Moldy Lemon Peels and Wholeness

My kids bought a big, black plastic composter bin and set it in the corner of the garden. Now, instead of throwing all biodegradable waste into one pile for the town to collect, we're keeping lemon and banana peels, eggshells, coffee grounds, and the lettuce that sat in the fridge too long.

The bin's contents are smelly, unpalatable, and attract thousands of pests specifically designed to break down the very things that we spent good money on at the grocery store.

Decomposition is a complex, multi-stage process. A diverse community of worms, beetles, sowbugs, and millipedes physically shred dead plant material into smaller fragments. The kids (who are actually adults, just kids to me) even went looking for worms to add to the bin. Next, bacteria and fungi take over at the biochemical level, secreting enzymes that digest the complex structures.

What once was a lemon peel is now heat, water, carbon dioxide, and mineral nutrients. The raw, decaying debris becomes a stable, nutrient-rich, dark and fertile soil that's glorious for feeding new life.

So much of our cultural conditioning tells us that we should be constantly improving, cleaning up, and fixing ourselves. The coaching industry is often complicit. We package transformation as a polishing project, as if wholeness waits at the end of enough fixing. In my American evangelical growing-up years, I was taught to polish away my flaws, take initiative, achieve greatness, and hide my messes. When I buy apples at Lidl, they're all highly polished, all the same size, all perfectly ripe with no bruises, kept fresh in a cardboard container.

Even certain streams of Eastern spirituality, which claim to be about total awakening and non-duality, often try to shush, ignore, or transcend the striving, achieving, comparing, and critical mind. They teach us to push the ego away, as if it were something dirty that doesn't belong. Yoga and breathwork practices can be as guilty of "spiritual by-passing" as praying and going to church.

The compost pile tells a different tale. It offers a much bigger, more generous lesson.

Awakening isn't about ridding ourselves of the parts of ourselves we don't like. It's about total integration. It means learning to hold, love, and accept even that small, combative, angry, egocentric mind inside. It means taking that reactive, defensive "I" and including it within the vastness of All That Is. It's keeping the moldy lemon peel close to home, and integrating it into the soil.

This isn't easy. It goes against almost everything we've ever been taught. It requires immense courage to look at our own shadow, or to stand present with the uncomfortable, difficult parts of another human being, and say: You belong here, too.

And trust me, I feel it! This week was the absolute WORST! Tenants destroying property. Someone stealing my passwords and committing bank fraud. Changing the locks. Changing the passwords. A couple of people we won't name here acting like complete %&#heads. I didn't feel enlightened or awakened this week. I felt pissed and strung out.

One of our course participants reminded me that serving people, no matter how challenging, abrasive, or unpalatable their behavior might feel in the moment, is divine work.

And serving ourselves requires the exact same grace. We have to stop waging war on our own minds. When we stop trying to silence the loud, scared, striving ego and instead wrap it in loving awareness, it stops being an obstacle. It breaks down, dissolves into our innate wholeness, and becomes the very groundwork for our wisdom, empathy, and growth.

When I allow awareness to take a look at me, there's always plenty of love for the stressed-out, pissed-off parts of me. It gets pretty amusing.

And yes, those people who made my week so hard belong in the pile, too. I am still turning that one over.

Here is what the compost bin keeps teaching me: transformation needs the right conditions. Day after day, the peels and coffee grounds go in, and the pile gets turned. The soil arrives in its own time, in a place set aside for exactly this work.

Every year at Awaken, we refine our sense of who our courses and community are for. Awaken is for a particular kind of person, and we say so gladly. We are for the coach who is ready to bring the whole pile, the polished parts and the moldy ones. We are for the person who longs to trade fixing and perfecting for presence, and who senses that being fully present with a client begins with being fully present with themselves. We are for those who choose depth over speed, belonging over convenience, and wholeness over polish.

The people who find their way to us come for the values far more than for a convenient calendar or time zone. Again and again, someone arrives and says some version of: "Yes! Finally. These are my people!"

That recognition is the rich soil we tend together, one moldy lemon peel at a time.

Everything has a place. Nothing is wasted. The bitterness you feel, the anger you hold, the striving you can't seem to quiet, are all raw material for your awakening.

May you have the courage today to embrace the whole pile: the sweet, the bitter, the smooth, and the moldy. It is all turning into rich soil for something beautiful to grow.

About the Author

Christi Byerly, MCC, is the founder and CEO of Awaken Coach Institute. Her coaching process motivates you to build a community of empathy and grace around you, and to live your mission as part of something bigger than you are. With over 15 years of coaching experience, Christi has trained hundreds of new coaches and maintains a thriving practice focused on depth, presence, and authentic transformation.

Frequently Asked Questions  

Why does wholeness matter for a coach?

Wholeness is our natural state, already present beneath every story about what needs fixing. Coaches who rest in that wholeness bring every part of who they are into a session: the wise and the reactive, the tender and the defended. Clients sense that permission and begin welcoming more of themselves, too. Coach and client grow together, held in the same Love.

How is self-acceptance a wholeness practice?  

Self-acceptance begins with getting to know our parts: the striving achiever, the inner critic, the frightened child, the angry protector. Shadow work is the practice of turning toward the parts we have hidden or rejected and meeting them with curiosity and care. Every part we welcome home reveals more of the wholeness already here, the same way every peel in the compost bin returns to the soil.

What is radical acceptance at Awaken Coach Institute?  

Radical acceptance is the foundation of the Awaken approach: meeting whatever is present, in ourselves and in others, with Love instead of resistance. Radical acceptance begins at home, with our own messy, striving, beautiful selves. Love is always available to hold every part of us, and receiving that Love for ourselves can be the hardest lesson life teaches. We hope every coach leaves our coach certification training carrying that lesson as a lifelong companion.

How does self-acceptance deepen coaching presence?  

Coaching presence is the practice of staying fully with a client, moment by moment, with openness and trust. Maintaining presence is one of the ICF Core Competencies. As we welcome our own anger, fear, and striving, we can sit steadily with a client who brings those same experiences. Presence gives clients room to hear their own wisdom. Coaches witness transformation, trusting the Path to do the deeper work.

What is spiritual bypassing?

Spiritual bypassing is the use of spiritual beliefs or practices to avoid difficult emotions, unresolved wounds, or the parts of ourselves we dislike. Psychotherapist John Welwood coined the term. Some people use meditation, prayer, or positive thinking to rise above pain. Wholeness invites a gentler path: turning toward every part of ourselves with loving awareness, so everything becomes soil for growth.