Can growing flowers relieve depression and anxiety?

Growing flowers can relieve depression and anxiety, but it is not a "universal antidote" for emotional problems. The effect and duration will vary greatly depending on the person and the way of growing flowers.

When I was sorting out the cases with a friend who was doing psychological counseling, I saw a particularly impressive case: a junior girl failed in the postgraduate entrance examination and fell out of love. She lay in bed for almost two months and had to bring her roommates to eat her food. Later, the aunt at the flower shop downstairs in the dormitory gave her a pot of longevity flowers that were about to wither. She said, "A dead horse is a living horse doctor. If you pour some water on it, you may still live." She didn't take it seriously at first, but when she remembered, she poured half a cup of leftover mineral water on it. Unexpectedly, flower buds appeared half a month later, and then pink flowers bloomed one after another for less than half a year. The girl later told the counselor that when she saw the flower buds for the first time, she sat on the balcony and cried for ten minutes and felt, "It turns out I can do something." Don't tell me, the Department of Psychology of Beijing Normal University actually conducted a related experiment in 2022, allowing 32 subjects with mild anxiety symptoms to spend 15 minutes taking care of plants every day. After 4 weeks, their anxiety scale scores dropped by an average of 17%, which was better than the control group who simply did mindfulness relaxation training.

Why does playing with flowers and plants have such an effect? In fact, it has little to do with the flower itself, and more to do with the process of your interaction with it. For example, if you squat on the balcony and rub the leaves of a pothos, your fingertips rub against the velvet-like texture of the leaves, and you stare at the veins of the leaves to wipe away the floating dust bit by bit. During those ten minutes, you are unlikely to think about the third version of the plan that the leader sent back yesterday, and you will not be anxious about the mortgage repayment next month. To put it bluntly, you have passively entered a state of mindfulness, and the distracting thoughts in your mind are temporarily squeezed away. Not to mention how rare that kind of positive feedback is: you may not be satisfied with your eight-version plan, but if you water the flower with the right water and get the right sun, it will definitely give you new leaves and buds. This kind of stable sense of control is rarely available in the messy daily life. There are also people who are accustomed to squatting on the balcony and talking to the flower about random troubles. Anyway, the flower will not interrupt to refute, nor will it turn around and tell others your secrets. It is less worrying than asking a friend to complain. In essence, it is a low-cost "safe transition object".

But don’t exaggerate this matter too much. There are always different voices in the academic and clinical fields. Many psychiatrists have clearly mentioned that if the patient has reached the stage of a moderate to severe depressive episode and the patient's mobility has been severely impaired, even getting up and brushing his teeth requires half an hour of psychological construction. At this time, if he is forced to give him a few pots of flowers and requires him to "take care of himself and regulate his mood," it will become a new source of stress. I met a netizen before. When she was in a depressive episode, she heard others say that growing flowers was useful. She bought seven or eight pots of imported calla lilies out of sheer enthusiasm. As a result, half of the roots rotted and died in half a month. She sat on the ground and cried all afternoon. All she could think about was "I can't even feed a flower. I'm really useless." This only aggravated her self-denial. Some researchers believe that the "healing effect" of growing flowers is often due to survivorship bias - people who have enough mobility and are willing to toss with flowers often have not yet reached their worst emotional state, while people who are truly stuck in an emotional quagmire will most likely not even have the energy to go downstairs to buy flowers.

Oh, by the way, if you are really feeling depressed recently and want to try growing flowers and pine trees to relax and unwind, don’t just buy those delicate internet celebrity varieties, such as phalaenopsis, colorful taro, and alpine azaleas. If you are a novice, you will die as soon as you raise them. You will simply cause trouble for yourself. Just pick the ones that cost ten yuan a pot on the roadside and they won't die. Sunflowers, longevity flowers, and wood sorrel will all work. If you forget to water them, they won't die even if it's dry for half a month. If you water them a little, they will grow and the flowers will bloom. The most important thing is to accumulate some positive feedback first. Don't set any KPIs for yourself, such as "watering once a day" or "ten flowers must bloom that month". That's not raising flowers, it's finding yourself another part-time job, which will only make you more anxious. When I remembered it, I went to the balcony to poop a few times. If I forgot, I would forget about it. If I died, I would buy another pot. It was just for relaxation and there was no need to add drama to myself.

I still have the copper money grass I picked up during the lockdown last year on my window sill. At that time, it was so dry that only a handful of dead roots were left. I poured half a bottle of leftover mineral water over it, and within three days, small green buds appeared. I stared at those little buds for almost ten minutes that day, and I felt happier than grabbing two kilograms of pork belly. Would you say it really cured my anxiety? Not really, I should change my plan, I should still suffer from insomnia, but at least for a few minutes, all my attention is on its small round leaves, and I don’t think about anything bad. That’s enough. If you have been feeling a little unmotivated recently, why not try picking out the cheapest sunflowers when you pass by the flower market? Maybe one day you will look up and see it blooming full of small yellow flowers for you.

Of course, if you have been unable to eat, sleep well, and have no interest in anything for half a month, don’t just rely on raising flowers. It’s time to find a doctor, and it’s time to seek consultation. Flowers are just a supporting role to accompany you on that difficult road. If you can bloom, bloom, or not, it doesn’t matter. You are better than anything else.