblical references to ‘reap what you sow’. But even if your persuasion is not biblically founded, the principle applies in our daily lives. We can reflect on our current circumstances and sometime blame life for dealing us a bad hand…a poor harvest. But if we just stop, catch our breath and think about how we got to where we are today, we would see that we planted a few wrong seeds or planted them in a weed patch.

Coming from the farm, I learned very early that you don’t mess with Mother Nature. You reap what you sow. Planting the right seeds in the right ground at the right time gave us the best chance to harvest the right crop. We seeded clover just after the last spring snowfall. We planted oats before the last frost and planted corn after the last frost. We planted wheat after harvesting the oats in late summer. We spread manure in the winter and spring on the old cornfields and after the last hay was harvested, we spread the manure on the old hay fields before planting the corn in the spring.

Look at something as simple as wheat seeds and weed seeds. Wheat is grown for consumption…to feed us. Weeds grow to consume us. It takes the same amount of energy to plant a wheat seed or a weed seed. What happens after the seed in planted makes the difference as to whether we have food or just a lot of weeds.

Weed seeds are numerous and diverse. There are more varieties of weeds than there are wheat seeds. Weed seeds can lay dormant in soil for years. They adapt to adverse growing conditions and thrive in ideal growing conditions. Weed seeds are resilient and resourceful. If you wanted to quickly cover exposed soil, plant weeds.

The wheat seeds simply don’t grow in poor soil. They like not too much or too little moisture, comfortable temperatures, and adequate sunlight and wheat plants prefer to be surrounded by other wheat plants. Sort of a community affair. But the weeds just don’t care. They grow where they want, when they want and with whom ever they want.

Just like in the soil where there are weed seeds lying dormant, waiting for the opportunity to grow, there are life’s weed seeds that surround us, waiting for the opportunity to consume us. Life’s weeds seeds come in many varieties from dysfunctional family support to misleading or agenda driven social and community environments. The important thing to remember is that you are the fertile ground for life’s wheat or life’s weeds to grow.

There is a saying, ‘where we are today is based on the books we read and the people we know’. We can change it to say, ‘where we are today is based on the type of seeds that we grow’. We can grow life’s wheat seeds in order to consume (have a life style of our choosing) or we can let life’s weeds sow them selves and consume us (have a life style dictated by others).

The farmer has a choice to make. Will he cultivate the wheat and eliminate the harmful effects of the weeds or will he neglect his food crop at the expense of the weeds. He will either enjoy loaves of bread just the way he likes it or he will eat weeds and complain about the taste and not having any bread.

It’s interesting that once the farmer was able to make bread, the weed farmers felt that they should have some of the farmer’s bread.

“You reap what you sow,” he said. “It will take hard work. You will have to sort the wheat seeds from the weed seeds and constantly watch out for new weeds.”

When you harvest your life’s wheat, there will be life’s weed farmers out there who just want a little of your success. Be a good farmer and teach them how to plant their own life’s wheat. If they listen, you perpetuated life’s wheat harvest and they will eat for generations. If they don’t listen, they will find that some weeds are OK if cooked in vinegar and garlic until they are tender.

How can you tell the difference between life’s wheat and life’s weed seeds?
In the new book, Grandpa And Andy, Grandpa talks about five principals to live by and by doing so you will know whether you are growing life’s wheat or life’s weeds. Your personal success and lifestyle will be determined by how you understand and live these principals.

Grandpa’s Legacy
1. Know the difference between right and wrong and always choose right.
2. Be accountable for your actions. Take personal responsibility.
3. Never quit learning. Always be a student but become a teacher.
4. Change the things that can be changed and don’t worry about the things that can’t be changed.
5. Help your neighbor. Help the people who want to be helped and don’t worry about the people who don’t want to be helped.

What do you do when you have weeds in your garden?
You recognize the weeds and pull them out one at a time. Some people find themselves surrounded by life’s weeds. Rather than pull them out, they try to live with in the weeds. Weeds will out grow wheat every time. If you have a bad influence (life weed) in your garden, either get rid of it or move your garden.

There are always people out there to help the people who want to be helped. Like the farmer told the weed farmers, ‘I’ll teach you how to grow wheat…if you want to eat bread (change your life style) but if you just want to eat my bread (don’t change your lifestyle), it’s probably best you learn to like cooked weeds.

You can choose your lifestyle or you can live the lifestyle that someone chooses for you: Wheat or Weeds