Mental Wellness


Reflections on Retirement

Udgar and I founded Growing Spaces in 1989. The process of selling it was like looking for the right partner to pass on the baton in an exciting marathon. Preparing for that moment took extra energy. Our team had become our community as we developed the agility together to master all the moving parts of an evolving company. After retiring, we decided to travel in order to mark the change and to distance ourselves from our results-driven habits.

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It’s QuaranTime

With the craziness of the world right now, it can be tempting to pick up the remote and start a little vacation in your apartment. However, this can quickly turn into a harmful thing. Staying inside all day can have negative effects if you aren’t working towards positive goals and creating a productive environment. Try to make your work-from-home day like any other workday. But instead of a stressful morning commute, take a healthy morning walk outside. And take the extra time to do some other things you normally would not have time to do on a busy morning.

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Green Thumb Daddy`s Greenhouse

Stories From Growing Domes Across the Globe Andrew Trujillo – Green Thumb Daddy The Growing Spaces team often refers to Andrew as the face of Growing Dome Greenhouses. Although he doesn’t work for Growing Spaces, he is one of our biggest supporters and provides outstanding feedback, content and wonderful pictures on our social media channels....

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December 2019 Tropical Flowers in New Mexico Mountain Greenhouse

Stories From Growing Domes Across the Globe Matt & Christie’s New Mexico Mountain Greenhouse is growing beautiful tropical flowers year-round If you are an avid user of the Growing Spaces Facebook Group “Growing Dome Enthusiasts”, then you are no doubt familiar with our December Growing Dome of the Month owner, Matt Larson. He often posts...

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Sustaining Mental Wellness In Your Growing Dome® Greenhouse

Gardening Sustains Mental Wellness While Providing Healthy, Nutritious Food: A Win-Win for You and Your Body Gardening in a Growing Dome is an invaluable method to improve and sustain mental and emotional wellness. Growing Domes are coveted, some would argue sacred, retreats to be with nature and one’s thoughts and emotions. At some point, however,...

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7 Simple Secrets to Maintain Vibrant Health

75 Year Old Ex-Dentist Reveals Effective No Cost Methods of Improving Health Naturally Following are 7 simple tips to maintain vibrant health, as given by this guy. And unless you’re brand new here, I bet you recognize our fearless leader! Udgar Parsons, the creator of the Growing Dome® and co-owner of Growing Spaces®. You’ve probably seen...

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Spring Equinox 2017. Break Out of Darkness, Return to Light

It is the Spring Equinox for 2017….traditionally symbolizing the breaking out of the darkness of winter and the return of light. It’s time for longer days and an “emerging” as birds sing and buds return from sleep to waking. In my world, it is especially significant this year, due to the symbolic darkness of this...

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Assisted Living Greenhouse

Robert Hilger transformed a barren wasteland, a forgotten metal scrap yard, into a living, growing landscape for the betterment of seniors. Now he is transforming an outdated barren mindset of institutions which may not serve us to our highest potentials.

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Notes from Puja: Reflections During Strawberry Moon

She just flew up to the window as if to say “Are you Awake now?” I am slowly getting there. Attempting to summarize my thoughts, my woodpecker friend evokes the question by testing various surfaces on our log cabin home. What to say? I’m in a reflective mood. In this record heat, all I can...

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Return of the Light: Back to the Garden

As I consider the “Return of the Light” as signified by the Spring Equinox, Easter and even the Lunar Eclipse this week, I have to say… “It is welcome!” I have been very moved by the troubles we see and hear about globally, as we enter the next season. Growing Spaces® mission “to help personal...

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Winter Solstice: The Turning Of The Light

The Winter Solstice: A time to celebrate, a time of re-affirmation, and a time of courage. In the Northern Hemisphere, the December Solstice is the Winter Solstice, and the shortest day of the year. Although winter is the season of dormancy, darkness and cold, the December Solstice marks the “turning of the Sun.” The days slowly get...

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Exercise To Cultivate Wellness

We all know the importance of eating good food. And we all know the importance of exercise,  but do you do it? Be honest. Do you get enough exercise? Do you have something in your life that keeps you consistently exercising 4 or 5 times a week? Now, I’m not talking about lifting weights, working...

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Season’s Greetings

Season’s greetings! What is this season? A time of turning…turning toward snow boots and scrapers and bundling up to scrape snow off the solar panels and help Udgar mount the plow. The smell of wood smoke nurtures my sense of gratitude for our Rocky Mountain home and the outdoor life we get to live. This...

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Living in Gratitude this Season

As I begin this Newsletter greeting, I was just watching wild turkeys outside our window scratching for food. I always feel wonder that they return every year and surround our cabin with their good energy, reminding me of the pilgrims and Native American’s offering gratitude. I am preparing a surprise turkey dinner for a friend and...

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Celebrate Everything – Growing Spaces Values

When we started Growing Spaces LLC in 1989, our effort was to build a socially responsible business based on the values and practices we are living. One of them was the idea to “Celebrate Everything.” For me that means the attempt to shift inside, and see the potentials in every experience as well as to...

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New Moon, New Year, New Beginnings

I have just settled in by the fire, on our coldest day on record in two decades in the USA, according to N.O.A.A. Weather Service online. With the wind chill, my relatives in Minnesota are experiencing 60 degrees below zero today! Lucky for us, it is only 5 degrees below zero in Pagosa Springs, but...

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Accessing Our Inner Wisdom in Business

A few years ago I was privileged to be on a panel of CEOs at our annual SW Colorado Women’s Business Conference and asked “How do women do business differently than men?”  Although the moment called a response from the three of us that invited us all to recognize that we all possess masculine and...

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Peace as a practice taught through gardening

There is an intangible, but equally empowering peace that comes with the practice of growing our own food. Have you taken the time to understand where this peace comes from? In understanding the roots of this peace we can find ways to expand on it and move the practice over into other parts of our...

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It’s Earth Day

It’s Earth Day, and this is being celebrated in many places around the globe (see Earthday.org ). In our own small town, the people of vision were out on a cold day in their booths giving away small trees to celebrate Earth Day. There were many examples of innovation and many contributions to the awareness...

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Dancing with Stress, Managing Overwhelm

What IF I could live in such balance that the energy needed for my everyday commitments was an OVERFLOW out of the peace and natural enthusiasm I carry within me? What if I could re-set myself, when I was thrown off balance? And make recovery an art form? This has been my developing goal since...

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Proof that Gardening Gives a Natural Mood Lift

How many people do you know who are affected by depression, anxiety, stress or other emotional illness? Or maybe the better question is: Who do you know that is not affected? The pressures of today’s increasingly fast-paced, high-tech society that demands you know all things at all times and learn to do them all at...

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Keynote Address: Staying Centered in the Cyclone

One of our two favorite leaders of Growing Spaces, Puja Parsons, gave a beautiful keynote address to an audience of nearly 200 at the SW Colorado Women’s Small Business Conference in Durango, Colorado on July 13th, 2012. It was a bit of a new frontier for Puja because she had the opportunity to present how...

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Visioning the Balance

“For Puja and I, everything is connected, and we are ever awed by the complexity and beauty of the natural world. Offering a product which helps people enjoy and support this beauty and the bountiful ways of nature – while growing an abundance of food – is very fulfilling for us.” – Udgar Parsons, Co-Owner...

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A Worthy Journey: Putting youth gardening into perspective

As we celebrate the interest from children and young adults in growing organic food, we want to point to major influences over the last few years. I thank the efforts of Jamie Oliver, Will Allan, and Michelle Obama and many Moms and Dads who are convinced that learning “where food comes from” is the beginning...

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Michelle Obama and Growing Spaces – Working Toward a Common Goal

Today’s announcement that Michelle Obama is authoring a book on the importance of school, urban and community gardening is another example of the mind shift that is happening in the United States and across the globe. Her support of healthier, more self-sustaining lifestyles is directly in line with Growing Spaces vision. Growing Spaces was founded...

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Food for Thought

As I am moved by the amazing colors of the harvest season here in the Rocky Mountains, it seems so appropriate to share why I feel so honored to have Shumei International® teachers arrive as our guests in teaching Natural Agriculture. We Americans were once gardeners and people of the land. My own lineage were...

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Shumei Natural Agriculture & Growing Spaces

“The principle of Natural Agriculture is an overriding respect and concern for Nature,” stated Mokichi Okada in his book A Great Agricultural Revolution. This respect leads to minimum intervention in the growing processes. While many modern agricultural practices are based on a belief in the need to control and manipulate the growing process, Natural Agriculture...

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How Growing Your Own Food Changes Your Life

Growing just one food-producing plant at home like tomato, bell pepper, strawberry, lettuce, snow peas, etc. can do more than just save money otherwise spent at the grocery store. Whether you are a family of five, a single-person household, or a community of many, you can make a difference in how you live – today!...

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Exploring New Ways of Doing Business

It is obvious that we live in unprecedented times. The combination of environmental and economic degradation are catalysts to review how we do business as well as how we live our lives. Growing Spaces has always been “alternative” in a way because we have a product that uses and teaches the use of natural energy...

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