INTRODUCTION
It’s hard to cultivate joy in our lives if we aren’t cultivating a healthy life. Gardening offers us some simple advice on healthy living:
DON’T FORGET:
Drink water and get sunlight.
You’re basically a house plant with more complicated emotions.
Alongside gratitude, love, and God’s promises of joy, we need those things that contribute to our physical, emotional, and spiritual wholeness so that joy can root, grow, and bloom in us. We need actual water and sunlight. We also need “water and sunlight” for our minds, hearts, and spirits. Like a garden, we need to keep our spiritual soil loosened up, and we need regular weeding.
Our health habits and self-care impact our joy. It’s hard to find joy when we are tired, anxious, or spiritually anemic. Because we are holistic beings, our physical, emotional, and spiritual health affect one another in both good and not so good ways. Self-care can be challenging and feel selfish. When we remember that caring for ourselves helps us to be more grateful, loving, and joyful, we are able to tend to ourselves with compassion.