We spoke with Dutch model, mother and avid gardener Doutzen Kroes on how gardening fuels her creativity, inspires her to tune inward and helps re-write her life experiences. She made the life-changing decision to put her modeling career on hold and focus on her family, our collective consciousness and developing her world view.
The more time I spend in nature, the more connected I feel to my own power. When I place my hands in the soil and feel the life beneath me, it fuels my creativity. It makes me look at the world from a different perspective. For me, I realized this feeling is what makes me happy. At the start of the pandemic, I imagined this metaphor of a high-speed train I had been in all these years suddenly coming to a halt. When I got off, nothing happened, and I realized that all along, I had been afraid of an ego death. I wondered who I would be if I were no longer doing the job I was doing, and when I stopped, nothing changed. When I started gardening, I would cook homegrown chard and place it on the table in front of my husband and children, and I would experience such a strong, full circle moment created out of pure love. I realized that all these years, I had learned to give away my power, and nature helped me take it back.
When I started gardening, I realized how intelligent nature is, and once I realized we are all part of nature, gardening became a mirror for me. Our connection with the earth is so important because it enables us to reconnect with ourselves and the magic of life. You realize you hold the same innate intelligence that allows a tree to know when it is the right time to drop its leaves.
As a child, my parents practiced homeopathy and my mother taught me about herbal remedies. Every summer, I helped my dad harvest potatoes. For my parents, healthy food was always a priority, but it was expensive and unpopular. So when they returned home from work in the evenings, they would work in the garden. Their dedication inspired me to work hard and follow my dream. Even when I was living in New York as a model, I always had a small herb garden. My biggest dream was to have a house with a garden and a vegetable patch, and now that dream has come to life. Planting a seed that sprouts, grows, gets eaten, and nourishes the body is such a miracle. It helps me see the little things as big things. This perspective has redefined how I view success. I enjoy walking the red carpet in an amazing dress or doing a fashion show, but the fulfilment I have experienced in the past two years through slowing down is something I never felt before.
He gifted me these two wild yellow roses, the first plants in my garden. They make a gateway to my vegetable garden and will forever remind me of my dear father. When people give you plants as presents, your garden becomes a living memory of all your loved ones.
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