Horticultural Therapy
Thomas Ogren
The idea of using gardens and plants as “tools” for therapy is
growing fast these days. Makes perfect sense, too. There is a
great deal of evidence that working in gardens is wonderful for
our mental health. The relation between our mental health and
our physical health is a close one. If we feel good about
ourselves, about our families, our work, our friends, often our
bodies will feel stronger too. Just being in a beautiful garden
can make many of us feel better. Doing small chores in the
garden, deadheading roses, pulling weeds, planting some bulbs,
fertilizing, all of these things have the ability to make us
feel good. In the Persian language the words “garden” and
“heaven” are one and the same. In our own lives so often we
spend most of our time rushing here and rushing there. We spend
way too much time stuck in front of computers, TV sets, stuck in
rush hour traffic, doing things that may be necessary, but
things that aren’t much fun, much less satisfying. But working
in the garden, that’s different, especially for those of us who
really do love to garden. I recently came on some research data
that suggests that the more tuned into gardening a person is,
the more nurturing, creative, and compassionate that person will
be. Again, this makes sense too. In the garden we are free to
experiment. In the garden what we do actually does make a
difference, a huge difference. Unlike so many things, the more
effort we put into our gardens, the better they are. What is the
link between gardening and empathy for our fellow man? Could it
be that gardening brings us closer to nature? That by getting in
touch with Mother Nature, we are ourselves enriched? Probably
so. But then too, there’s no doubt that the type of people drawn
to gardening in the first place, may already have in them an
extra dose of creativity and compassion. I used to work in a
prison for juveniles. The CYA it was called, the California
Youth Authority. I started from scratch the program there and
over the years the program grew, the gardens expanded, I learned
new things and so did my wayward students. Most of my “boys” in
the CYA were gang members from the Los Angeles area. Typically
they were “in” for armed robbery, muggings, murder. Most of
them, although they ranged in age from fifteen to twenty-five,
most could barely read, and none had done any gardening. I
designed our gardens to be therapeutic. We built a big brick
barbecue so we could cook things we grew. We grew fruit trees,
hundreds of them, so we’d have fresh fruit to eat. We put up
bird feeders so we could attract and see birds in the garden. We
put up birdbaths, we made wind chimes, and we planted huge
gardens of vegetables and flowers. In our gardens we grew things
organically. I taught them to value frogs, toads, lizards,
snakes as welcome additions to the garden. We made huge piles of
compost. About the only form of punishment we used was, “turning
the compost heap.” We always had a radio to play some music to
listen to while we worked. Deep, profound changes happened to
many of these hardened criminals while working in the garden. As
they learned to hybridize roses they lost their desire to rob
liquor stores. As they grew tomatoes big as your fist and
watermelons big as beach balls, they became proud of their
accomplishments. The more they learned about plants, the less
they were interested in crime. Many of these boys learned how to
read, to do math, to write, and learned it all there in the
gardens, in the greenhouses. I worked in the CYA for twelve
years. People in authority sometimes claimed that I bribed my
“wards” and that I must be doing something illegal. They
couldn’t understand how it was that these hoodlums could learn
the scientific names of hundreds of plants, that they actually
learned to love to read, to love to garden. But I didn’t bribe
the boys; I just set up a garden with a healing atmosphere and
then let it work its wonders. The right garden is a magical
place. Plants are not judgmental. You take good care of them and
they thrive. In the garden our minds are free to wander, to
daydream, to relax. Good things happen in good gardens. Why talk
about horticultural therapy in a book devoted largely to allergy
avoidance? The answer is simple. Gardening of itself can be very
therapeutic, however, if the garden is filled with plants that
cause allergies, well, the gardening experience won’t be that
good. It is no fun to be sneezing and even less fun to have
attacks of skin rashes or asthma. By making our gardens
allergy-free we can avoid these negatives. The physical work
done in gardens is also good for us, burning calories, making
our muscles stronger. In the right garden the air is cleaner,
too, refreshing our lungs as we work. If it makes sense to have
a therapeutic garden be allergy-free, it also makes sense that
gardening is food for the soul, and the happier we feel about
life, quite often, the better will be our health.
The Fen Shui Garden. The more people you talk to about Fen Shui
and gardening, the more opinions on it you get. Ms. Robin Wood,
a very talented landscape architect once told me, “Fen Shui
gardening is really just good landscape design.” And to a point,
I would agree with her. In many ways the ancient Chinese
philosophy of Fen Shui, also called Feng Shui, is all about
creating harmony. In a true Fen Shui garden the focus is on the
atmosphere. A garden is created that encourages meditation,
relaxation, close connections to Nature. A good Fen Shui garden
does not ignore any of our senses. There are fragrant flowers to
smell, wind chimes, the sounds of water, and the songs of birds
to please our ears, shade from the hot sun, protection from the
wind, places just to sit and think, contrasting surfaces to
feel, beauty to please our eye, and perhaps even some fruit or
vegetable for our tongue to taste. A true Fen Shui garden is not
strictly formal, overly clipped, too tidy and sanitary, all
drawn with squares and rectangles. Shrubs don’t need to be
square nor do all trees need to resemble each other. A quiet
restrained informality is encouraged. Love, peace,
understanding, and wisdom reign in a true Fen Shui garden. In
many ways during all my years at the Youth Authority, although I
didn’t know it at the time, I was instinctively trying to
develop a Fen Shui garden. Surrounded by guards, gangs, and
concertina razor wire, I aspired to create an inner sanctum, a
natural place for me and my students to remove ourselves from
all the bad vibes so very close by. I am not a Fen Shui expert
by any means and certainly do not claim to be, but I have read a
great deal about it, listened to numerous talks given by
so-called experts, and I have long been interested and involved
in garden design. I think that Fen Shui does indeed have much to
offer and that it is well worth exploring. However, I often
notice a certain snobbishness surrounding the subject. One
expert writes that none of the others know what they’re talking
about, especially the Western writers and speakers. I’ve met
some Fen Shui designers and writers who were cold, impersonal
and rude, none of which jives with true Fen Shui in my mind. I
sometimes encounter a similar snobbishness with people who
refuse to grow any plants not native to their own little local
area. My feeling about all these snobby attitudes in gardening
is this: Elitism doesn’t belong in the garden. Plants aren’t
critical, let’s not be that way ourselves. Many people, far
wiser than I, have long known that the more we learn about
something, the more we realize how little we know. Harold Young,
the wonderful senior editor of Pacific Coast Nurseryman Magazine
once wrote me in an email, “I used to think I knew a lot of
plants.” I know just what he means.