Why do I draw gardens?

I draw gardens to better understand how I feel and how events in my life influence me. It helps me clarify my thoughts and to put names on my feelings. They also provide a safe space in which I get to choose how I react to events instead of just reacting automatically.

What is the garden?

A garden seen from a distance shows unity, but when looked at closer, it is made of individual plants and other living beings that each have they own lives. The organic and ever-changing aspects of the garden seem a good way to map our own evolution. Seen from the outside, we look like one being and yet we have the impression that we have many different parts that all constantly evolve and interact.

The garden is a metaphor of me as a complex human being interacting with the outside world. A garden depends on its environment to thrive and it has in turn an impact on its surroundings, just like us.

What does the garden template show?

The garden shows five areas marked body, mind, soul, heart and psyche separated by light pencil traits. It also has an almost blank central area and no fixed outside boundaries:

©2023 by Christophe P. Meili

That’s pretty much it!

Why does the garden look like that?

The layout is inspired by the classic French sixteenth century garden design such as this one at Villandry castle in the Loire valley.

I went over time for a less formal circle rather than the  more formal square or polygons to give my hand more freedom when filling it with plants and thoughts.

Why do I use a template?

It’s just easier and save me time. At the beginning I would draw the background each time but then quickly started to photocopy a background I liked so that I could jump into the garden faster. Also, a nice thing about using the same template over time is that the changes in the garden are easily spotted.  

How do I draw a garden using the template?

The body section is how I feel physically; the mind is what helps me reason and think analytically; the soul has to do with the meaning of life, of why I’m here; the heart describes my relationship with loved and not-so loved ones and psyche embodies the appetite to live and do things.

The center of the drawing is me, without too much attention to the outside world whereas the outside of the drawing, beyond the circular garden borders made up by the 5 words, is the outside world.

Does the format change over time?

Yes, the format changed over the past two years, and I settled on the current template a few months ago. I like it because it is light and open. It does not impose a rigid structure and it allows overflows from one area to another, as well as from the inside to the outside and back.

One funny thing with having the same fixed format is that I memorized it and sometimes find myself during the day wondering where I would place the event or emotion I am living at a given moment.

Is the order in which I draw the 5 areas important?

No, the order is not important. I used to start with the body because it was easy: Do I feel rested and fit? Do I feel a pain in my body? Did I drink too much the night before and still feel the effect? But today I start a bit randomly, maybe with the heart if the time spent with friends last night is at top of my mind or with the soul if the moving piece of music I listed to the day before still resonates.

How do the areas interact with each other?

Some things are difficult to plant in only one section. Take for example a negotiation discussion with a customer: Is it a psyche thing about primal fight or flee reactions? Is it the mind because I planned the discussion in advance and played it like a chess game? Or maybe even a body thing because I could feel the adrenaline flow?

In such a case, I draw the plants crossing over from one section to another and interacting with each other. I found out that these events and states that cover more than one section often are the most fruitful.

What is inside and outside the main circle?

The inner circle is the garden area where I draw my feelings and thoughts whereas the outer circle shows how the world and I interact. I can draw for example a colourful flower in my inner-heart area just because I feel that way today for no reason and have it reach out to the world in the outside circle. Or I could draw a wild jungle in the outer heart area representing a wild party with good friends and see what kind of vegetation it generates inside.

How do the inside and the outside of the garden interact?

There is a 2-way movement between the inside and outside of the garden. How I feel today, shown in red in the image below, will influence how I interact with the outside (in green), but the outside will also influence how I feel (the black arrows below).

Is there something outside the drawing on the page?

I have not found a good answer to that yet. An idea I once had was to extend the page around the garden to show what is happening in the world. A bit like the posters children do with press images for their class presentations.

Are the 5 areas very precise?

The 5 areas are not super precise, and one item could in one or another section. Take for example a talk with a friend that inspired you. It can fin a place in the heart area, but also in the psyche because you feel better and motivated to do new things after the discussion.

I tried to define a bit more the content of each area in the drawing below:

Is there scientific research validating the 5 areas?

I have not searched for studies explicitly addressing this question. It could be a future project in itself: to build a rigorous taxonomy of human feelings.

Could you imagine other areas?

Yes, I think one could work with different areas, of course. The key is probably to stick to the same areas for a while and see how they work for oneself and over time. I can appreciate that way if the areas are the right ones for me by seeing how much material I can connect to them daily, and if their interactions provide insights into my own life.

Why 5 areas and not 4 or 6 or a different number?

Four or less areas seem to be too general, not precise enough. I need the five areas. And all the emotions, thoughts, and feelings I experience now seem to fit in one or in a combination of the five areas. There is no need to add more granularity and we’ll see if that holds over time.

Can you change the names of the areas?

Of course, the 5 names of psyche, body, mind, soul, and heart are arbitrarily chosen and could be different. I’m not totally happy with the names of body and heart for example but have not yet found better alternatives.

Are the colours set?

Interesting question because I have not formalized the choice of colours. I tend to use red for the mental part, blue for body, pink for the heart, orange for the psyche and purples for the soul. It is a subjective choice I made and applying it in my gardens helps me draw them faster. Also, I expect that over time I will be able to see an evolution for each part and for the garden, a bit like a real garden and its plants evolve with the four seasons.

Why these colours?

No real reason I suppose. Red is associated to sharpness and vigour (of the mind) and I always associated blue to the body-related tings such as my calendar appointments that have to do with exercising or medical appointments. For pink and the heart, I suppose I followed the traditional European and North American cliché. Orange for the psyche is connected to the meaning of psyche for me: the appetite to live and to do things, for which orange seems just right. And the soul in deep purple because the colour evoked depth and unknown world.

When do I draw it?

I am still trying to find out the best time of the day to draw the gardens. Right now, it seems that drawing it before I start the workday works best for me.

How much time does it take?

I take me between 5 and 15 minutes to draw the garden. The time it takes is also an indication of how I’m doing. When I’m stressed, I usually have less time, but I noticed that having free time does not mean that I’ll have more time for my drawing. 

Do I do it every day?

No, I don’t draw a garden every day. It is a target I have, to do it daily, but I usually only do 3 gardens per week.

Can I do more than one drawing a day?

Of course, as many as I want – I only did more than one garden two times, I think. But it’s interesting to see how the garden changed within a few hours.

Are there 2 gardens that are the same?

I have not yet found any of my drawings to be very similar to another one. Even when I draw 2 gardens the same day, they tend to be different.

What do I do with the gardens?

I mainly draw them and do not spend much time looking at them afterward. I sometimes share them with friends to illustrate a thought or a change in myself, and I have ideas to post them regularly in a way that shows how I feel and how I evolve over time.

Do the gardens show personal information?

My first gardens showed a lot of personal information in text form, but I recently started to sperate the drawings from the text. I draw a garden without explanations that I can show and publish as it does not reveal anything private or too embarrassing. And I write on the opposite page of my notebook that has the same template the details that add contact and more specific information. That page is not meant for publication.

Does the garden exist in real life?

It does not, and that would be a great project to do!

What real plants would belong to the 5 areas?

I have not yet found the real plants and I am not sure whether I need them. They might come in time as my knowledge of real gardens grows. There is one plant however that seems to pop-up regularly in my drawings for the soul area: the lotus flower.

End of Q&A