Tending Life in Heavy Times
As the light lingers a little longer each evening and the soil begins to warm and soften beneath our hands, there is a quiet, undeniable shift happening all around us. You can feel it.
In the subtle swelling of buds, in the return of birdsong at dawn, in the way the air itself seems to carry a different kind of breath, the earth and sky surrounding us is alive, awake, becoming.
Every living organism responds to this call. Plants stretch upward and roots deepen. Seeds, once dormant, begin their slow, determined unfurling. We are not separate from this rhythm. Whether we realize it consciously or not, something within us is stirring.
And yet. This season of renewal, of life, of hope, and of growing doesn’t arrive in a vacuum.
Many of us are holding a heaviness right now. Grief, uncertainty, and overwhelm as we witness the state of the world and the division of community around us. It can feel dissonant to carry both: the tenderness of new life alongside the weight of what is unfolding globally and collectively.
But nature does not ask us to choose.
It teaches us how to hold both.
In the same garden bed where new shoots emerge, last season’s decay still feeds the soil. Life and loss, growth and grief. They are not opposites, but companions in a much larger cycle.
This is something I’ve been sitting with deeply as I begin preparing this season’s garden.
Hands in the dirt again, I’m planting yarrow, calendula, skullcap, catnip, motherwort, chamomile, comfrey, California poppy, mugwort, lavender, and so many more. Each one carrying its own intelligence, its own medicine. Each one a quiet reminder that resilience doesn’t mean the absence of hardship, but the ability to continue growing in relationship with it.
There is something profoundly grounding in this work.
To tend the soil.
To plan for the future.
To participate in life’s return, even when the world feel uncertain.
It doesn’t erase the heaviness, but it offers a place to put it. A way to move with it. A reminder that we are still allowed to create, to nurture, to hope, to see beauty. When we embrace the work of tending a garden, it gives something back to us. A place to be held. Where mistakes are not only acknowledged but transformed, softened into learning. And where, through care and patience, we are nurtured into becoming better than we were before. The soil accepts our tears and reflects back our private celebrations.
If you’ve been feeling this duality too, know that you’re not alone in it.
Maybe your version of tending looks like planting seeds. Maybe it’s making tea, stepping outside for a few quiet moments, or simply noticing the way the shadows have changed.
However it shows up for you, I hope you give yourself permission to stay connected. To the earth, to your body, and to the small, steady rhythms that continue regardless of everything else.
There is wisdom there.
There is medicine there.
And there is, always, the quiet promise that life is still unfolding. A promise that our collective grief and determination will bring light and joy in the future.
Deep breath. We are here together, and here for each other.
Love and herbal tea,
Jenn
