May Sarton

Rest as Medicine for the Wandering Mind

Having established rest as healing, Sarton immediately adds a surprising instruction: “Let your mind go into strange, untouched places.” The logic is subtle but coherent—true rest is not only stopping work; it is changing mental scenery. When the mind repeats the same worries and familiar scripts, it may be “resting” in time but not in experience. So she proposes a gentler alternative: loosen your grip on the known. In practice, that might mean allowing daydreams, drifting attention, or quiet curiosity to replace productivity. Rest, in her view, restores not only energy but also the capacity for discovery. [...]

Reflections of the Soul in the Garden’s Embrace

Furthermore, the cyclical life of a garden—its blooming springs, languid summers, and dormant winters—mirrors the ever-shifting tides of the heart. Just as plants experience birth, vitality, and repose, our inner lives similarly pass through seasons of growth, turbulence, and introspective pause. Japanese poets of the Heian era, for instance, often linked their own emotional ebbs with plum and cherry blossoms, reinforcing this connection. [...]

Embracing Authenticity: The Courage to Be Yourself

Many have dared the journey Sarton describes. Artists like Frida Kahlo and writers like James Baldwin became icons by fearlessly revealing their authentic selves—despite risk and ridicule. These biographies illustrate how personal courage inspires not only individual transformation but broader societal progress, making authenticity a collective value as much as a personal one. [...]

Embracing Risk on the Path to Genuine Delight

Looking to nature—and to creativity, which Sarton cherished—we find countless examples of risk as the price for brilliance. A seed must split to sprout; an artist must dare a blank canvas. Sarton’s own garden, chronicled in 'Plant Dreaming Deep' (1968), is replete with moments when tending to beauty required enduring both literal and metaphorical storms. Thus, risking delight becomes an act of ongoing engagement with life’s unpredictability. [...]