Our Tree Died ... AND

What if the thing you planted with hope — the thing that once gave you shade, shelter, and pride — is now standing in your way?What if it’s not growing … It’s groaning? What if it’s not dying … It’s already dead, and you just haven’t admitted it yet?

In this raw and thought-provoking episode of the UNCOMMODiFiED Podcast, Tim Windsor amplifies the quiet death of a Norwegian maple on his front lawn into a brutally honest meditation on growth, loss, and renewal. Through the violence of a chainsaw and the silence that follows, Tim invites you to confront the dying “trees” in your own life — the projects, relationships, habits, and beliefs that once gave life but now steal it.

This isn’t a story about gardening — it’s a story about courage. The courage to admit when something’s no longer alive. The courage to cut it down. And the courage to replant — deliberately, patiently, and with purpose. With unfiltered honesty and piercing insight, Tim explores the roots of why we cling to the dead, how “shoulds” silently suffocate our growth, and what it takes to cultivate a new season of possibility.

Listeners will walk away with questions that cut deep — and answers that can heal: How to audit your “root system” and identify what’s nourishing or draining you. How to know when something’s dormant versus dead. Why destruction often precedes rebirth. And how to plant new beginnings that will one day stand tall again.

Our Tree Died … And: is a reflection on endings, beginnings, and the fierce, liberating beauty of growth that appears only after you let go and stop watering what’s dead.

Tim Windsor
the UNCOMMODiFiED Podcast – Host & Guide
tim@uncommodified.com
https://uncommodified.com/
  
PRODUCERS: Alyne Gagne & Kris MacQueen 
MUSIC BY: https://themacqueens.ca/

Transcript

PLEASE NOTE: UNCOMMODiFiED Podcast episode transcriptions are raw text files and have not been proofed or edited. They are what they are … Happy Reading.

© UNCOMMODiFiED & TIM WINDSOR 

What if the thing you once planted with hope, the thing that once shaded and sheltered you, the thing that stood tall and proud on your front lawn is now just standing in the way of something new. What if it's not growing? What if it's actually just groaning? What if it's not just dying? What if it's already dead and you just haven't admitted it?

Hey, my friends. Welcome back to the Unmodified podcast. I'm Tim Windsor, and this gonna be a bit different. This is a Sunday morning coffee chat. It's Sunday morning. Grabbing a coffee here. I just wanna have a chat about this because I had this experience and I think there's some real lessons for me and for you in it Today.

I wanna tell you the story, A story really about death, about roots, about rot and redemption. There. There was a Norwegian maple tree on our front lawn. It was, it was stately. It was strong until it wasn't. Over the years, we watched it die in slow motion, slowly from the top and the culprit. Actually its [00:01:00] roots, tangled, constricted, and no longer able to draw life water from the earth.

It was a stark and almost brutal reminder to me that sometimes the most vital parts of us, of our lives are hidden unseen, and when they fail, we don't realize it right away, but everything starts to suffer and to shrivel. Now this experience has got me thinking, really thinking about our own roots, my roots, personal and professional, about the silent struggles that can choke off our growth and the uncomfortable, often painful decisions that we face when something we've invested in something we've nurtured is simply no longer viable.

So here's some of the things that I've been thinking about as a result of this experience. I think it's time for you and I to audit our subterranean root system. Just like those maple tree roots, our own can get entangled. They can become atrophied, no longer able to get water.

The question that I [00:02:00] think about is, are we spending maybe too much time on things that don't genuinely feed our soul, or are we just going through the motions? Are you, craving and getting relationships that are truly reciprocal or are some of them draining you, leaving you without any water to return?

It's time, I think for an honest inventory, for you and I to consider this, to consciously nurture our roots and make sure that they don't become knotted in a mess of obligations and superficial connections. It's also reminding me that I think there's a silent killer at work, the, the silent suffocation of shoulds.

How often do we let external pressures and societal shoulds dictate our choices rather than listening to our internal compass? I think these are sort of like the rocks that we found in the ground, that were pressing on the root. They, they're limiting the ability of those roots to expand and draw a nourishment ultimately.

So my question is, what shoulds are choking your growth right now? And what if you just didn't see the only way forward? I think. This [00:03:00] journey for all of us, is to admit the tree was dead. And this was perhaps the hardest part, the denial for months, for years, we, we hoped maybe it was just a tough season, maybe it would bounce back, but the browning leaves the brittle branches, its inability to draw water to the top anymore.

They told us a different story and eventually we had to admit the tree was dead. I think this translates into our lives. We must muster up the courage to declare every once in a while that something is dead. We cling to dying projects, failing relationships on unfulfilling careers, not because they serve us, but because of the fear of the unknown, nor the sunk cost fallacy.

We've invested so much. How can we let go? But continuing to water a dead tree or dead dreams only drains your resources and prevents new growth. The question we all must ask ourselves is this. Is it time for us to acknowledge something is truly irrevocably dead in our lives? [00:04:00] And if it is, then I think what happens is we discover as we did that day when the arborists came to take it down, that the chainsaw is a powerful and painful tool.

Making the decision to remove the maple tree was hard. The sawing, the cutting, the cutting of the trunk, the limbs, correction, its ground. It felt violent, destructive. But I guess it's no different when we cut off ties with a part of our past or a self limbing belief or relationship that no longer serves us.

It's painful. It, it's messy, but sometimes that necessary destruction is the only path to renewal. To do this, we all musk, as we did that day, embrace the temporary chaos on the front lawns of our lives. Now, the space where the Norwegian maple stood, it felt when we took it out, it empty at first, of course, a gaping hole, but we didn't leave it that way.

We replanted a young, vibrant red maple full of promises. It's small now for sure, but it represents hope, resilience, and the intentional act of [00:05:00] starting again. This is where the real power lies. I think it's in intentionally replanting. When you remove something dead, you create a void, but you have a choice, and don't let that void be filled by default.

What do you want to plant in its place? What new habit? What new relationship? What new project? What new beliefs will genuinely flourish and nourish your future growth? Be deliberate and choose wisely as we did when we picked our new red maple. And remember, and this is important, it's hard for me be patient with the new growth, the new red maple.

It's not gonna offer the same shade or stature for a long time. Similarly. New beginnings, take time. Don't expect instant gratification. Nurture your new venture with patient consistency and belief in your future potential. And understand that the initial growth will often be subtle, sometimes [00:06:00] unseen, and often enough.

It's beneath the surface first. See, the dying Norwegian maple was more than just a tree for me. It became a powerful metaphor, and hopefully it is for you as well. It it forced. Us to confront the unseen, the uncomfortable, and ultimately the empowering truth that sometimes to truly live, to truly grow, you must cut down the old and bravely plant something new in its place.

So here's your challenge. Here's a challenge I want to give you as I wrap up. Before I do that, lemme grab another drink of my coffee.

Here's what I challenge you to do. Number one, audit your root system. Two em. Admit what's dead. Three, remove what's choking you. Four. Replant what matters. And water the hell out of that new beginning. Here's my final thought. I think I'm gonna entitle this episode. Our tree died and because [00:07:00] death isn't always the end, sometimes it's the most wondrous invitation to plant something new and live in the power and the potential of what will grow next.

Cheers. Have a great day.