In 2014 I was overworking, over-giving and utterly burnt out.
I would get home from work each day crying, but I didn’t know why. My brain so full of the things I had to do that I didn’t have the headspace to work out what the matter was. I'd wake in the middle of the night sweating with my mind racing.
My stomach was so bad I’d convinced myself I had cancer, so I booked a doctor’s appointment.
They told me it was stress, told me to do less and offered me CBT. Fat chance of that happening I scoffed to myself, I couldn’t possibly let those who needed me down like that. What would they think of me?
I'd recently moved into a new house and begun to garden, mainly because I had a garden that needed doing and as the people pleasing overgiver that I was I added it to my already VERY LONG to-do list. But something unexpected happened.
I quickly realised that whilst I was gardening my brain was actually quiet.
My mind didn’t feel like a washing machine on a spin cycle. My racing thoughts were nowhere to be seen and for the first time in my life, I had some headspace.
Eventually after a few months of using gardening to quiet my mind, I realised that I'd been keeping myself busy in order to avoid the difficult things that were happening in my life. Losing a dear friend to cancer, being bullied at work, redundancy- twice.
I'd been trying to out-work my feelings. Because society tells us if you want something, and I so desperately wanted to avoid my feelings, then you need to work harder at it. So thats what I did.
Until I couldn't any longer. My brain was telling me no more.
So I gardened, allowed my brain to quiet and allowed 25 years of feelings to resurface.
At times it was terrifying, but I just kept on gardening, moving my body, allowing the feelings to move through me into the earth and out of my mind and body.
I put boundaries in place at work, stopped saying yes to everything and used my garden to process the fear that came up around others judging me for saying no.
Before long, my stomach problems stopped, I woke up feeling refreshed after a full 8 hours and I realised that constant feeling that I was about to explode, was gone.
When you work with me 1:1, it’s so much more than just learning to garden.
It's growing your strength and confidence to be able to say no, its growing your self worth so that you know you deserve time in the garden for you and you boldly claim it.
This is not something that can be taught in a single social media post, a one-off masterclass, or even a Substack article. This is a process and thats why I support you through the seasons to practice these new skills as you garden.
Because as women we sure as shit haven’t been taught them before now.
Reply to this email or send me a direct message and lets chat about how I can help you.