This article focuses a lot on large, well curated gardens, but I'm an engineer who found a lot of solace and safety in managing my own garden. (As someone who has faced burnout and anxiety from work before.)<p>There's something about planning, planting, and then caring for a garden that appeals to my engineer brain. It's an exercise in organization and planning that scales from "throw seeds at dirt" to "these plants will attract bees near these other plants, these plants will repel insects. These will bloom early, these bloom late".<p>You can grow flowers, you can grow vegetables which you can turn into cooked, canned, or pickled food.<p>There's something about putting food on a plate that came from your yard, from your care. There's something about sitting in a green (or red, or blue, or yellow, etc.) space that you made.<p>I'm a sucker for games like Minecraft, Factorio, etc. Raising a garden is like a slow motion version of those things. It's a fusion of creative and scientific/engineering brains. It's great.
I've had a theory for some time now based on my own observations:<p>A big part of why nature is so calming is the absence of repeating patterns. In our artificial life everything follows standardized forms and patterns. It's a sterile world.
The most obvious example being rectangles and perfect 90 degree angles everywhere. But I would also count things like uniform colors, evenly spread (artificial) light, predictable sounds etc.<p>That makes me think that somehow something like this absence of patterns - and the knowledge/assumption for our brain that they are not to be expected in nature - helps us.<p>The beauty in this is that nature _is_ full of patterns. But on a different level, no two patterns are ever the same. When you look at a green tree you simply won't assume to find two leaves with the same color and shape. That's the difference.<p>Some years ago I got myself an empty canvas frame and put natural linen fabric (<a href="https://www.fabric.com/buy/ff-357/kaufman-antwerp-linen-natural" rel="nofollow">https://www.fabric.com/buy/ff-357/kaufman-antwerp-linen-natu...</a>) on it. No painting, just the linen. For the same reason: It's calming to look at<p>Or maybe I'm just weird :)
Of all the plants, trees by far give me the most pleasure. A suburb with trees is a thousand times better than one without. The shade of a tree is completely transformative. It gives me a fuzzy warm feeling inside.<p>It’s concerning to me that such an important aesthetic component is so transient and difficult to control. When you build a house, you control every aspect of its design. It’s materials are tough and long lasting. But the trees around the house are prone to dying. They get too old or they get sick or whatever. And when they do, you can’t really replace them. I’ve seen tons of houses where they had great atmosphere but then one of their large trees died and the feeling of the house is totally ruined. I’m not sure if you can order a grown tree and have it implanted but it’s probably really expensive. We need artificial trees that last longer and are easy to replace.<p>Humans are drawn to vistas. Standing on the top of a hill and looking at the vista is something everyone agrees is beautiful and feels good. I think it might be because our ancestors were tree-dwelling monkeys. The higher in the tree you climb, the better the view, the safer you are from predators. If we are drawn to views then we would likely spend more time high up in the tree. Maybe that’s also why we find trees themselves so appealing. Ancient wiring.
Before we had kids, my wife and I would work in the garden almost every weekend. After spending a week dealing with servers on fire, doing mindless repetitive work was exactly what I needed to rest my mind.<p>At one point I dug out a garden that was 37’ x 14’ and over a foot deep. I did the math once and figured out that I moved more than 2000 lbs of dirt (a literal ton) and then I moved a literal ton of bricks to the back yard to build the retaining walls.<p>Measuring your accomplishments in tonnage is very satisfying.
>I cannot say exactly how nature exerts its calming and organizing effects on our brains, but I have seen in my patients the restorative and healing powers of nature and gardens, even for those who are deeply disabled neurologically. In many cases, gardens and nature are more powerful than any medication.
---<p>I have witnessed this with my wife who's neurological disorder causes her to be in a "fright or flight" state virtually all day every day.<p>When she is either planning the garden, tending to the garden or just enjoying the garden I can see a reduced level of stress and increased ability to focus and multitask. All things which are very difficult outside of the garden.
One of the gardens pictured in the article, Elizabeth Street Garden, is a great spot in the middle of retail chaos in New York. Sadly a real estate development filed a lawsuit this month in hopes of destroying it: <a href="https://static1.squarespace.com/static/581fb257b8a79bf741c673a9/t/5c41f63242bfc10641576ff6/1547826743141/know+the+facts+-+v3.jpg" rel="nofollow">https://static1.squarespace.com/static/581fb257b8a79bf741c67...</a>
I'm (hopefully) on the tail-end of dealing with mental health issues. I was dealing with burnout, depression, substance abuse, trauma, psychosis, and severe anxiety. Right about then I started this backyard project to create a chemical-free, sustainable, and diverse "forest garden". Currently, about two years later that Eco-system is starting to explode with more bugs, fungus, and birds.<p>I found solitude, peace, and healing in the process of working with nature. I worked hard to revitalize the natural environment around me, and through that process I want to believe that nature found a way to heal me too.<p>Also, I had a therapist and a supporting partner who helped me through the tough times.<p>Anyways, I can't recommend enough getting your hands in the dirt, appreciating all forms of nature, and learning about the various Eco-systems that are needed for nature to thrive.
My wife and I have been gardening for around 15 years.<p>We spent a couple of years, maybe 5 or 7 years ago, trying straw bale gardens.<p>It was quite interesting. I would recommend giving it a try some time. You can do it even with just one bale. We did it with about 10-12 bales of oat straw from a farm we knew.<p>E.g., <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Straw-Bale-Gardens-Complete-Karsten/dp/1591869072/" rel="nofollow">https://www.amazon.com/Straw-Bale-Gardens-Complete-Karsten/d...</a> was the author of the book we used, though this seems to be an updated version to the one we used.<p>I prefer raised soil beds, but this straw bale style was quite enjoyable.
Given the author's observations, I would draw a different conclusion. I would conclude it isn't so much that gardens are good for you but that urban living, surrounding yourself with noise, strangers, glass, and concrete is bad for you.
Oddly, I have never felt the allure of gardens, I don't have any plants myself, and if I'd have to choose between a city environment and nature, I'd in most cases choose the city (and not because of its parks). Both when I am happy and when I am sad.
I like a good sunset but that's it.
I'm clearly in a minority with this, it seems.
I am actively working on a startup to encourage gardening for all the mentioned benefits. If someone wants to chat about it please reach out. Email in profile.
Gardens and other natural spaces absolutely affect social and mental wellbeing.<p>An interesting piece of research into the effects of greenery and nature on wellbeing was conducted back in 2001 by Ming Kuo and William Sullivan [0]. I love referencing it in discussions like these as it's a rather opportunistic experimental setting that might have otherwise never occurred, and gives us some pretty great data to recount when we only otherwise have anecdotes.<p>In Chicago there was a set of high-rise public-housing buildings. The residents of these buildings had been assigned randomly by the public housing system. Attrition over time had left some buildings surrounded by only concrete and asphalt and others with pockets of green. Kuo and Sullivan were able to compare levels of aggression of 145 residents. They found higher levels of aggression and familial conflict recalled by those living less close to nature. They backed up this data by looking at similar low-rise developments [1]. Controlling for other factors, they compared crime rates of inhabitants who experienced less natural proximity to those with more. They found that roughly 7% of the variation in crime that couldn't be accounted for by other factors could be accounted for by the amount of trees.<p>Ming Kuo has gone on to research the link between nature and school performance, one of her recent studies concluding that "greening has the potential to mitigate academic underachievement in high-poverty urban schools."[2] In another fascinating piece of research she has also found that "Children with ADHD have fewer symptoms after outdoor activities in lush environments."[3]<p>Many of this research matches our collective anecdotes. We know that we are somehow hard-wired for nature. Yet we keep ourselves locked away in buildings for hours on end with little of it except corporate potted plants (often fake) and the odd photo or poster on the wall. To pile on with another opinion... I think there's something about 'wild' greenery that is distinctly effective versus manicured greenery. Its chaos and growth somehow synchronise with the minds' inherent nature. In an incredibly fundamental way, we are supposed to be amongst that wildness.<p>[0] <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/245234610_Aggression_and_Violence_in_the_Inner_City" rel="nofollow">https://www.researchgate.net/publication/245234610_Aggressio...</a><p>[1] <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/249624302_Environment_and_Crime_in_the_Inner_City_Does_Vegetation_Reduce_Crime" rel="nofollow">https://www.researchgate.net/publication/249624302_Environme...</a><p>[2] <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/327876862_Might_School_Performance_Grow_on_Trees_Examining_the_Link_Between_Greenness_and_Academic_Achievement_in_Urban_High-Poverty_Schools" rel="nofollow">https://www.researchgate.net/publication/327876862_Might_Sch...</a><p>[3] <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/23192434_Children_With_Attention_Deficits_Concentrate_Better_After_Walk_in_the_Park" rel="nofollow">https://www.researchgate.net/publication/23192434_Children_W...</a>