The Spiritual Garden (Part 1) – By Judy Fenyvesi

With so much gardening in the media nowadays, it does seem as if the very essence of gardening and gardens is often being ignored, and by the “essence”, I mean nature.

So many of us like to potter around, trim, weed, mow, dig, prune and so on and much of our time spent gardening is during the weekend.

Have you noticed how much better you feel on a Monday when you’ve spent the weekend gardening – perhaps not always physically when we’ve tended to overdo things, but emotionally?

Although many of us spend a fair amount of time working in our gardens, how many of us actually spend time in our gardens doing nothing in particular?

The key to tuning in to the spiritual aspect of a garden is simply to take the time to observe and be quiet in it.

A garden is surrounded by life, nature, the elements and so on even if you have a modernistic garden or not.

If you come to the garden with the right perspective there are rewards available for the mind and spirit.

As mentioned earlier, so many of us tend to use our gardens for work, and many of us cannot simply go into the garden without noticing something that needs to be done, trimmed, hoed or whatever.

We may even use the garden for other such busy activities as entertaining with barbecues and so on. How many of us can admit to using our gardens for periods of quiet meditation or contemplation?

We spend so much time busying ourselves making our gardens perfect that we forget that it is nature that is in charge and we could simply make use of this natural outside space to tune in more to our surroundings.

In various religions and philosophies the garden together with nature plays a significant part; the Garden Of Gethsemine, the Hanging Gardens Of Babylon, The Garden of Eden (or Paradise – taken from the Persian word “pairidaeza” – meaning “enclosure”), Buddha’s moment of enlightenment while sitting under a Boding tree.

In the Islamic tradition the Koran promises the faithful that the “Gardens of Paradise shall be their hospitality, therein to dwell forever, desiring no removal from them”… and so on.

Many gardens designed for Spirituality can be seen in Buddhism whereby many are designed in a mandala form.

Your garden – no matter how well kept – is still your link to the outside elements and nature in general and worthy of having you in it and allowing the fresh air and elements to help spring-clean the mind every now and then.

Plants That Are Reputed To Have Spiritual Connections:
• The Grape Vine
• The Madonna Lily
• The Butterfly Bush
• The Sweet Bay
• The Hupeh Rowan
• The English Yew
• The Common Box