Gardening and Serotonin flow… Well I just put a quick post of my gardening buddy (Bramble my dog) on my facebook page and it made someone smile straight away so I though I would share it here too!
But there was more behind just sharing a picture of my lovely fury pal… Gardening is great for the soul, and I have to admit that one thing that makes me as happy as a pig in mud is gardening. Watching things that you plant growing day by day, seeing shoots coming up – realising that grass seems to grow everywhere that you don’t want it to grow and never in the bits you do! Eating that first tomato off the vine, all makes my heart sing and I believe many other peoples too.
Getting outside and doing something like gardening is a real positive activity,not only because you can get a sweat on mowing the lawn, planting pots and digging over that flower bed or vegetable patch, but because you are thinking all the time how you can improve it so you are also thinking positively. And lets not forget it often leads you to chatting to others for advice, whether that be at the garden centre or to a neighbour (I often marvel at my neighbours lush green lawn, which St Andrews golf club would be proud to have as one of their greens!)
Now the reason I am rambling on like the mighty vine at the bottom of my garden (that’s another story!) is that we all need positive action, positive interaction and positive thinking in our lives to really help that flow of serotonin.
Serotonin is a neurotransmitter in the brain. A neurotransmitter is a chemical that aids the transmission of nerve impulses across the gap (the synapse) between nerve cells (neurons). Now the neurotransmitter Serotonin has been linked to helping heighten mood so effectively, by doing things like gardening we are helping that production of Serotonin to make us nice, brave, coping little souls!
So it’s the weekend, it’s sunny why not get out there and do something that you can be proud of, do a bit of gardening to get the Serotonin flowing! And if you haven’t got a garden window boxes will bring as much joy too! And after all that work I have to be rather British here and say that I like to admire my handy work with a lovely cup of tea!