spirituality and aesthetics

Retrieved on 29th Sept 2011 fromwww.koanga.org.nz/koanga-institute-collection
 27th September


Silly to say that it isn't  too hard to think about gardening without thinking about the potential to express beauty .
Norfolk (2000) "Gardeners are like landscape painters.Their canvas is soil, their paints the vast array of living, flowers ,trees and shrubs" 
This is the time of year where the first flower especially from the veggie garden are starting to come.Sad but true part of my work on my veggie garden this week was hoeing my broad bean plants and I was getting quite excited about seeing the flowers as it will sign of beauty is also a sign that it all go for the growing season   YAY !!!! .

retrieved on the 28/09/11 from id.wikipedia.org/wiki/Berkas:Broad_bean.jpg

My concept of beauty definitely links with my view of spirituality and respecting the environment that you work in  that you allow the plants to grow the way they want. I cant see beuty in a garden that obviously has blue nitrogen pellets that has perfect rows(this is an aeshetic rebellion as my father was one for strings and lines.
I can only see beauty in vegetables that are not hybrid x coming from the netherlands .We live in NZ so use the beautiful seed and plants that come from companies such as Koanga gardens using varieties that work here

retrieved on 29th Sept 2011 fromwww.koanga.org.nz/koanga-institute-collection

• that you plant flowers next to vegetables i.e nasturtiums take pests away from cabbages and other brassicas.
• that gardens dont look aesthetic unless mulched with something like seaweed ,compost .
• that you use as natural things as possible no platic poles net for beans.

 I am lucky I inherited a beautiful garden and it is easy for me to create beauty by weeding  and giving the plants space .The beauty and spirituality is increased by the olfactory extras including oregano, thyme, a lemon verbena tree, lavender ,a bay leaf tree .

• which i have aesthetically experimented on and have shaped it in a topiary manner as a lolly pop styled tree( must be the ordered English aesthetic in me)
  

For someone that is not very aesthetic i definitely see gardening as a way of creating beauty .but as every thing I do i probably err on the edge of chaos and scruffiness. let plants go to seed and stuff coming up every where




I  find it hard to take away gardening from spirituality as a culture that has tried everything to distance itself from the earth that sustains us as somone that always tries to live in the country .I know that i am not grounded if i don't spend time labouring gardening or eating food from the garden

Susan Bowden who is an important advocate for the healing properties of garden argues things well "gardens are a means of enriching our spirituality and possibly our faith,being involved in the process of gardening is a vital tool to counteract the many stresses and demands of the world in which we must live and enable us to become fully and maturely human".

The quiet garden movement have been influential in many green space s in towns especically in schools and prisons

I still think that neil from the young ones sums up the spirituality of gardening the best

Reference list


Bowden,s. Quiet gardens :the root of faith?. London. U.k: Pickstock


Norfolk, D. The thereapeutic garden. London . England: Bamtam Press.

The affordances of pruning

affordances19th September                                     retrieved from en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tree_of_life 


Alrighty some more rantings about my relationship with my garden.
This week taking the slant of looking at it from an affordance point of view.
I suppose my gardening activity this week was quite solitary pruning two beautiful gnarly majestic apple trees that i have.
I started of with some important communication with my partner finding time that was suitable for us both ,which we justabout managed.
I then tried some communication with both of my oldest children trying to argue how much fun it would be, even pointing out to my boy we would be using relatively sharp and dangerous tools .
But alas this beautiful teaching and learning moment didn't happen ,neither were interested in the slightest!!
.
I definitely showed respect to the apple trees especially one that I will name Ethel , who shouted at me implored  me to prune her .She hated being so overgrown or messy, with cumbersome suckers going every where .Which especially for Ethel has meant that all these branches  meant all her energy is going into producing lotsa wispy branches supporting lotas small apples and not allowing her to look after herself .
We decided it was a year to be heavy handed and cut some fairly large branches out .Ethel pointed out that this year I may not get as many apples as Im used to but long term she,ll feel better and pay me back in future years .

My above rantings basically convey that especially when working with trees its easy to see when they are happy ,when they are stressed ,when they need feeding .It is also important to show respect to something as alive and spiritual as a tree.
As Norfolk (2000) points out when "contemplating a tree its roots firmly planted in the earth from which it draws it nourishment, the tree then sends it arms reaching upwards to the sky from where it absorbs the life force"p.118.  



Also the trees pay us back we get a load of both cooking and eating apples and especially the cookers are able to pass them onto mates in a sort of swapping way .
I feel i am caring for my family in a small way that they can get fresh food out of the garden although i need to improve this communication cause they love to eat the apples WELL!!! before they are ripe.
I definitely put some of myself into pruning i would like to say it is my aesthetic side although it may jus be my lazy side.


Reference list
Norfolk, D. The thereapeutic garden. London . England: Bamtam Press.
Tree of life image rettrieved on the 19th September 2011 from en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tree_of_life  

ERGONONOMICS

OK here we go again I will start with a definition of ergonomics.
Ergonomics aims to design appliances technical systemsand tasks to improve human safety,health comfort and performance Dul , J & Weerdmeester (2008) p.1

I will try and break up gardening into three areas .  PERSON    ACTIVITY     ENVIRONMENT
First      Person thinking of my garden with myself

• I guess I am the Stereotypical age for a Gardener,at the life stage where  the husband runs out in to the garden for solace , peace and quiet.
• I know it is an activity that i am fairly skilled in although this skill is used for quick easy gardening i.e you will always gat bigger veggies if you use comfrey and sea weed and horse manure.
• This knowledge is underused as I'm not doing large scale gardening in the past.It is an activity that I find harder and harder to fit in my life with study and work .I also realise I am less motivated to garden as  I earn money doing other peoples, to be clever the theory is to teach the children the skills .I remember being excited when my daughter could pick a good salad from the garden using nasturtium mescalin chive parsley rocket etc.

The Activity of gardening erm this is hard .well the occupation always changes usually because of environmental factors .But the occupation always involve our favourite word labour.

 Arendt points out that "Labour is the activity which corresponds to the biological process of the

human body, whose spontaneous growth, metabolism, and eventual decayare bound to the vital necessities produced and fed into the life process bylabour.  The human condition of labour is life itself." ( 1958) p.7

At the moment my gardening involves pruning apple trees, weeding, soil preparing and I really need to plant some herb plants marjoram chives in an awaiting new herb spot ,garden.
The activity is one that is beautiful and sometimes exhausting(i.e weeding ,digging) for its different components.

Because i have knowledge i try and limit the work process in garden one buy using perennial /self seeders such as rocket .the other i mulch heavily and usually make my own soil in raised beds to lessen the weeding and digging aspects.Permaculture sees this as a system where if you work with the environment you lessen the need for labour.
Mollison has described permaculture as "a philosophy of working with, rather than against nature; of protracted and thoughtful observation rather than protracted and thoughtless labor; and of looking at plants and animals in all their functions, rather than treating any area as a single project system."
Environment how can you write about gardening without involving the environment .

I do loosely in a pick and mix way follow  bio dynamic gardening this uses the force of the universe the main way i follow this is ido follow moon calendars for planting and pruning .for an itersting link pease check out www.koanga.org.nz/moon-calendar

Ive got to admit i look at the calender which is on the toilet wall and if it ssuits i.e next Tues Ti's a good root veg day i will follow if i cant then oh well
OK the next thing with environment and occupation is that i do try and scape the activity of gardening in a ergonomic way
firstly my garden beds are raised and sized that i can reach every where and dont need to stand on them
i also follow again roughly the permaculture principle of zoning.b

Zones are a way of organizing design elements in a human environment on the basis of the frequency of human use and plant needs. Frequently manipulated or harvested elements of the design are located close to the house in zones one and two. Less frequently used or manipulated elements, and elements that benefit from isolation (such as wild species) are farther away. Zones is about positioning things appropriately. Zones are numbered from 0 to 5.

image retrieved from permaculturetokyo.blogspot.com Basically i have or will have herb garden outside my kitchen window zone 1 my main garden very close ZONE 2 and then a rougher area where The compost is and which is a work in progress although i do bigger crops here runner beans and spuds.ZONE 3

so Basically in my own way i try and follow ergonomic principles in my garden
References
Arendt, H. (1958). The human condition. Chicago: Chicago University Press.


 Dul , J & Weerdmeester (2008) Ergonomics for beginners a quick reference guide 3rd edition,Boca Raton: USA.:Crc press.


Mollison, B. (1991). Introduction to permaculture.Tyalgum,N.S.W, Austrailia: Tagari publishing.






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Participation in occupation 2

image retrieved from permaculturehi.wordpress.com

My chosen activity is gardening to produce food

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Which involves running a garden or areas over a year to primarily produce food. Including roles of soil conditioning compost green manures.weeding making structures to grow thing up etc .sowing seeds transplanting wtering pruning etc.(and of course many other roles).
The activity is one that is debatedly one of the oldest occupattions and has been taken part as long as huimans have settled in areas the activity is one that has been written.

What does it mean to me!!
To me it is a strong part of my identity . Gardening is one of the ways to lessen your carbon footprint (especially if its organically grown) decreasing amount of fertilizer pesticides ,miles on transport, packaging etc,composting back into the garden.
To eat  food that you have grown seems to taste better and it  is different than veggies sold in the shops.I mainly try and use heritage i.e dalmation beans ,lady finger potatoes and or interesting varities.Also being a stuent it allows my family to eat some organic food as I cant afford shop prices for most organic food.
To be able to have a relationship with your garden.There is a huge feeling of stisfaction if you have improved the fertility of an area through soil and composting. I follow many principles from permaculture that tries to work with nature and have been slightly influenced by bio dynamic gardening that harnesses more obtuse forces such as the moon . These principles allow you to work with nature ie growing thing that help each other close to ech other (companion gardening, i.e. nastutiums take bugs away from cabbages).Permaculture has a broader reach than just gardening and is seen as a design process to work with nature and live as environmentally as possible,which again reflects how i would like to live my life.

Earlier in my life to live a simpler life to grow most of my own food defined a lot of whom i was, including living in Spain and having my own land . At this period of my life my gardening is quite minamal, although at this time of year i am easily spending two hours a week preparing my garden for the spring rush of planting.
I cant deny for me there is a strong spiritual  element for me in gardening. Neil from the young ones(1982) summed it up nicely "we sow the seeds nature grows the seeds and then we eat the seeds then we sow the seeds etc".
This sums up the beautiful cycle of life'.

Ways that the occupation of gardening can be  used in occupational therapy.
To start in this section gardening is an occupation that is vitally important to many people .There are many ways that the use of gardening can be used in occupational therapy which is only limited by our knowledge and imagination.

image retrieved  from www.disabled-world.com/entertainment/hobby/gardening/

When people are physically limited from gardening ie being in a wheelchair modifications can be made to the garden i.e heightened beds, container gardening, putting your garden in easier to access area things, being grown up wall and down from containers.As an ot the environment can be assessed and changed for the person.
Adaptive equpment can be used that helps minamise a persons physical deficits .i.e easy hold tools .
the use of gardening as theraupeutic tool used by an occupational therapistin mental health and learning difficultie programs is immense.
Some examples would be for some the environment of gerdening is freer then other environments and it is used in many groups ie back  to work schemes i.e youth gro,or existing companies that will take on peole to work . I worked with an anthrosphical group tht had regular input from an OT. This group was one of mixed learning , it did gardening and community compost. The roles and work that this group filled an important gap for occupations for this group of peole where everybody found a role working out sid had a less constricting environment.People had found work afterthais and similar groups and some 15 years on have found a group and occupation that they enjoy and satifies them.
Gardening as an occupational therapist is atool that has many uses it also allows people to have an interest in the food they produce which naturally moves in to cooking etc .It is an occuption tha works on many different levals i.e labour producing food ,spirutuality which in my view work well with the holistic approach of occupational therapy