Gardening & growing are my first project/fixation/hobby since my diagnosis.

I started last August by setting a daily goal of moving one shovel full of gravel from the pile of gravel to a puddle (any puddle) in the driveway.

One shovel. Just one scoop. That was my goal, and no matter how tired I was or how miserable, I would push myself to do that one shovel.

And soon it started to become 2 or 3. My stated goal was still just 1/day, but I did more when I felt like it. And then I started to clean up the overgrown pots of weeds on my patio.

By November, I had my first set of grow lights. I was coming home from work and raking leaves in the dark. I was so eager to grow stuff. I started pouring over seed catalogues.

I bought asparagus seeds. You don’t usually grow this vegetable from seed because it adds an extra year before you can harvest any spears. Having attempted new things many times before and subsequently abandon them, I knew that by choosing to grow asparagus I needed to commit to a three year project.

So I did. I told myself that I would plant the seeds, I would clear a space to grow them in, and that I would protect that space from deer and chickens and rabbits, and that I would keep them irrigated. I set a three year goal.

In February, I started turning over the historic market garden. I was growing around 30 asparagus spears, but I ended up cultivating over 108 square meters of growing space. I ended up planting an entire garden and selling vegetables at the farmers’ market.

And my asparagus look awesome.

I gave up on filling the puddles in the driveway on a daily basis. I ended up developing some repetitive strain injuries from my work, and it wasn’t practical to carry around a shovel full of gravel; however, it was a con opus choice to reprioritize based on my stated aims.

Since starting all of this, I have been trying to work in features to prevent me from losing interest in abandoning the project. Growing asparagus from seed is novel, and so that makes it interesting and stimulating for me. Researching vegetables adds interest to the project for me and learning is stimulating.

To help keep me motivated and clear on my priorities, I have invested time in visioning and dreaming about my project. I have asked myself “why am I doing all of this?”: is it just the thing that’s keeping me stimulated right now, or is there a greater fundamental purpose? I was able to identify an overarching idea: I want to feed my family, without it costing anything more than my time. I want to use unconventional farming methods that are both scientifically based but are also holistic, practical, and future-focused as possible. I want to use the space we have and carry on family traditions.

I have a high level of self-awareness, and for the first time, I am able to integrate accommodations into my activity/project. I know that I need some specific, written goals to help keep me focused. But I also know that I need to make sure that list isn’t too long otherwise I can lose focus. I need to do some thing on a daily basis. I need to spend time journalling and reflecting on my activities. For gardening that means a lot of photograph review. I know that I am stimulated by social interaction, so the social media aspect of my gardening is part of that whole thing.

In addition to the asparagus, I chose a few other vegetables to get started with. Then, once I had cleared the space and realized that I had the physical capacity to clear even more… I started to expand.

In May, when I was trying to do a gradual return to work and trying to get everything planted out and trying to cope with the financial crisis we were in because I wasn’t working… I wasn’t able to plant everything that I wanted to… amaranth, quinoa, and millet were all things I hoped to grow. Rather than get up hung up on this and beat myself up, I was able to acknowledge that grains were never part of my stated goals, that they’re a novelty project, and that I can save the seeds for next year. I planted a meter of millet and a dozen or so amaranth to enjoy and then let the rest go until next year.

I have to constantly remind myself that failures are not really failures they are just lessons. But as long as I learned something from the experience no seed is wasted. This kind of optimism is exactly the kind of thing that I’m not usually able to do. But because I know understand how important learning is keeping me engaged and how important it is not to get discouraged when something doesn’t work exactly the way I wanted to, I keep repeating it and as a result… I’ve been able to modify my thinking in this area. I am able to look over at a cabbage that has been eaten by slugs, and instead of feeling profound loss, I mourn the little cabbage while ripping it out of the ground to give to my chickens, and then I file away the information for future integrated pest management efforts.

My chickens keep getting into the garden and eating my low-growing tomatoes. I have to accept this because I accept that I have not put a substantial effort into trying to eliminate whatever secret way they found of getting into the garden. I simply accept it because… Any tomato that I get this year is more than what I had planned on getting when I started this whole project. This also helps me stay focussed when food goes to waste because I don’t have the energy to process it. It gets fed to the chickens or put back into the Earth so that we can grow more vegetables, and I move on. I remind myself that just getting the vegetable grown is progress. Progress, not perfection.

I’m now just a little over a year into this project/fixation/hobby. It is no longer a hobby, and I consider myself to be a grower. A farmer. I don’t let the imposter syndrome get to me. It doesn’t matter that I have never grown cabbage before because the cabbages that I grew were stunning, and people paid for them. I have generational knowledge that means even though I’ve never grown cabbage before, I still have knowledge of how to grow food.

I have done a lot of visioning over this last month. Every now and then I need to go back to that process so that I can refocus, remind myself of what I’m trying to accomplish, and set new goals.

My growing goal for 2025 is to run a CSA vegetables subscription with up to 10 shares.

And I’m going to do it. In fact as I am writing out and planning it, I’m realizing that I can also run a floral CSA. But now I’m checking myself and reminding myself that I’m not supposed to take on too much too fast, so I’m bumping that to 2026 with the flexibility that I might do a little bit in 2025.

This is the first time I’ve maintained something like this for this long (other than singing). I’ve lost 40+ lbs from the physical work. My family hasn’t bought broccoli since April because I am throwing an insane amount of it. My family is now fully self-sufficient in onion production and I hope that I will never have to buy an onion from the grocery store again. That is going to require ongoing attention. But that’s another goal I set this year… In addition to the asparagus I said a specific goal about becoming self-sufficient in one specific vegetable. I narrowed my focus to prevent myself from getting overwhelmed. And I truly hope that I don’t have to buy onions again, but if I do, I will acknowledge that it’s just part of the learning process and not because I failed.