The Olive Tree

We aren't too familiar with olive trees here in Minnesota because they can't survive our harsh zone 4 winters.  I was reading about olive trees earlier this week. It takes 15 years for a sapling to reach olive bearing maturity. (In contrast fruit trees will typically bear in 3-5 years.). 15 years is a long time to dedicate space and nurture to a crop before getting any pay back at all.

However, once the root system and the scaffolding of the plant is in place olive trees can bear fruit for 2000 years. There are trees in the middle east that are this old. I've heard the analogy of slow and steady personal growth if we want to be  "a squash or an oak tree", Based on these new facts I guess I rather be an olive tree.

Learning about the olive tree made me think about the task of parenting and the parallels between olive tree husbandry and raising children. Here are 5 principles of raising children gleaned from the olive tree.