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teaches with or without me, but that the garden is everywhere and not just in one place.

HOW MY GARDEN TAUGHT ME:

The mysteries of Gardening are veiled by the busyness of everyday life, to a passer by the garden may seem like, well, a garden and not much more but for me the activity of gardening reminds me most of Yoga. When doing Yoga the mind and the body become "rest in motion" a synchronous balance of mind, body and spirit. It sounds ridiculous, but try it and you might begin to learn the lessons only a garden can teach.

After a time a garden becomes a place where work, peace, harmony and the self combine or collide depending on what state of life one is in. This interaction of self with nature can produce fascinating revelations, not of all of which are pleasant. It can also teach you just how much work is involved in keeping something healthy and beautiful by design as the most simple garden is untouched by human hands and may not look like a garden at all.

Does the garden have a living essence? Maybe it does and maybe it doesn't. If you do find an essence you might also find that your garden is more than just dirt and plants but a whole lot more.

Gardening is not as simple as the word sounds but in its essence has the simplicity of beauty and the wisdom of nature. Gardening is the doorway to another mode of being beyond the one we commonly know. It can take you to a place deep within yourself where peace, and reality coexist in a medley of shades, actions, smells and textures that change with each passing minute. A movement in a cloud thousands of feet above you can repaint the whole landscape in a different hue, a nearby bird can change the mood from tranquil to harmonious in an instant, an invasive weed can cause you to ponder some of life's deepest questions and tackle the justice of the garden.

The garden can teach in ways one might think impossible. It teaches through silence and interaction and as strange as that may sound, the garden will help you face yourself in an environment where there are no desks, paper, psycho-therapists, theories etc. How exactly does this happen one might ask? and why is it hard? When gardening, if you truly care about your garden, you will bond with it. You give to your plants and your plants give back.

WHY IT WAS A HARD LESSON:

Being taught by my garden was hard for obvious reasons. It was a garden, not an instructor; there was no manual of how to learn from it; and the lessons were my own, made by me, and facilitated by

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