Gardening as Therapy

A psychotherapist once gave me a relaxation exercise: focus your eyes on a spot on the floor. Slowly name five things you see with your peripheral vision, then five things your body feels, then five things you hear. Repeat the process naming four things you see, feel, hear, then three, then two, then one. When you finish the process you are relaxed and at peace.

It works amazingly. When I finish, my body and soul and mind are slowed down. It is great therapy.

Gardening does the same for the members of my gardening group. Sheryl Hixson went right to the point when she described her reason for gardening: “It is very therapeutic and I enjoy it.

Karen Schiebout expanded: “Greg and I call our garden our therapy, even at this time of year when it looks more like a weed haven. But just wait. There’s always next year. . . .”

For Linda Jansen, the therapy is a contrast to her job. “It is calming for the mind and soul. I felel renewed when I can go outside and work in the garden after sitting behind a computer all day.”

For these people and for many other people, gardening produces feelings of peace and wellbeing, probably in multiple ways. We get fresh air and exercise. Our spirits brighten in the sunshine. We experience a change of pace and place. We become part of a process that is bigger than we are, and it produces hope. It opens our eyes, ears, and senses to the world outside of us.

The gardening process does this—as well as the garden itself. Mary De Jong commented, “When I come home to a plant blooming in my yard, it is like coming home to a smile.”

What could be more therapeutic than that?