AS GARDENERS, we know we feel better when we're working in the garden. Nothing pulls weeds faster than a few frustrations, but it's much more than that. When we work in our gardens, we get physical activity in the outdoors; we have a front-row seat to insect, plant, bird and animal life cycles; and we enjoy a palette where we use fragrances and colors and textures and design principles to create something uniquely beautiful and uniquely ours. For many of us, our gardens are our canvases where we exercise our imagination and our creativity.
In the September/October 2023 issue of Horticulture, I wrote about the growing body of research that proves gardening's role in keeping us mentally well. I've recently found two books published in the United Kingdom that expand on that idea. One is written by a psychiatrist and psychotherapist who draws on decades of experience as a clinician and a gardener to discuss how gardening and interaction with the natural world benefit us. The other is written by a woman with mental illness whose efforts at becoming well brought her to outdoor activities, including gardening.
My premise here is that mental wellness exists on a continuum: Whether one has a clinical diagnosis of anxiety, depression or post-traumatic stress disorder, or one simply experiences the everyday stresses of modern life, we all benefit psychologically from time spent outdoors, tending and loving our gardens.
A DOCTOR'S TAKE
In The Well-Gardened Mind: The Restorative Power of Nature, doctor and author Sue Stuart-Smith covers a lot of ground explaining how gardening and the natural world positively influence our well-being. I'd like to focus on three points here: presence; anticipation; and repetition. Stuart-Smith points out that time takes on a different quality when one is working in the garden. It slows.
Esta historia es de la edición July - August 2024 de Horticulture.
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Esta historia es de la edición July - August 2024 de Horticulture.
Comience su prueba gratuita de Magzter GOLD de 7 días para acceder a miles de historias premium seleccionadas y a más de 9,000 revistas y periódicos.
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WEEDING OUT WORRY
Two books give perspectives on gardening's importance to mental health
Prized Perennials
GAPS IN THE GARDEN? TRY ONE OF THESE AWARD-WINNING PLANTS AS A SAFE-BET FIX
A TOAST TO CORK
A trip to Portugal inspired Greg Coppa to peel back the botany of the cork oak
THE GARDEN CENTER'S GRIP
SOMETHING WEIRD HAPPENS when gardeners enter a garden center. We change. Suddenly, somehow, we're overcome with this vague yet powerful, transcendental feeling of liberation, and we become aware of money we probably have and hopefully won't otherwise need.
OUTSIDE OF THE BOX
AS BOXWOOD BLIGHT DAMAGES THIS STAPLE EVERGREEN, IT'S TIME TO LOOK AT WORTHY ALTERNATIVES
NEW MOUNDING ANNUALS
Also known as summer snapdragons, angelonias produce spikes of outward-facing flowers throughout the hottest, most humid time of the year.
AN ANNUAL AFFAIR
Combine a designer's best advice with the year's new varieties for a summer's worth of showstopping containers
A Big Role for SMALL GRASSES
The unexpected benefits of small native grasses
GOLDENSEAL
A woodland herb worth guarding
RICHARD HAWKE
Try and try again