When Gardens Teach Resilience

This spring has taught me something unexpected about resilience—not through dramatic stories of overcoming, but through the quiet heartbreak and renewal happening in my own backyard.

As I moved through my annual garden cleanup this year, I kept looking for familiar friends that have faithfully emerged each spring for years. My echinacea, those vibrant purple coneflowers that had been spreading so beautifully. The bee balm that always called in the hummingbirds each summer—one of my greatest garden joys. Even my reliable fescue, the hardy Minnesota natives that I've always counted on to anchor my garden design. One by one, I realized they weren't coming back.

Something strange happened this winter. Fellow gardeners across the Twin Cities are reporting similar losses—plants that should have easily survived our climate, plants that have thrived for years, simply didn't make it through. It's perplexing in a way that leaves you questioning what you thought you knew about resilience itself.

When Our Foundations Shift

Last fall, as I prepared my gardens for winter, I had such clear visions. I could see exactly how those established echinacea and bee balm would anchor the design as I wove in new varieties, creating ribbons of color that would flow through the garden beds. I had plans built on the assumption that my reliable plants would return, as they always had.

Standing in my garden this spring, looking at empty spaces where vibrant life should have been, I felt that familiar tug of sadness. These plants had brought me genuine joy year after year—especially anticipating those summer mornings when the hummingbirds would dance around the bee balm. There's a grief in losing something you've nurtured and counted on, even when it's "just" a plant.

But here's what the garden taught me about resilience: it doesn't serve the garden—or me—to dwell in that sadness. And perhaps this is nature teaching me another fundamental lesson about living life well. We're all hardy for a time, thriving in the conditions we've adapted to, until suddenly we're not. Sometimes the conditions shift beyond what even our strongest foundations can weather.

The earth doesn't pause its cycles waiting for us to process our losses. The growing season moves forward whether we're ready or not.

The Reality of Empty Spaces

Those empty spaces in my garden beds won't stay empty. That's one of nature's most fundamental truths—voids will be filled. The question isn't whether something will grow there, but what will grow there. If I don't intentionally plant something I want, the space will fill itself with whatever seeds happen to find their way there.

Yesterday, in one spot that had been unintentionally dense with echinacea and was now much more sparse, I found myself planting a butterfly bush transplant that I had discovered in a different area of my yard—inviting it to become part of my beautiful garden family. Here's the thing: I had seen this plant last year but was struggling with where to put it. The spot I felt would serve it best was filled with echinacea. Now it was the perfect place for my new addition! Nature took away from me, and nature naturally gave back.

This isn't just true in gardens. It's true in our lives.

When disappointment creates a void—whether it's the end of a relationship, a career change we didn't choose, or plans that didn't unfold as expected—that space in our hearts and minds won't remain empty. Something will grow there. Our sadness might transform into wisdom, or it might deepen into bitterness. Our setbacks might become stepping stones to something we couldn't have imagined, or they might become the foundation for limitation and fear.

The choice isn't whether change will fill the void. The choice is how intentional we want to be about what grows there.

Resilience as Creative Response

Standing in my garden this spring, I realized I was being offered an unexpected gift: open canvases for repainting.

Instead of the carefully planned color ribbons I'd envisioned, I now have the freedom to try something completely different. Maybe this is the year to experiment with that native wildflower mix I've been curious about. Perhaps this is the perfect opportunity to create the meditation corner I've always talked about but never had space for.

There's something liberating about being released from what I thought was so important, or sometimes what I felt "stuck" with because I didn't want to go through the work of transplanting established plants. Now I can look at these spaces with fresh eyes, reconsidering what I actually want to grow, rather than simply maintaining what was already there.

And who knows? Maybe along the way, some dormant seeds from years past will surprise me by sprouting in places I never expected.

This is what resilience actually looks like—not an ability to prevent change or loss, but the capacity to respond creatively when change arrives uninvited. It's less about bouncing back to what was and more about growing forward into what might be possible.

Choosing What Fills the Spaces

True resilience isn't about being unshakeable. It's about developing the awareness to recognize when voids appear in our lives and the wisdom to choose—as much as we can—what we invite in to fill them.

When a job ends unexpectedly, we can choose whether that space fills with bitterness about the unfairness or curiosity about new possibilities. When a relationship changes, we can decide whether to fill that emotional space with resentment or with deeper self-understanding. When our bodies change with age or circumstance, we can choose whether that experience grows into shame or acceptance.

This doesn't mean forcing positivity or denying legitimate grief. Just as I needed to acknowledge my sadness about losing those beloved plants, we need to honor our losses. But we also need to remember our agency in what comes next.

The Wisdom of Uncertain Beginnings

What strikes me most about this garden lesson is how it mirrors something I see in my coaching work. People come to me feeling like they need to have their whole life figured out before they can take a meaningful step forward. They want the complete plan, the guaranteed outcome, the certainty that their efforts will lead exactly where they hope.

But gardens don't work that way. I plant seeds without knowing exactly which ones will thrive this particular season. I design beds knowing that some plants will surprise me by spreading more than expected while others might need more time than I anticipated.

And sometimes I enlist what you might call a "tough love" approach to gardening. I don't always follow the guidelines about optimal timing—if I'm called to transplant something in the middle of summer because I think it belongs in a better spot, I'm not afraid to do it. Of course, I'll give those transplants some extra love and watering as they adjust. But once plants are established in their place and growing, that's when I become more hands-off. I believe there's something to be said for being strong enough to stand on your own. That's exactly why I love working with native plants—they're genuinely up for the challenge of Minnesota weather. I don't want to spend my time fussing over something that needs constant extra attention and care when there's so much beauty to behold in the "average" varieties that can thrive on their own.

The joy is in tending the process, not controlling the outcome. Maybe those dormant seeds from previous years will emerge in unexpected places this summer. Maybe they won't. But I'll be here, watering and weeding and paying attention, creating the conditions for whatever wants to grow.

An Invitation to Tend Your Own Garden

As you think about the voids that have appeared in your own life—the plans that didn't unfold, the relationships that changed, the versions of yourself you've had to release—I invite you to consider them as gardens waiting to be tended.

What do you want to plant in those spaces? What conditions do you want to create for new growth? How can you tend the process with both intention and openness to surprise?

The soil of our lives is remarkably fertile, even after loss. Especially after loss. Some of the most beautiful growth happens in ground that's been disturbed, in spaces that have been cleared of what no longer serves.

Your resilience isn't measured by your ability to avoid change or loss. It's revealed in how you choose to fill the spaces that change creates, how you tend the new growth, and how you remain open to possibilities you couldn't have planned.

What's beginning to grow in the cleared spaces of your life?

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