Plants (the green ones) are good for your brain

Hello my friends!

Just another short little nugget of niceness to end the week.

With all the cold, windy, sleet-y weather and all the things that seem wrong in the world, it can be hard to believe the sun will still come out tomorrow. But you know what? It will. And you know what else? Plants will be there to soak it up and grow into something beautiful and nourishing (sometimes). Plants are always there, never talk back to or over you, and if you just give them water (or Diet Coke), light and dirt, they will flourish.

Bottom line: plants are good for your wellbeing (listen to this super short but awesome podcast on the science behind why green things are good for us).

Even lower bottom line: When things suck, go get a succulent! Just look at how much it lifted spirits in the Healthy Mind Lab! All I had to do was order a bulk pack of live succulents on Amazon, along with some cute little pots, give them names and let people pick their pot and name. Now we’re all on the same watering cycle, and a village has already started to help those with less green thumbiness keep their succulents juicy and healthy.

Next time, we’ll track progress on another Wellbeing challenge – restoring life to resurrection ferns with either standard of care control or Diet Coke. We’re accepting bets now on who will win: Julie (Diet Coke) or Ginger (water). I’m serious, this is do-not-miss stuff.

OK, let’s get some visuals* in here so you can see plant action in action (grammar schmammar).

Original plants and names:

*Scroll to the end for bonus cat pics.

Succulent babies in their new homes:

Marissa: “I am a plant killer😅 Either forget to water it or water it too much. It has to be in front of me, otherwise, I will forget about it.” And for the name: ‘Fluffy,’ easy to remember, and reminds me my fluffy dog 🐶” (obviously the “killer” shadow self only indulges in killing plants, not dogs).

Torie: “I chose the ‘Paul Dean’ coaster because I have no idea how to cook (yep, still have never browned meat before in my life!) and thought…just maybe the succulent growth will inspire me to grow in my cooking skills (or otherwise, lack thereof!)”

Teddi: “The name on my coaster is Kevin—[my lovely and sweet husband’s] middle name.” (I added the last part in brackets because Teddi is a woman of few words and I knew what she meant).

Stephanie: As she was picking her succulent, she was singing the Oscar Myer song (my bologna has a first name, it’s O-s-c-a-r…). Thus “I chose ‘Prudence’ randomly while singing the Oscar Myer song!”

Vicki: “This is Spike (Jonz). I chose him because he reminded me of Spike, Snoopy’s brother from the desert, and because my fam has been big, BIG fans of all things Snoopy for a long time.”

Avi: “This is Bo Peep. They [succulents] are small and feisty. Also, they’ve lost their sheep. (I think that means that plants are terrible shepherds?)”

Bonus pics of cats AND succulents: Gus the great white supervillain likes to play with them to death. Greta (aka tiny hell on wheels) riles him up and a bona fide cat rodeo usually ensues, usually when I’m on a zoom call. I know cats and plants are not children, but sometimes they act like it (the cats, not the plants).

Original plants and names:

Succulent babies in their new homes:

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