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26 Simple Ways to Nurture Your Creative Life

#26: Zen Garden

Use the art of Zen gardening to relax, rejuvenate, and enhance creative flow.

By Chris Dunmire

I've just discovered the art of Zen gardening, a contemplative way to nurture creativity with the delightful side effect of being meditative, relaxing, stress-relieving, and a dynamically-fun creative medium to play with!

How did I stumble upon Zen gardening? I was in a Barnes & Nobel Bookstore passing by a small rack of miniature desktop gifts on my way to the checkout. Idly waiting in line for my turn, my eyes met with a novelty gift box with a tiny 2-inch Zen garden kit inside.

Cute, for a Barbie Doll-sized person or my cat. I thought to myself as I picked it up (a sure sign of an impending impulse buy). I curiously read the box and then restocked it next to the selection of "Build Your Own Mini Stonehenge" kits. But I can surely invest my seven dollars into a larger-sized Zen garden that has more space to work with!

So began my quest (online search) for a moderately-priced desktop Zen garden with more space to groove. I went Amazon.com and found a whole bunch of different Zen Garden kits in various sizes and shapes and after reading reviews and comparing prices, finally decided on a Japanese-Style Desktop Zen Garden (like the one pictured left) complete with a wooden tray, polished stones, fine white sand, two wooden rakes, and a meditation booklet. Honestly, the packaging and two rakes won me over.

My new 12" x 8" Zen garden arrived in less than a week. After unwrapping it, I carefully set it up and gently raked. First in shallow straight lines. And then in zigzags. Then in deeper circles and swirls. I plunked in some stones and raked around them. It was a bit cramped. So I created some dunes, took out the rocks, and raked some more.

As I formed pretend rivers and mountains in my open sand Zen garden, I joked to myself that I could add some black ants and repackage it as a novelty humor free-range ant farm. Then I wondered how I could Nit Wits-ize the idea, which I did here, and you can print my free humor poster here). (C'mon, doesn't, the image of hard working tunnel-digging ants scurrying off my free range farm when nobody is looking amuse you?) Just then I realized how effortlessly my mind became engaged in the flow of creative possibilities. Of how relaxed I was feeling. Of how good raking sand felt after only a few minutes of freeing my mind and entering into the formless potential before me.

This happens each time I return to my Zen garden. There is something so relaxing, yet engaging to using this simple tool — whether it's for pure play or with the intention to go deeper into the Japanese meditation angle of it, as my red Book of Meditations describes: "to clear the mind of the chaos of everyday life in order to achieve a greater state of harmony."

It's been over a month since I began the practice of Zen gardening, and all I do is rake the sand without the rocks for 10-15 minutes several times a week. I've dubbed the practice my "Creative Energy Rakey" (an energy reiki play on words like my Commander Reiki and Chakra Khan).

Zen rock gardening, sand combing, artscaping, Creative Energy Rakey, or whatever you want to call it, is something that everyone can enjoy and benefit from. If it appeals to you on any level, I encourage you to try it and see.

Now for a Goldilocks confession. After playing with my desktop Zen garden for a few days, I found it to be too small for my enthusiastic practice. I needed more room to play in because the sand kept spilling over the sides no matter how gentle I was with it. Plus I figured more room = more fun! So I brainstormed and browsed craft stores looking for materials to create a new, larger Zen garden, which I did and now use regularly. I gifted the other one to a new, happy Zen gardening friend (Hi E!).

Do you want to learn how to make your own desktop Zen garden for your office or creative studio for less than $10? Of course you do! Keep on reading to learn how...

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