An Injury Healed

A child I know has been growing a bean plant in school for science class. Each child in the class has placed a bean to the side of a wet piece of cotton wool in a plastic cup, and have observed the changes to the germinating bean plants day by day. I have popped in occasionally to watch the beans grow. Last week this child's bean plant look a bit frail. The germinating new stem had incurred a small injury, perhaps where too much water had coalesced, rotting the tiny stem where it emerged from the bean casing. I was not sure whether or not the plant would grow, but held hope, as the sprout ahead of the deformity was green and budding. Today I walked into the class and was amazed to see a bean plant that towered above the others, reaching green fingers into the air, as if in triumph. I looked closely and the injury could still be seen, but was being overtaken by the ever thickening stem.

Somehow the growth of this bean plant seems a fit analogy for how an underlying emotional injury may be healed. If you have incurred an emotional injury, and if you then have enough of the right care and a chance to prosper, you can outgrow your injury and overcome adversity. The emotional injury scar may always remain a part of you, but the crippling effect will fade in time.