I don’t know about you, but the conditions of society and the world can stress me out. Since I run an online business, social media is part of my every day life and it can suck me down a rabbit hole and become a huge time-waster. I stumbled on a free method for getting my mind off the world and reducing my addictions to social media and mindless snacking. I’ve found the answers to peace, mindfulness and balance in my garden.
I’m spearheading our garden next to the house this year. We have so much land, that it’s a good idea to divide things up so Dave doesn’t have everything on his plate. Besides, I like having my own little plot of earth to play with and do “my way.” We’re both rather opinionated, strong willed, action people. We work incredibly well in our business when each of us has our own areas of responsibility. It seems like a good idea to take that concept into our care of the property.
I’ve planted a garden in this spot of earth over a dozen seasons, so I’m familiar with what areas grow well and which ones don’t. I’ve also tried gardening different ways in this plot. Since Dave has lived here, he’s tried both a rototiller and simply plugging plants in without worry about weeding around them. In Northwest Georgia, it’s easy for the weeds to get ahead of you so that your planting efforts are wasted.
There was one year I remember with great fondness – the best garden I ever grew on my own. I dug the plot manually with a shovel. No tiller. I kept the weeds out as it went along. It produced extremely well.
This year, I’ve decided to try this method again. I’m also going above and beyond by removing the weeds completely from the garden. I push the shovel in, lift up the dirt, and move over, push the shovel in, lift up the dirt, and move over. I keep doing this until I’ve loosened up a 4 foot by 2 foot patch. Then I sit on a stool and loosen the weeds from the clods of dirt by hand. The great thing about this method is I can rescue all the earthworms. A typical shovel-full will reveal four or five earthworms.
I remove as much dirt from the clod as I can and toss the weeds into a pile outside the garden. As I go through each shovel full I can also remove rocks, cutworms and snails from the garden. My theory is that if I remove the weeds thoroughly, instead of just turning them back into the soil, I’ll have fewer weeds to remove throughout the spring and summer. We’ll see.
Yes, this is time consuming, and I know there are ways to garden without even digging up the weeds. But there is something incredibly therapeutic about this method. Sitting out in the sun, sifting through the dirt calms my mind, gives me much-needed exercise and makes me feel fantastic. While I use gloves most of the time, I usually pull my gloves off for part of the time to get my hands in the dirt. The cool earth between my fingers grounds me on a whole new level.
Sitting there in the sun, with a gentle breeze and the dirt between my fingers for hours at a time, makes me forget all about society’s issues or any personal problems I might have. There is a peace in my garden that I cannot find in the world or online. The more time I spend in the garden, the more addicted I become to it. Interestingly, other “addictions” like to my computer, my phone, to social media or to snacking diminish, eventually fading into what feels like a foolish waste of time.
