Gardening for health & spirituality with Arit Anderson
Jun 26, 2024
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Award-winning garden designer Arit Anderson discusses how gardening can positively impact health and spirituality. Topics include creating garden sanctuaries, the healing power of gardens, forest bathing for health benefits, and finding joy in unexpected garden moments.
Gardening promotes holistic well-being by integrating creativity and healing into daily life.
Designing gardens with personal preferences enhances emotional and spiritual well-being through tranquility and connection to nature.
Engaging in gardening provides physical benefits improving fitness, reducing stress, and grounding individuals in the present moment.
Deep dives
Gardening for Health and Spirituality
Gardening can positively impact health and spirituality, providing a sanctuary for physical and mental well-being. Engaging in gardening activities allows for mindful tasks and a space for both concentration and relaxation. Through the process of designing and nurturing a garden, individuals can integrate creativity, intuition, and healing into their lives, promoting holistic well-being and a deeper connection to their surroundings.
Creating Garden Sanctuaries
Designing gardens as sanctuaries involves incorporating personal preferences that promote solace and peace. Elements like dedicated quiet spaces, favorite plants that evoke joy, and seasonal changes in the garden can enhance emotional and spiritual well-being. Additionally, the presence of natural scents, changing plant life cycles, and sensory experiences contribute to a sense of tranquility and connection to nature.
Physical Benefits of Gardening
Engaging in gardening activities offers physical benefits such as providing varied levels of exercise suitable for different abilities. From sweeping to digging, these tasks contribute to physical well-being, enhancing heart health, reducing stress, and releasing feel-good hormones. By involving the body in gardening tasks, individuals experience groundedness, improved fitness, and reduced anxiety.
Gardens as Therapeutic Spaces
Gardens serve as therapeutic spaces through social prescribing, offering healing activities beyond traditional treatments. Social green prescribing incorporates gardening as therapy to address pain, emotional distress, and overall well-being. The practice of forest bathing and deliberate immersion in natural surroundings further enhances mental, emotional, and spiritual connections, promoting harmony and a sense of purpose.
Connecting with Nature Through Gardening
The act of gardening allows for the observation of natural changes, fostering a sense of connection and joy. Embracing spontaneous garden developments and incorporating intentional design elements can bring about unexpected delights, such as serendipitous plant growth or seasonal transformations. By immersing in the garden environment, individuals experience a deep sense of interaction with nature, leading to exploration, reflection, and appreciation of life's cyclical rhythms.
Gardens and green spaces can be a sanctuary for our health, physically, mentally and spiritually, and can be places to nurture people, as well as plants. Award-winning garden designer, writer and presenter Arit Anderson explores how gardening can have a positive impact on our health and spirituality. In this episode, we discuss why thinking about health, including our mental health, is an important foundation for any garden, how being in gardens and the act of gardening can help restore our natural balance and how taking inspiration from nature can increase our wellbeing.