Yesterday we visited Daintree Rainforest in Queensland Australia. This rainforest is older than the Amazon. At the Discovery Centre, we wandered around on paths ranging from ground level to 23 metres in the air. We’re familiar with walking in the forest, but walking at the different heights gave quite a different feel.
Some of the information boards talked about the various layers of growth – decay and regeneration on the ground, a mid-layer as trees matured, the canopy which blocked out much of the light, and the super tall trees that pushed through the canopy searching for light.
Other boards talked about the way that different plants grow. You’d think it was simple – plant a seed, it grows up. But there is more variety than that in a rainforest. There are vines – Tarzan style. Plants grow on other trees but create their own catchment system to collect nutrients and water. Plants grow from seed in a tree crevice and send roots down the tree; eventually outlasting their host tree to appear as though they grew there all by themselves in the first place.
I’d never thought about seeds growing from the top of a tree. I thought that they grew from the ground up.
Other boards went into the details of what different animals eat – flowers, fruit (some of them toxic to other animals or humans) – and how their seeds spread based on how far the animal travels. Tree kangaroos and birds drop seeds at the top of other trees. Cassowaries and other ground dwellers carry the seeds far from the original plant and excrete them in a different area.
We have a way about us that exudes a certain colour or scent. In Daintree, birds and insects are drawn to brightly coloured flowers and fruit, whereas opossums and bats are attracted to the pale or green ones. There is even a plant that exudes a smell like rotting meat to attract little flies which it needs to germinate.
Whether you’re bright or toxic, fragrant or bland, you will attract particular types of people to you. What seems plain in the daylight might be the first thing to shine in the dark. Comparing yourself to your neighbour won’t help, they’re designed to attract different people.
The bible describes what some would call virtues, as fruit. It lists off love, joy, peace, patience, faithfulness, kindness, goodness, gentleness and self-control. There are other fruits too. Some fruits contain seeds that sow life into relationships, others sow strife or division.
My assumption that fruit, and therefore seeds, fall to the ground to grow was an incomplete picture. Seeds sown into your life as a child or young person shape the type of person you grow into. But seeds might stick to you as an adult and work their way in, establishing themselves in a way that you never expected.
What if a seed establishes itself on the edges of your life and sends down roots to sustain itself. That new part of who you are, might outlast the original version of you and become the only thing that others see.
That means that you can change. The old you can become the scaffold for someone entirely different. It works both ways. When you allow something parasitic to latch on, it can quash who you once were. Equally, something may grow later in life, making you stronger and more varied, providing new environments for those around you.
So be aware of the influences in your life. Just because you are a certain way does not guarantee that you will remain that way. Seeds start small, then grow.
Those around you produce seeds that work their way into who you are. Different forest animals cover distinct distances or territories, still, the seeds they carry are more likely to fall close to home.
Seeds influence you even when you’re mature, so be discerning about which ones you allow to take root in your life.
Who you are, what you produce, influences the people around you.
Do you want to sow strife or life into your relationships? The way that you respond to someone might impact their future.
Holding an offence might become someone’s evidence that they’ll never be good enough, that they always do things wrong.
A harsh response might land in a life saying, ‘you can’t trust anyone’.
Unfaithfulness will grow, even if it’s hidden deep in the undergrowth right now.
Patience or kindness might become a turning point in someone’s life story. That fruit might plant a seed that develops into a kind person or someone who is patient with others.
Self-control and considering others plant other seeds.
At whatever level, some seeds flourish and others decay. We get to choose which seeds sprout in our life. Just like some birds peck away diseased matter, we can weed out those things that don’t sow life.
Daintree experiences frequent cyclones. Most recently in 2023, several slips and fallen trees changed the shape of the forest. The spaces created in the canopy or in freshly exposed earth are filling in as the surviving trees grow to fill the gaps.
Sometimes we remain hidden under a canopy that blocks out the light. When a storm blows through and clears out some of the old, those things that are underneath have space to grow and the terrain can change dramatically in a short period.
The devastation of a storm changes things. It also provides opportunities. What is growing up into the space created during that hard time you went through?
Much like us as a community, a forest goes through dramatic changes and regrowth. The seeds within it determine what it will become. There are tried and tested pillars of strength that provide shelter for others, like the beautiful 500-year-old fig tree towering in the canopy of Daintree. There is new growth that takes time to mature.
The trees in the Daintree Rainforest are not the originals, but what it is there now is a living testimony to the seeds that have sown and developed there for generations.
What fruit do you produce? What seeds do you sow in the lives of those around you; intentionally or as they digest and excrete what they carry from their interaction with you?
As someone processes their experience of you, you have no idea whether they’re going to drop those seeds nearby or at a great distance. What is it that multiplies from your life?
There are layers to a forest, each with their own roles. Who you are and what you do matters.
