Healing in the Garden
The in-thing today is the Healing Garden. Many dismiss this as a nice
landscape feature, but it can be so much more than that. It can actually be
therapeutic in itself, as a calming place where stress can be shed, anger
released and peace found. The garden can also go far beyond this and become an
empowering and mentally stimulating place of discovery rather than a refuge.
With a few insights we can create healing gardens that are profoundly active
rather than passive.
When the garden is used as a part of a treatment and therapy program, it can
reduce recovery time for surgery patients, reduce stress, lower blood pressure
and increase oxygen levels. And that’s only the beginning. Diabetics, cardiac
and cancer patients can benefit from the garden setting and activities.
Active or passive use of a garden setting can reduce depression and need for
antidepressive medications, lower levels of anger and frustration and promotes
engagement. The healing that can happen here can be physical, mental, emotional
and spiritual. These four aspects that define who we are cannot effectively be
treated separately.
The healing garden need not be a huge and labor intensive botanical garden.
It does need to be accessible to those who need it. That includes not only the
patients but staff, volunteers, chaplains, family, social workers and friends.
They can find their way to the healing garden to shed stress and seek their own
harmony. It is also a safe and comforting place for those who want to, or need
to, spend time with a patient for confidential conversation and therapy. It also
needs to be accessible to the patient alone or several patients together.
This isn’t a place to park a patient and leave them in solitude, unless that
is their choice. It is the place where the people-plant connecting can be
incredibly calming, inspiring and relaxing. In the company of the plants and the
earth miracles can happen.
The journey from passive to active healing gardens
One of the primary roles of a healing garden is to reduce
stress. When we provide a space designed to be safe, inviting and comforting,
what we are really doing is making an effort to reduce stress for all who enter.
This begins with the limiting of warnings and signs proclaiming "Do Not!" A
good healing garden can contain some, not necessarily all, of the following.
These elements are all designed to limit stress and provide an emotional comfort
zone, a safe place.
This can become a comfortable place to meditate, pray,
converse, accept reality, let go of the burdens, and heal. When one member of
the family is ill, infirm, experiencing recovery or facing the end-of-life, the
entire family and network of friends also face difficult emotions, feel the same
pain and need the same opportunity to work through the difficult processes. The
following elements of a good healing garden can give one the strength to seek
answers, face reality and share the discomfort.
The following are a few guidelines for the creation of a
healing garden.
It is strongly recommended that before designing such a garden a
professional horticultural therapist be consulted. This is not usually in the
realm of expertise of a landscape architect. When a healing garden is ready for
use it is also suggested that the staff attend a seminar on the effective use of
such a garden. Not only is this advised to prevent problems but to obtain the
most benefit from it.
1. Safe walkways with accessible plantings that become a
sensory experience, as well as a way of experiencing the people-plant
connection.
2. Resting areas, seating, stones and log benches that blend
the natural and the creative to produce places for meditation or prayer. These
are opportunities to let go, discard the burdens, even for a little while.
3. Features such as distinctive plantings, sensory
experiences, arbors, butterfly gardens, and fountains that provide destinations
are a part of the garden and the journey, but in the design of a healing garden
is it is important not to over do the planting so that it becomes little more
than a confusing, sensory overload that can increase the stress and discomfort.
Keep it simple, keep it comfortable.
4. Plant and non-plant materials that provide multi-seasonal
features can also be a valuable part of the healing garden. Too often the
healing garden is a neglected area after spring flowers or other seasonal
displays. Healing needs to happen throughout the year.
5. Conversation stations, stopping points where families or
small groups can pause to visit. Visiting the healing garden doesn’t have to be
a solitary journey.
Healing in the tea garden - Simplicity
While discussing the role and value of a healing garden with
a community group, one of the participants spoke up. "Oh, you mean like a
Japanese tea garden?"
She was absolutely right. The tea garden is a journey with a
series of thresholds where the visitor can let go of stress and move toward a
state of harmony and inner peace. This makes the garden a place of active
engagement, even if the one on the journey through the garden is not planting,
pruning or doing any of the "work." In this journey, as we let go, we can truly
experience with all of our senses. In the tea garden, the way of tea, the
journey is as much a part of the destination as the tea house. This is one of
the purest applications of a healing garden. The concept of a garden as a place
for healing is not limited to one place or time. In the Egypt of the pharaohs
there were special gardens where the stressed could walk and recline, find rest
and renewal.
Sensory elements and discoveries to be made
The plant material is only a part of the healing garden
concept. In the journey from passive to active engagement the inspiration for
active experiences often depends on the non-plant materials, the available
locations for meditation and the tools to permit active involvement.
Opportunities to touch, smell, contemplate, recall or share a memory are the
benefits of sensory moments. Other opportunities include a rake to texture a
sand garden, an accessible garden space with trowels and small plants that can
be planted, vines that may need trimming and training, and the list is limited
only by the creativity of those involved.
The healing garden can provide moments of empowerment, a
decrease in depression, the exercising of mind and body and healing moments that
originate with sensory stimulation, whimsical moments, and freedom to
contemplate, meditate and pray. The journey can be one of personal discovery, or
from within to beyond oneself. The journey isn’t always from illness to health.
It can be a journey from anger or fear to acceptance.
Plantings can provide sensory stimulation, without Do Not
Touch signs. In one healing garden hanging baskets lined the walkway and
each had a sign suggesting that the visitor touch the leaves, smell the flowers
or share a special moment. It’s even better when these plant features reflect
the familiar plants, trees, herbs, vegetables and flowers of the people who will
be using the healing garden rather than the landscape architect’s favorites.
Herbs and other aromatic plants should be spaced apart, not
clustered together. When the scents become jumbled, it ceases to be therapeutic
and may become stressful. The healing garden can provide opportunities for the
use of art, statuary and whimsy along the pathways and near seating. These can
inspire meditation moments, prayers and discussion. The healing process can be
shortened when we can share the questions, the fear and the anger with others.
When we can be a part of this conversation, when we are willing to listen, we
can be a gift to each other. The healing garden provides the safe place to talk,
and listen.
Use signs to identify the plants. While this isn’t a
botanical garden, the simple and subtle labeling of the plants can be a way to
share information, and this gaining of knowledge can be empowering. Signs should
be conveniently placed, and if signs are in Braille they must at a uniform
height and consistently within reach.
Features such as butterfly gardens and hummingbird feeders
can be a very beneficial part of an active healing garden. Some view such
elements as a distraction, but they stimulate the senses and make it possible to
become engaged. These sensory elements help to draw the individual from self
outward in the journey from isolation to engagement. The sharing of these
discoveries can be a powerful gift from the healing garden.
Sand boxes, Zen gardens, whimsical statuary, religious icons
and touch pools all serve a similar purpose. They all break down the barriers
and open the doors to contemplation, prayer, conversation and activities ranging
from touching and raking to smiles and laughter. A small patch of grass that is
accessible by wheelchair can have a profound impact on people who are able to be
"barefoot in the grass." This can be even better if two or more people are able
to share this joyful, and spiritual, connection with the earth. Night blooming
and night fragrant plants can have great value in expanding the usefulness of
the healing garden.
Any passive garden, even a postage stamp size corner of the
landscape by the door can become a delightfully active garden with opportunities
for engagement, sensory stimulation and discovery.
Accessibility is essential to the healing process
Experiential opportunitiescan be planned or
spontaneous, but they need to be accessible.
Adapting the garden for convenience requires some common
sense and understanding.
Adapting the garden for safety, to fully appreciate the
risks to those with physical limitations try navigating a wheelchair along the
paths and walkways.
Adapting the garden for experiential opportunities means
we need to limit barriers, fences, while providing vertical features and seating
within significant plantings.
We need to be cautious about overdoing the planting and
features of the healing garden. It’s very easy to have too much of a good thing.
Venues for healing gardens
Hospitals
Schools, from elementary to graduate level, for all
students, not only those with "special needs."
Senior care communities
People with special needs, physical or mental
limitations
Cancer, cardiac, diabetic and trauma patients
The workplace
Places of worship, religious retreats
Memorial gardens, cemeteries, mausoleums and mortuaries
Home & neighborhoods
The view
Vistas are an important part of the healing garden
The view from the window is the only garden connection many
will experience in times of harsh weather, or those with allergies, or
compromised immune systems.
The view from within the Garden should lead the eye, draw
attention to focal points, provide opportunities relaxation and letting go, and
for surprise and whimsy.
Finding the way home can be an important part of the garden
design.
Conversation Stations
These are comfortable places for people to relax and engage.
Socialization is a valuable activity for healing, and for quality of life, even
as we approach the end of life. This is important for family and professional
caregivers as well as patients or residents.
Beyond self-focus, many function with an internalized
focus, but when interaction can occur body and mind benefit
Sensory Connections can be enjoyed more when they is
someone to share them with
Sense of Humor, the whimsy of life is one of the greatest
healing elements, it is also an avenue to dispel depression and anxiety.
These can be a place for Story Circles, where stories,
poetry and music can be shared
Comfortable seating is one of the keys to a successful
conversation station
Shade is necessary too, for both health and comfort
Opportunity garden concept
Every garden can be a special place where opportunities for healing,
improving health, better diet and learning. Much of the following is from the
Opportunity Garden we developed with the Disney horticulture team and the
American Horticultural Therapy Association as a part of EPCOT’s annual
International Flower & Garden Festival from 1999-2003.
Elements of an opportunity garden
Reminisce garden, or scattered plants as memory triggers
Vegetables and fruit on trellises and raised beds
Sensory opportunities that are accessible
Vertical gardens
Arbors with vines, gourds and flowers
Safe water features
Special stations for conversation, discovery, activity
The healing garden setting as a place to use as we would a backyard, or the
back porch
One-on-one conversation between participant and therapist, medical staff,
clergy, and others
Quiet place to relax and visit with family or guests
Safe space to be alone to relax, meditate, or simply think
A place where we can experience through the senses and connect with nature at
our own pace
Opportunities to actively engage, physically, mentally, emotionally and
spiritually
Plants, non-plant materials and settings that provide memory triggers and new
discoveries
A safe place to let the emotions flow, from tears tolaughter
The healing garden as a gathering place, for groups, and
activities
breakfast on the patio
barefoot in the park
sing along party with bubbles and snacks
site for activities, storytelling and sharing
a life filled place with a fish pond, butterflies, ladybugs, perhaps crickets
bird feeders & hummingbird plants
vegetables and fruit growing like home
opportunities to pick flowers, smell the roses, plant, weed and engage arts, crafts, writing, games, ceremonies, events
Night Lights party with a movie or slide show, patio lights and cool
breezes
Remember the view from the window
Wind, rain, snow or ice in the garden can pose a safety risk for the health
of everyone involved. This doesn’t mean that the healing garden is a bad
investment in time, energy or finances. The garden can be placed where there are
large windows so that it can be viewed in the comfort and safety of the indoors.
There is sensory stimulation in a snowfall, icicles, a thunderstorm or even a
late night view of the garden. Comfortable chairs with space for a wheelchair
can make the virtual visit to the garden a healing experience. If there are
materials such as photos, pine cones, bouquets, pussy willow and birch twigs
available as props the value can be greatly enhanced.
A powerpoint slide show of seasonal scenes, activities in the garden,
butterflies, flowers, seeds being planted, sprouting, blooming, producing fruit
and appearing on the dinner table, and other scenes linking the garden to our
existence can have a valuable influence on the patient, family and all others
concerned. This can have great value for those with Alzheimer’s and hospice
patients as well. These can have musical accompaniment and be used by a trained
horticultural therapist to calm, reduce anxiety, stress and anger, and initiate
conversation.
Lobbies and hallways can be home to potted plants, fountains, lights &
sound. Artwork can be displayed in areas where there is easy access and
comfortable seating. Statuary and whimsy can also be a part of this little
indoor oasis. This is also a healing garden.
Birds, fish, therapy dogs, cats and bunnies can be a part of the indoor or
outdoor healing garden. There are some precautions that must be taken when
including animals. There are some with allergies to birds, dogs or cats. The
animals must be in good health themselves and it is best to limit the number of
animals present at any given time to avoid confusion, undo stress and fear.
There is a great deal of benefit to be gained from the engagement with therapy
dogs, cats and rabbits. Of course cleanliness must be a part of the routine.
Writing, poetry and art can be even more effective means of engagement even
when the weather limits outdoor visits to the healing garden. Therapeutic
writing programs conducted in a healing garden setting can be very
effective.
Avoiding the health risks in the healing garden
high or low temperatures
too much sun
dust, pollen, air pollution
toxic plants and garden chemicals
dehydration
The healing garden need not be massive, or complex, it does need to be safe
and accessible. This can be the ultimate celebration of the people-plant
connection and one of the most significant applications of horticultural
therapy. It is a matter of quality of life for some, a part of the journey
toward healing for many others. This is one of the ways that hospitals,
rehabilitation centers, senior care, cancer treatment, trauma centers, and so
many other venues can expand the ways that healing can take place.
The key to a successful healing garden, either passive or active is the
opportunity for engagement, either individually or with others.
landscape feature, but it can be so much more than that. It can actually be
therapeutic in itself, as a calming place where stress can be shed, anger
released and peace found. The garden can also go far beyond this and become an
empowering and mentally stimulating place of discovery rather than a refuge.
With a few insights we can create healing gardens that are profoundly active
rather than passive.
When the garden is used as a part of a treatment and therapy program, it can
reduce recovery time for surgery patients, reduce stress, lower blood pressure
and increase oxygen levels. And that’s only the beginning. Diabetics, cardiac
and cancer patients can benefit from the garden setting and activities.
Active or passive use of a garden setting can reduce depression and need for
antidepressive medications, lower levels of anger and frustration and promotes
engagement. The healing that can happen here can be physical, mental, emotional
and spiritual. These four aspects that define who we are cannot effectively be
treated separately.
The healing garden need not be a huge and labor intensive botanical garden.
It does need to be accessible to those who need it. That includes not only the
patients but staff, volunteers, chaplains, family, social workers and friends.
They can find their way to the healing garden to shed stress and seek their own
harmony. It is also a safe and comforting place for those who want to, or need
to, spend time with a patient for confidential conversation and therapy. It also
needs to be accessible to the patient alone or several patients together.
This isn’t a place to park a patient and leave them in solitude, unless that
is their choice. It is the place where the people-plant connecting can be
incredibly calming, inspiring and relaxing. In the company of the plants and the
earth miracles can happen.
The journey from passive to active healing gardens
One of the primary roles of a healing garden is to reduce
stress. When we provide a space designed to be safe, inviting and comforting,
what we are really doing is making an effort to reduce stress for all who enter.
This begins with the limiting of warnings and signs proclaiming "Do Not!" A
good healing garden can contain some, not necessarily all, of the following.
These elements are all designed to limit stress and provide an emotional comfort
zone, a safe place.
This can become a comfortable place to meditate, pray,
converse, accept reality, let go of the burdens, and heal. When one member of
the family is ill, infirm, experiencing recovery or facing the end-of-life, the
entire family and network of friends also face difficult emotions, feel the same
pain and need the same opportunity to work through the difficult processes. The
following elements of a good healing garden can give one the strength to seek
answers, face reality and share the discomfort.
The following are a few guidelines for the creation of a
healing garden.
It is strongly recommended that before designing such a garden a
professional horticultural therapist be consulted. This is not usually in the
realm of expertise of a landscape architect. When a healing garden is ready for
use it is also suggested that the staff attend a seminar on the effective use of
such a garden. Not only is this advised to prevent problems but to obtain the
most benefit from it.
1. Safe walkways with accessible plantings that become a
sensory experience, as well as a way of experiencing the people-plant
connection.
2. Resting areas, seating, stones and log benches that blend
the natural and the creative to produce places for meditation or prayer. These
are opportunities to let go, discard the burdens, even for a little while.
3. Features such as distinctive plantings, sensory
experiences, arbors, butterfly gardens, and fountains that provide destinations
are a part of the garden and the journey, but in the design of a healing garden
is it is important not to over do the planting so that it becomes little more
than a confusing, sensory overload that can increase the stress and discomfort.
Keep it simple, keep it comfortable.
4. Plant and non-plant materials that provide multi-seasonal
features can also be a valuable part of the healing garden. Too often the
healing garden is a neglected area after spring flowers or other seasonal
displays. Healing needs to happen throughout the year.
5. Conversation stations, stopping points where families or
small groups can pause to visit. Visiting the healing garden doesn’t have to be
a solitary journey.
Healing in the tea garden - Simplicity
While discussing the role and value of a healing garden with
a community group, one of the participants spoke up. "Oh, you mean like a
Japanese tea garden?"
She was absolutely right. The tea garden is a journey with a
series of thresholds where the visitor can let go of stress and move toward a
state of harmony and inner peace. This makes the garden a place of active
engagement, even if the one on the journey through the garden is not planting,
pruning or doing any of the "work." In this journey, as we let go, we can truly
experience with all of our senses. In the tea garden, the way of tea, the
journey is as much a part of the destination as the tea house. This is one of
the purest applications of a healing garden. The concept of a garden as a place
for healing is not limited to one place or time. In the Egypt of the pharaohs
there were special gardens where the stressed could walk and recline, find rest
and renewal.
Sensory elements and discoveries to be made
The plant material is only a part of the healing garden
concept. In the journey from passive to active engagement the inspiration for
active experiences often depends on the non-plant materials, the available
locations for meditation and the tools to permit active involvement.
Opportunities to touch, smell, contemplate, recall or share a memory are the
benefits of sensory moments. Other opportunities include a rake to texture a
sand garden, an accessible garden space with trowels and small plants that can
be planted, vines that may need trimming and training, and the list is limited
only by the creativity of those involved.
The healing garden can provide moments of empowerment, a
decrease in depression, the exercising of mind and body and healing moments that
originate with sensory stimulation, whimsical moments, and freedom to
contemplate, meditate and pray. The journey can be one of personal discovery, or
from within to beyond oneself. The journey isn’t always from illness to health.
It can be a journey from anger or fear to acceptance.
Plantings can provide sensory stimulation, without Do Not
Touch signs. In one healing garden hanging baskets lined the walkway and
each had a sign suggesting that the visitor touch the leaves, smell the flowers
or share a special moment. It’s even better when these plant features reflect
the familiar plants, trees, herbs, vegetables and flowers of the people who will
be using the healing garden rather than the landscape architect’s favorites.
Herbs and other aromatic plants should be spaced apart, not
clustered together. When the scents become jumbled, it ceases to be therapeutic
and may become stressful. The healing garden can provide opportunities for the
use of art, statuary and whimsy along the pathways and near seating. These can
inspire meditation moments, prayers and discussion. The healing process can be
shortened when we can share the questions, the fear and the anger with others.
When we can be a part of this conversation, when we are willing to listen, we
can be a gift to each other. The healing garden provides the safe place to talk,
and listen.
Use signs to identify the plants. While this isn’t a
botanical garden, the simple and subtle labeling of the plants can be a way to
share information, and this gaining of knowledge can be empowering. Signs should
be conveniently placed, and if signs are in Braille they must at a uniform
height and consistently within reach.
Features such as butterfly gardens and hummingbird feeders
can be a very beneficial part of an active healing garden. Some view such
elements as a distraction, but they stimulate the senses and make it possible to
become engaged. These sensory elements help to draw the individual from self
outward in the journey from isolation to engagement. The sharing of these
discoveries can be a powerful gift from the healing garden.
Sand boxes, Zen gardens, whimsical statuary, religious icons
and touch pools all serve a similar purpose. They all break down the barriers
and open the doors to contemplation, prayer, conversation and activities ranging
from touching and raking to smiles and laughter. A small patch of grass that is
accessible by wheelchair can have a profound impact on people who are able to be
"barefoot in the grass." This can be even better if two or more people are able
to share this joyful, and spiritual, connection with the earth. Night blooming
and night fragrant plants can have great value in expanding the usefulness of
the healing garden.
Any passive garden, even a postage stamp size corner of the
landscape by the door can become a delightfully active garden with opportunities
for engagement, sensory stimulation and discovery.
Accessibility is essential to the healing process
Experiential opportunitiescan be planned or
spontaneous, but they need to be accessible.
Adapting the garden for convenience requires some common
sense and understanding.
Adapting the garden for safety, to fully appreciate the
risks to those with physical limitations try navigating a wheelchair along the
paths and walkways.
Adapting the garden for experiential opportunities means
we need to limit barriers, fences, while providing vertical features and seating
within significant plantings.
We need to be cautious about overdoing the planting and
features of the healing garden. It’s very easy to have too much of a good thing.
Venues for healing gardens
Hospitals
Schools, from elementary to graduate level, for all
students, not only those with "special needs."
Senior care communities
People with special needs, physical or mental
limitations
Cancer, cardiac, diabetic and trauma patients
The workplace
Places of worship, religious retreats
Memorial gardens, cemeteries, mausoleums and mortuaries
Home & neighborhoods
The view
Vistas are an important part of the healing garden
The view from the window is the only garden connection many
will experience in times of harsh weather, or those with allergies, or
compromised immune systems.
The view from within the Garden should lead the eye, draw
attention to focal points, provide opportunities relaxation and letting go, and
for surprise and whimsy.
Finding the way home can be an important part of the garden
design.
Conversation Stations
These are comfortable places for people to relax and engage.
Socialization is a valuable activity for healing, and for quality of life, even
as we approach the end of life. This is important for family and professional
caregivers as well as patients or residents.
Beyond self-focus, many function with an internalized
focus, but when interaction can occur body and mind benefit
Sensory Connections can be enjoyed more when they is
someone to share them with
Sense of Humor, the whimsy of life is one of the greatest
healing elements, it is also an avenue to dispel depression and anxiety.
These can be a place for Story Circles, where stories,
poetry and music can be shared
Comfortable seating is one of the keys to a successful
conversation station
Shade is necessary too, for both health and comfort
Opportunity garden concept
Every garden can be a special place where opportunities for healing,
improving health, better diet and learning. Much of the following is from the
Opportunity Garden we developed with the Disney horticulture team and the
American Horticultural Therapy Association as a part of EPCOT’s annual
International Flower & Garden Festival from 1999-2003.
Elements of an opportunity garden
Reminisce garden, or scattered plants as memory triggers
Vegetables and fruit on trellises and raised beds
Sensory opportunities that are accessible
Vertical gardens
Arbors with vines, gourds and flowers
Safe water features
Special stations for conversation, discovery, activity
The healing garden setting as a place to use as we would a backyard, or the
back porch
One-on-one conversation between participant and therapist, medical staff,
clergy, and others
Quiet place to relax and visit with family or guests
Safe space to be alone to relax, meditate, or simply think
A place where we can experience through the senses and connect with nature at
our own pace
Opportunities to actively engage, physically, mentally, emotionally and
spiritually
Plants, non-plant materials and settings that provide memory triggers and new
discoveries
A safe place to let the emotions flow, from tears tolaughter
The healing garden as a gathering place, for groups, and
activities
breakfast on the patio
barefoot in the park
sing along party with bubbles and snacks
site for activities, storytelling and sharing
a life filled place with a fish pond, butterflies, ladybugs, perhaps crickets
bird feeders & hummingbird plants
vegetables and fruit growing like home
opportunities to pick flowers, smell the roses, plant, weed and engage arts, crafts, writing, games, ceremonies, events
Night Lights party with a movie or slide show, patio lights and cool
breezes
Remember the view from the window
Wind, rain, snow or ice in the garden can pose a safety risk for the health
of everyone involved. This doesn’t mean that the healing garden is a bad
investment in time, energy or finances. The garden can be placed where there are
large windows so that it can be viewed in the comfort and safety of the indoors.
There is sensory stimulation in a snowfall, icicles, a thunderstorm or even a
late night view of the garden. Comfortable chairs with space for a wheelchair
can make the virtual visit to the garden a healing experience. If there are
materials such as photos, pine cones, bouquets, pussy willow and birch twigs
available as props the value can be greatly enhanced.
A powerpoint slide show of seasonal scenes, activities in the garden,
butterflies, flowers, seeds being planted, sprouting, blooming, producing fruit
and appearing on the dinner table, and other scenes linking the garden to our
existence can have a valuable influence on the patient, family and all others
concerned. This can have great value for those with Alzheimer’s and hospice
patients as well. These can have musical accompaniment and be used by a trained
horticultural therapist to calm, reduce anxiety, stress and anger, and initiate
conversation.
Lobbies and hallways can be home to potted plants, fountains, lights &
sound. Artwork can be displayed in areas where there is easy access and
comfortable seating. Statuary and whimsy can also be a part of this little
indoor oasis. This is also a healing garden.
Birds, fish, therapy dogs, cats and bunnies can be a part of the indoor or
outdoor healing garden. There are some precautions that must be taken when
including animals. There are some with allergies to birds, dogs or cats. The
animals must be in good health themselves and it is best to limit the number of
animals present at any given time to avoid confusion, undo stress and fear.
There is a great deal of benefit to be gained from the engagement with therapy
dogs, cats and rabbits. Of course cleanliness must be a part of the routine.
Writing, poetry and art can be even more effective means of engagement even
when the weather limits outdoor visits to the healing garden. Therapeutic
writing programs conducted in a healing garden setting can be very
effective.
Avoiding the health risks in the healing garden
high or low temperatures
too much sun
dust, pollen, air pollution
toxic plants and garden chemicals
dehydration
The healing garden need not be massive, or complex, it does need to be safe
and accessible. This can be the ultimate celebration of the people-plant
connection and one of the most significant applications of horticultural
therapy. It is a matter of quality of life for some, a part of the journey
toward healing for many others. This is one of the ways that hospitals,
rehabilitation centers, senior care, cancer treatment, trauma centers, and so
many other venues can expand the ways that healing can take place.
The key to a successful healing garden, either passive or active is the
opportunity for engagement, either individually or with others.