The Well Gardened Mind

Rediscovering Nature in the Modern World

By: Sue Stuart-Smith

Narrated by: Sue Stuart-Smith

‘The wisest book I’ve read for many years … Much more than a gardening book, much more than a guide to mental health … Hugely recommended’ Stephen Fry

THE SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER

A Times and Sunday Times Best Book of 2020

How can gardening relieve stress and help us look after our mental health? What lies behind the restorative power of the natural world?

In a powerful combination of contemporary neuroscience, psychoanalysis and brilliant storytelling, The Well Gardened Mind investigates the magic that many gardeners have known for years – working with nature can radically transform our health, wellbeing and confidence.

With illuminating stories of how people struggling with stress, depression, trauma and addiction can change their lives, this inspiring and wise book of science, insight and anecdote – now translated into fifteen languages – shows how our understanding of nature and its restorative powers is only just beginning to flower.

©2020 Sue Stuart-Smith (P)2020 HarperCollins Publishers Limited

Critic reviews

"The wisest book I’ve read for many years. Much more than a gardening book, much more than a guide to mental health. Hugely recommended." (Stephen Fry)

"Fascinating....Extends the awareness – backed up by compendious and elegant research – of how mentally enriching it is to swap screen for green...[She] renders a very special service with this book." (Observer)

"Stuart-Smith’s beautifully written book is filled with insights into the joys but also the therapeutic benefits that tending plants can offer, not just to people who feel they have lost their place in nature, but to everyone. This is a life-affirming study of the pleasures of growing things." (Guardian)

A book for these times...

How fortunate it was to find the recommendation for this book in times such as these. Not a word about about Covid-19 but about times past that have needed the mending ways, physical, mental and emotional, of gardening as now. Whether the garden be small or large it is a form of medicine that restores.
The audio book is read softly and calmly but firmly by a gardener and mental health professional who has experienced all she has written about. When I found it would not be in the bookshops in Australia until July I ordered the audiobook and followed up with the book order. Instant gratification and the book in my hands three weeks later.
The implication is that one has to help oneself by the choice of gardening and creation. There is no hectoring just wonderful examples through the ages.
Some soil, water, seed and care go a long way - listening and reading for these times - thank you.

Beautiful return to our essence as humans

A clear and profound invitation to ponder the prioritity that us humans have given to mind over nature, and to return to our center in every sense

Enjoyable Reading

Thoroughly enjoyable and informative reading. I quite liked the narration of the author, unlike other reviewers have mentioned. If you're a gardening enthusiast who would like to understand a little behind why you enjoy the garden, this is a lovely read. For me, as a budding horticulture therapist, I really enjoyed the simplicity this book provided on the benefits of gardening and the stories the author shared.

Very insightful and metaphorical.

This book convinced me to start gardening myself and it truly has made me look at the world differently.