Jun Gardening to Ease Stress & Anxiety: Coping Skills in the Garden

Intentionally cultivate and grow your connection with the land through a hands-on gardening series

Now more than ever, we need to return to our gardens. We all know instinctively how we feel better with time outside with wild plants. Intentionally cultivate and grow that connection in this four-part series. Easy-to-understand, scientifically proven benefits will be covered alongside hands-on gardening techniques. Offering many of the benefits of meditation, gardening can be a powerful mindfulness practice. All are welcome, whether we plan on growing an herb container garden in a window, joining a community garden for the first time or growing veggies in our own backyard.

Jen Kardos leads this four-part series:
1. The Undeniable Benefits of Time with Plants
2. Bring Your Worries to the Garden
3. Coping Skills in the Garden
4. Foraging Self-Compassion

The Undeniable Benefits of Time with Plants
Friday, March 25, noon–1 p.m.
Zoom session
This will be an easy-to-understand overview of the numerous evidenced-based benefits of time in gardens and nature. Much like our pets, nature can provide the unconditional love and sense of connection we are all seeking. An overview of future classes and easy plants to grow will be included.

Bring Your Worries to the Garden
Friday, April 22, 4–6 p.m.
Green Community Gardens at Prairiewoods
We are invited to bring our worries to the garden. We will experience hands-on all the ways our body's nervous system and immune system self-regulate in the garden. We will practice gardening techniques to nurture mind, body and spirit while developing practical bed preparation, seeding and transplanting skills.

Coping Skills in the Garden
Friday, June 3, 4–6 p.m.
Green Community Gardens at Prairiewoods
We will learn coping skills in the garden. We will enhance our plant-tending skills while gardening to reduce anxiety, improve mood and sooth the inner-critic. We will learn techniques of thinning and pruning and their applications in our lives. We will even be able to nibble on early harvests in the Garden of Eat’n!

Foraging Self-Compassion
Friday, June 24, 4–6 p.m.
Green Community Gardens at Prairiewoods
We will be on foraging self-compassion. This is for the perfectionist who desires to embrace the imperfect and experience more joy in the garden (and in life!). Learn the messy ways that nature thrives in the unpredictable world and the delicious abundance it offers in return. We will be foraging and tasting cultivated and wild plants, and noticing their non-judgmental natures.

The first online session is free, and each in-person session costs $20 (or register for the four-part series for $50 by calling 319-395-6700). Attendees are encouraged to sign up for the series, although registrations for only one or more individual sessions are welcomed.