Stuck In A Moment

We’re all about the mindfulness now. Are you inhabiting the now, are you here? Are you focused on what you are doing right now, relinquishing all thought and preoccupation with the past and the future? We are encouraged to savour each moment whatever that moment is composed of, however unpleasant we might have traditionally considered it. You’re not doing the washing up , you’re enjoying the sound of water and the feel of soft, soothing suds on your skin. It can be safely said it’s not for everyone.

The Mindful Gardener?

It can also be safely said that the backyard gardener is high on the list of those that it does suit.  When you think about it the whole concept of the garden seems to have been custom designed to promote mindfulness. Inhabit what is presented to you; weed when it’s time to weed, seed when it’s time to seed, divide when it’s time to divide. Planning is quite obviously a large part of what happens in the garden and every job on some level has one eye on the future but the garden also lends itself to retaining that focus on the here and now which is fundamental to the whole mindful approach.

Monty Don and other well known gardeners continually speak of the value of letting nature do its thing and going with the flow rather than trying to intervene and modify it. In so doing Monty et al have been practising mindfulness all their lives, without even realising it.

Nancy Darling is a well known American psychologist and mindfulness advocate, the following is an excerpt from a recent piece she contributed to Psychology Today;  

“When my spring assault on the garden began,  I tore up weeds and spent an hour untwining the tightly wound stems of old bean plants and peas from their strings in an attempt to let the netting last just one more season.  I lugged kid-sized bags of vermiculite, compost, and peat moss from bin to bed.  I hauled out the hay fork and mucked out and flipped last year’s leaves and this winter’s kitchen scraps, hoping to find rich soil at the bottom of the pile.  I did.  I loaded it in the wheelbarrow and slogged across the yard.

Just like always, I was struck with the contrast between the idyllic gardening experiences of my fantasies and the real life gardening of my backyard.  Somehow, the cold wind, muddy knees, hot sun, and chronically runny nose never figure into those mid-winter daydreams.  I don’t remember ever fantasizing about the wet puddles that always gather this time of year, the sloshy mud that squashes into my clogs, or the tomato poles that just won’t stand up straight.  All those baby centipedes stampeding when I stick the trowel into the dirt just never came to mind when I looked through those catalogues featuring perfectly ordered gardens last February.

My senses were completely full.  My hands were stirring through cold, crunchy vermiculite, damp moss, and earth, re-energizing my one and only raised bed.  I could hear my breathing, drowning out everything except for the cardinals arguing over turf and that yellow bellied sapsucker that has been calling all week.  Just like when I’m swimming, I was totally aware of the air going in and out of my lungs and the sheer physicality of my labour.  Wiping my dripping nose, the caked mud under my fingernails left a dark streak I could feel and taste on my upper lip.  My thick socks were sodden, but warm against my feet.

I moved on to the long rows of dead tomato plants, pulling old vines off the rhubarb finding its way to the sun.  Throughout my work, I found myself just gazing at the dirt, the water, the crocuses among the leaves, the mucky puddles.  The strawberries were already greenleaved.  I’d catch and shake myself after a minute or two.

Nothing anywhere on the surface of my mind, but completely occupied.”