How to keep a houseplant alive

I have been wanting to write this post for a while, but I struggled in putting into words. I need to push thoughts out of my head now, so here I go.

Houseplants need water. And sun, and soil. But then some houseplants need more water or more sun than others, or maybe a different kind of soil or a bigger pot for their roots. When houseplants get sick or don't do well, it's worth putting them into a different pot with different soil, maybe some fertilizer, and check out how much and water that plant is getting.

I saw this linkedin meme (unfortunately I was unable to find it again) about people being like houseplants. In the right environment, they flourish. But houseplants that need sun and water will look dismal in a dark corner, and plants that prefer the dark will dry up in the heat of the sun.

When I was unhappy at work, I was that houseplant in the wrong spot, in the wrong soil, with the wrong amount of water. But with the right amount of water, in the right spot - in the right company - that's where I blossom. Or do houseplants bloom? I actually don't know much about gardening, but this is going on my "google list".

I have felt at the right place for over a year now. And while I enjoy my job and the company and the people there, for me what shows that I'm at my best is my personal development. Sure, I'm still a bit too afraid of life, in general, I get sloppy sometimes, I'm scared of making mistakes and scared of not being (good? fast? nice?) enough. But in the one year, I have found the confidence to ride a bike to work after being terrified of biking for 15 years. I took charge of my health and went to see all my doctors - even accepted weekly (but necessary) dentist's appointments as part of that deal. I learned to drive a car - and hopefully I'll remember how because I haven't driven in like a month, but it's something I've secretly wanted to learn but never felt I could justify.

I'm out there being me, living my life, because my environment - that for 38 hours of the week, at the least, is my place of employment - where instead of feeling beaten down, I can rise up. I sometimes think back to my times at Starbucks, when we had this program of "being better than the you from the previous day every day" or something like that. We called it Growth mindset. I guess that was a good way to put it, but I do think rephrasing it into: Be your best, every day, and accept your best yesterday might have been better and your best tomorrow might be a bit less. We're humans, we can't just keep going uphill. But we need to take charge of every day, in some way or another - otherwise that houseplant (Which if you haven't figured out is me, I myself, ) is gonna get sick.