When it comes to gardening, you need to have a quite good set of skills. It’s not only about planting the seed, adding some water, and taking the fruit afterward. There are many more skills that you need to learn. And we don’t only talk about the skills that you need physically in the garden. They are important as well, but they are not everything. These skills are important for you no matter how much experience you have. Even if you’re an experienced gardener, there are a lot of things that you can learn to get even better. And these are the skills that many people don’t talk about.
Patience
The first and probably the most important skill that you need to have is patience. Now, some people might not call patience a skill, but that’s what it is. You need to develop the skill of patience so that you can properly grow a garden. And you can’t do that if you don’t have patience. You need to be ready to wait for some time until you start seeing the results. That can be for weeks, sometimes even months.
You’ll need to wait for a few months until the harvesting time comes. But you won’t only wait all the time. You’ll need to put in the work without knowing what the result may be. Sometimes, the result won’t be as good as you wanted it to be. And that’s not a pleasant situation to be in. But it’s something that may happen to you if you’re a beginner. It happens to many experienced gardeners as well.
Responsibility
When you have patience, you’re a few steps ahead of many people. But it means nothing if you don’t have the responsibility to put in the work. If you don’t have the responsibility, you probably won’t get too far. You need to know a few things about gardening before you start working, of course. But you also need to take responsibility and do these things. You can’t be lazy if you want to succeed in gardening.
And when we say succeed, it can mean many things depending on what your goals are. Some people want to build a business around gardening and grow a lot of organic food they could sell. Other people want to have a simple home garden and grow food for their family and eat healthier. Both goals are great and they both have something in common. They need you to take responsibility, do the work that needs to be done, and be patient.
A Will to Learn New Things
If you don’t have a will to learn, you probably won’t get too far. You can depend on a few things you know how to do and do the same things every day. Well, you definitely can, but why would you want to do that? There is an abundance of information and knowledge on every possible topic. We live in the 21st century and we have access to the internet. Whatever you want to learn, you can be sure that you can find all the material you need.
And when it comes to learning how to garden, there are many websites and online communities. Many people in these communities will help you if you need something. There are many truly great books on gardening as well. These books are available more than ever and you can find every book that you need. And if the book isn’t available, you can always buy an eBook. So there are no more real excuses when it comes to doing or learning anything. So take responsibility and start learning.
Empathy
This is a skill many people lack when it comes to communicating with other people, let alone plants. But this skill is very important in one way or another. Of course, there are a ton of ecological movements and people that talk about the environment. But people still don’t seem to pay attention to that. And this doesn’t only include people that live in big cities or whatever. This includes many people that live in the countryside and somewhere in the middle of nature.
We still need to work a lot on the empathy and environmental intelligence of people. But we shouldn’t become that guy or that girl that only talks about that. We need to focus on ourselves and develop that sense of understanding. If every person cleans his or her backyard and stops throwing trash around, we would have a clean planet. It’s simple as that. And that’s also the hard part because everyone needs to understand that. But let’s focus on what we can change and change ourselves first.
Delayed Gratification
This one goes hand in hand with patience because you need to have both. You want to think a few steps ahead every time. And you want to take responsibility and do the work before you start seeing the results. This is something that takes time and you shouldn’t rush to see the results tomorrow because you won’t. Be patient and do the work and don’t even think about harvesting until the time comes. Develop the feeling of fulfillment only by doing the work. If you can do that, it won’t even feel like work anymore. It will feel like relaxation or therapy because you’ll completely relax your body and mind while working. And when the harvesting time comes, the gratification will be bigger than you ever thought it can be.
Commitment
You have to be committed to what you do if you want to see the results. You need to show up every day and do the work that needs to be done. Whatever you need to do to get to your goal, do that. If you work a 9 to 5 job, get up earlier so that you can work on your garden. If you finish earlier with your job today, don’t sit and watch TV so you can relax from work. Go into your garden and do the work that needs to be done.
You can relax later when you finish what you’ve started. Don’t ever think that it’s a good idea to maybe skip one day. Show up every day and do the work that needs to be done. This is the only way to reach your goals and have a wonderful harvest at the end of the season. That will be a much bigger reward and a much greater fulfillment than skipping the work and watching TV.
Creativity
Creativity is something that will always be helpful when you work around the garden. But even if you think that you’re not a creative person, don’t worry about it. You probably are, you only don’t know it yet. And you’ll realize that as soon as you start working and planning around the garden. Once you start experimenting with different setups and put your hands in the soil, everything changes. You’ll start to think about it more often and your mind will start finding new solutions. This is where things start to get interesting. But it will only happen if you genuinely love gardening and everything about it. So as we said, creativity is a big plus if you already have it. But even if you don’t, you’ll develop creativity while you work.
Gardening Basics
Of course, you can’t start working around the garden if you don’t have basic gardening skills. You need to know how to use the tools, how to test the soil and many other things. But don’t let that discourage you. If you have a will to learn and you want to work, it will all come along the way. If you love gardening and you genuinely enjoy working, that won’t be a problem. You’ll find solutions as you go. Don’t bother yourself too much about knowing it all before you even start working.
Whatever you need at the moment, you can easily find it on the internet. Everything is available at the tip of your fingers. Basic gardening skills are not hard to learn. If you know someone who’s been doing gardening for some time, you might want to ask for advice. Or you may want to spend some time with them to learn some basics. Find the way that works the best for you.
Planning
We mentioned planning when we were talking about creativity. Indeed, you need to be creative when planning your garden and everything about it. But it’s not rocket science and you can pretty much start by improvising the entire process. You’ll see what needs to be done better as time passes by. If you haven’t done something correctly and you couldn’t find the information before, now you have it. Now you know what you need to do better next time you do the same thing.
This is why doing the work is the most important thing because you’ll have experience. You can read all the books on gardening that you can find if you want to. But if you don’t do anything in your garden, you won’t have experience. So you want to start with a plan and start working. If you think that you might need to learn a few more things, that’s ok. You can learn along the way. But for now, get your hands into the soil.