I lurk here way too much - and post way to little, but all the old threads popping up make me miss the old days when lurking was even more interesting and thought provoking. So I am going to try to contribute to the conversation more, rather than being selfish and lurking!

I think inner gardens relate to our own need for creativity. Landscaping and garden design are artistic endeavors (despite the need for an artist on some projects as referred to on another thread). As such they express this intrinsic need to "create".

We have a long, seemingly never ending winter here, and without expressing my inner garden in garden designs and plant materials for so long I have started painting and creating mosaics. It has become a bit obsessive because I have such a strong need to create something! Its such a strong feeling to express this inner garden...

Thank you Timbu for starting this thread. And Wellspring, I am happy that you saved the original inner garden thread. What a wonderful thing the technology today is that you can save and replay the best conversations you have had.

My inner garden is one remembered through the eyes of a child in the years when the world is still largely a place of wonder, magic, mystery and endless beauty. It sounds like you, timbu, had a similar youthful magic inner garden landscape that shapes your current outer garden. I think the best thing was just having the freedom to wander that landscape and work in it in the company of family who shared an appreciation for both the tamed and wild aspects of the landscape

...and then I thought: O.K I have the blog so that I can talk to myself but there are people here on a similar wavelength, "Inner garden" you say? It is said that smell is the strongest link between us and what is meaningful for us and this may buck the visual trend although I think all of the senses lead us to our inner garden that our real garden can only allude to. My blog is called 'beyond a garden full of colour' for this reason. The reason in case you missed it is precisely "a garden is one remembered through the eyes of a child in the years when the world is still largely a place of wonder."

Afew quick random thoughts:

Ink, I'm glad you didn't stay away. I think the never-ending winter has us all testy.

Inner Garden Yes, it is title if you will. Parts of childhood such as wind in a cottonwood tree, the grass (it wasn't really a "lawn") to play crochet or fetch with the dog; memories of special places/vacations; a semi-hidden nook to read or just observe the world go by, memories of special people (Effie's irises etc). Its past, present, and hope for the future, practical and whimsical all tangled up together. As such I expect my inner garden to continue to evolve over the years. And adapt to the visions of others who share my life. For me the garden is intensely personal. I look at the pretty landscapes installed in some yards and that is what they are, installations. That isn't a bad thing. Sometimes they are very functonal and attractive but they are impersonal. My garden will never be featured in a magazine spread. It isn't meant to be. Its mine.

Phlox on a humid summer evening and wind crinkling the cottonwood leaves. If only I can incorporate a gooseberry bush because we had them when I was very young and lived in England.

Maria

Do you have to water your inner garden? Weed it? Fertilize it?
Metaphorically speaking of course.

Was the Inner Garden thread re-posted somewhere? I can't find it and don't really remember it except for the title.

drtygrl, thanks for coming out of lurkdom, your comments and questions are appreciated. If we don't water, weed, and fertilize our inner gardens, they will waste away, don't you think? Travel is a wonderful fertilizer for the inner garden. Maybe yoga is good for weeding?

I agree with Maria about the inner garden evolving over the years. Gardens from childhood made impressions, of course, particularly observations of my maternal grandmother attending to her special rose or cactus plant, and my mother's painterly way with plants.

But my present inner garden originated from the slap across the face I got the first time I emerged from an air-conditioned jet to the moist tropical air of an island, heavy with the scent of plumeria blossoms strung into necklaces looped around my neck, the whisper of palm fronds in the trade winds.

For a very long time I thought it was something I couldn't have, but now I know that's not true, and it's growing like a Rousseau painting behind my house.

A walk in the woods, or a visit to some impressive garden, is certainly a good maintenance practice - though the latter could result in clutter!

Yea, timbu, its like "retail therapy" it makes you feel better but it also clutters up your closet.

The cool thing is when the inner and outer gardens start to merge in Reality!!!!

Catkim, the old thread was lost, but Wellspring had saved it, and she emailed it to me.
A recent encounter with another person's inner garden:
My mother has been pondering what to do with her front bed - she has dwarf conifers planted now, with some free space. I suggested various things such as tall grasses, russian sage, sedums - she reacted with a "hmm, ok, maybe..." Her eyes only lit up when I mentioned red roses; "Oh yeah, roses, and let's get rid of the conifers altogether!"
She's a girl who loves drama and contrast - I'm into details and nuances. Hers is another inner garden that has more to do with travels in the south, I guess (and her Ukrainian roots). Maybe I'm not the right person to give her advice at all.
I asked my husband about his inner garden. He said: "I have none. I just have an ocean in there."