Oportus blog September 2023

Don’t give up; the potential is in the seed…

This is our second year of trying to grow butternut squash here in Ireland. Last year, the seeds from a butternut squash we’d eaten got planted into a pot on our windowsill, watered and nurtured until they were ready to go outside and then planted in a small bed I made at the back of the house. It was really encouraging to see the rate at which they grew in just a matter of weeks, and even when they were subjected to the wild Autumn storms of the west of Ireland, they kept growing and putting out loads of green foliage…and even flowers.

Our hopes were high for a butternut squash banquet when these root vegetables eventually appeared (however, after doing a little research, I’ve now discovered that the humble butternut squash is “botanically a fruit – specifically a berry, as it has seeds which come from the flowering part” rather than a vegetable – who knew?), especially as the vines grew longer and longer, spreading out for several feet. Alas, nothing came of them and we since found out that the male flowers and the female flowers need to exchange pollen in order to produce fruit.

This year, some very kind neighbours let us have some space in their polytunnel to try our hand out at growing, before we step out and invest in a polytunnel of our own. We were specifically told not to plant too many squashes as they tend to take over the space. I’m not sure we fully understood, as we only planted the seeds from one butternut squash that we had eaten. To cut a long story short, when I went there yesterday for the first time in a couple of weeks to check on things, I was confronted by what looked like a Connemara version of the Amazon rainforest! The basil, peppers and other bits and pieces we’d also planted are lost somewhere under the huge leaves, and the tomatoes are putting up a valiant but hard-fought battle. How many butternut squashes did I find when I waded through this jungle? I received a message from our neighbour, saying that it didn’t look like they’d pollinated so probably wouldn’t produce fruit and would need to be pulled up in the next few weeks. I was just about ready to give up on squash, when something caught my eye just as I reached the door – a small (not the length of my finger), but golden and squash-shaped thing growing out of the greenery. I got excited and started looking more closely – there are four or five baby squash growing right there!

Sure, there’s a way to go yet, and anything could happen, but what is undeniable is that there was potential in those seeds and at least some of the plants are bearing; we just needed to not give up yet.

One of Oportus’ quotes is: ‘If at first you don’t succeed, learn and try again. Our butternut squash journey is far from over, and I’m sure we’ll have more learning to do in the next weeks, months and years, but if we’d given up and pulled up the plants when it seemed like they weren’t doing what we hoped for, we’d have really missed the potential in the seed! Have you got any similar journeys to share? Have you had to go back to something that didn’t work the first, second or third time, to get the result? It would be great to hear about them! In the meantime, let’s keep learning even when it’s tempting to give up as the potential is in the seed…

Oportus Resource

Here’s a link to a chapter of The Learn Thing, a book I wrote a couple of years ago, on Learning to try again – this is a free download which I hope will inspire you to try again and maybe bring a smile to you or somebody you know!

New Oportus Training

Know Your Potential (workshop)

People are often unaware of their true potential, just like our humble butternut squash; it can also be difficult to know how to encourage someone to get up and try again. The Know Your Potential workshops are for those who would like to enable those they work with/for to discover their potential by looking at their work history, life experiences etc. to see where best they can use them.

This training can be offered online or in-person and is suitable for:

• Corporates who want help to uncover the potential within their teams to meet their CSR goals

• Community groups or charities working with people who need to move into a new phase around meaningful occupation

If you or a group you know would like to find out more about the Know Your Potential workshop or other Oportus services, please get in touch here, by email at: thomas@oportus.net or by telephone on 07398 201 738 (UK) or 0877 570 501 (Republic of Ireland) and we’d be happy to discuss how we can help.