Gardens grow better humans

Gardens are not merely places where we grow food or flowers for our own consumption and enjoyment. In my experience, gardens grow us just as much as we grow plants. We’re also experiencing a good deal of growth ourselves—and in ways that make us better human beings.

Gardening improves physical fitness. Because I find working in the garden to be so enjoyable, I’m often surprised when I’m stiff and sore after a couple hours of gardening. I shouldn’t be surprised. I’m constantly in motion, walking around the garden, in and out of my garage to get tools, and making trips to the compost pile. I kneel, twist, lift, and reach. I lift heavy bags of soil, large pots, wheelbarrows, and more. I dig holes for fruit trees. I pull deep-rooted weeds. By a few weeks into the spring garden season, I’m feeling more fit and strong. In fact, 30 to 45 minutes of garden activities can burn up to 300 calories.

Gardening improves our nutrition. We can’t, after all, grow cookies, pizza, or chips. It’s so much easier to eat healthy food when we have salad greens, tomatoes, squash, peaches, raspberries, and all kinds of herbs a few steps from the door. Growing new-to-us varieties of food—for example, mizuna, bitter melon, bok choy, or kamo kamo squash—introduces new flavors, recipes, and combinations of food into our diets. By eating less processed, fresher, higher-quality food, we improve our health.

Gardening can our mood and our mental health. I have dysthymia (mild to moderate, long-term depression) as well as episodes of major depression. Being in the garden almost always lifts my mood. The beauty of the garden brings me happiness, yes, but I also have experienced satisfaction and contentment from:

• Seeing pollinators and beneficial insects thrive at a time when they’re endangered.
• Providing healthy habitat for a mama robin to nest, as well as the worms, spiders, and other invertebrates she needs to feed her young—and then seeing the fledglings running around the garden while their mother watches them from the fence.
• Knowing I’m providing essential habitat for countless insects, spiders, worms, arthropods, and microscopic life of all kinds.
• Doing my small part to sequester carbon and combat climate change.
• Cutting bouquets of flowers for friends and for neighbors who stop by to chat, or encouraging a toddler to pluck a ripe tomato.

In fact, soil contains at least one natural antidepressant—Mycobacterium vaccae—that exhibits similar neurological effects to pharmaceutical antidepressants.

Gardening connects us to our neighbors and communities. When I bought my home years ago, I confess I was a bit anxious about the lack of a privacy fence between my backyard and the street. However, once I started spending time gardening, neighbors started calling out compliments and sharing their gratitude for the views of gorgeous flowers my garden provides. When I tore up my front lawns and expanded my garden beds into my front yard, I got to know many more neighbors by name, and I enjoy answering their questions about gardening as well as learning more about them.

Of course, this isn’t a complete list. What benefits do you get from gardening? How has gardening contributed to your growth?