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How to Grow: A Transformative Journey from the Garden to the Soul - Cultivating Physical Fitness, Mental Health, and Spiritual Awareness Through the Wisdom of Plants
In this transformative guide, TikTok’s most popular gardener, Marcus Bridgewater—aka Garden Marcus—offers lessons for growth rooted in lessons from the plant world to help cultivate the soul.
Marcus Bridgewater has been compared to Bob Ross and Mister Rogers for his soothing TikTok videos that relate botany to humanity. A gardener “who shares tips about caring for one’s plants and oneself” (New York Times) and “is not only a trove of information if you’re looking to flex your green thumb, but a balm for the pandemic-induced chaos happening in the world” (Vogue), his soothing observations on plants and life have made him a social media star. In caring for over 600 plants, Marcus has gained invaluable wisdom. Life inside us yearns to grow; like plants, humans maximize their potential when presented with the right conditions. Through care and attention, he reminds us, we can successfully cultivate growth.
Centered on a trinity of wellbeing—Mental Health, Physical Fitness, and Spiritual Awareness, How to Grow weaves together insights from the garden with stories from Marcus’s life to help you foster personal development. With lessons rooted in his experiences gardening—from how a replanted flourishing sweet potato vine is a reminder that all living things benefit from a change of scene, to how to embrace patience to foster growth—this inspiring guide helps you do “the dirty work” (pun intended) to discover kindness, patience, and positivity within. “We cannot make anything grow,” he advises. “But we can foster an environment where it may grow.”
How to Grow isn’t a gardening book. It is a self-help book that draws inspiration from the garden. Original, timely, and filled with nurturing wisdom, it takes perennial knowledge from plants to teach us about ourselves and opens our eyes to what we are capable of achieving.
Marcus Bridgewater has been compared to Bob Ross and Mister Rogers for his soothing TikTok videos that relate botany to humanity. A gardener “who shares tips about caring for one’s plants and oneself” (New York Times) and “is not only a trove of information if you’re looking to flex your green thumb, but a balm for the pandemic-induced chaos happening in the world” (Vogue), his soothing observations on plants and life have made him a social media star. In caring for over 600 plants, Marcus has gained invaluable wisdom. Life inside us yearns to grow; like plants, humans maximize their potential when presented with the right conditions. Through care and attention, he reminds us, we can successfully cultivate growth.
Centered on a trinity of wellbeing—Mental Health, Physical Fitness, and Spiritual Awareness, How to Grow weaves together insights from the garden with stories from Marcus’s life to help you foster personal development. With lessons rooted in his experiences gardening—from how a replanted flourishing sweet potato vine is a reminder that all living things benefit from a change of scene, to how to embrace patience to foster growth—this inspiring guide helps you do “the dirty work” (pun intended) to discover kindness, patience, and positivity within. “We cannot make anything grow,” he advises. “But we can foster an environment where it may grow.”
How to Grow isn’t a gardening book. It is a self-help book that draws inspiration from the garden. Original, timely, and filled with nurturing wisdom, it takes perennial knowledge from plants to teach us about ourselves and opens our eyes to what we are capable of achieving.
268 pages, Kindle Edition
Published May 24, 2022
49 people are currently reading
452 people want to read
About the author
Marcus Bridgewater
3 books8 followersMarcus Bridgewater, widely known as "Garden Marcus", is an author, plant enthusiast, and CEO & Founder of Choice Forward. He began gardening when he bought his first house nearly seven years ago. After killing nine of his original 16 plants, he found himself determined to learn how to care for all living things. He now has around 500 plants at his Texas home.
He developed his internet presence by connecting his observations in his garden to greater life lessons, and has been featured in the New York Times, Vogue, and the Los Angeles Times. When he is not in his garden, he is leading presentations, workshops, and seminars with Choice Forward. His first book, "How to Grow: Nurture Your Garden, Nurture Yourself,” (HarperOne, 2022) debuted May 24th.
He developed his internet presence by connecting his observations in his garden to greater life lessons, and has been featured in the New York Times, Vogue, and the Los Angeles Times. When he is not in his garden, he is leading presentations, workshops, and seminars with Choice Forward. His first book, "How to Grow: Nurture Your Garden, Nurture Yourself,” (HarperOne, 2022) debuted May 24th.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 41 reviews
February 19, 2022
As a gardener myself, I really enjoyed Marcus's frequent garden analogies to personal development and wellness. He includes many insights throughout the book and weaves them in nicely. I was impressed by his ability to take many stories from his youth and find such insight in them later in life. While I enjoyed the book immensely, some chapters lacked some cohesion, but overall, I really enjoyed the positive message and the mindset of the author. I think Marcus is awesome and love that he took the time and effort to share his profound words and thoughts with others!
June 6, 2022
How to Grow is a wonderful inspirational and meditative book with a calm voice. I hadn't heard of Marcus Bridgewater before, but the book description intrigued me. I loved his voice and can understand comparisons to Mr. Rogers. It's clear the author is a gentle soul and views things holistically and thoughtfully. Though what he reveals is fairly common sense, it's a great reminder to work on ourselves in a much more tranquil and patient way, focusing on the process instead of the destination. It can be hard to get back to this in our world of constant stimulation and distractions. I loved his holistic perspective and encouragement to connect with ourselves, others, and observe deeply. I also listened to the audiobook, which is narrated by the author. He has a wonderful soothing voice.
Thank you NetGalley and the publisher for providing this ARC. All thoughts are my own.
Thank you NetGalley and the publisher for providing this ARC. All thoughts are my own.
June 21, 2022
This was an interesting listen. The main thing I got out of it was be patient with your plants and with yourself. Don't give up.
July 11, 2023
This book was so uplifting. It was easy to read and would also make a great gift!
July 5, 2024
A fairly solid 3 stars for me. I'd love to give it more, but I'm reviewing the book and not the man. To note, I listened to it as an audiobook, read by the author.
For the man, 5 stars!! He comes across as incredibly interesting, self-aware, holistic, gentle, fun, multi-talented, grounded, natural and an all-around great person. When someone asks "who is one person you'd love to have coffee with, anyone in the world" - he comes to mind. I didn't find his voice to be soothing, per se, but he was very easy to listen to.
For the book, though, 3 stars. It's a good first book, and I'd like to see him do more, but I pushed myself to get through it. I think the content is better suited to a podcast series. I enjoyed listening to the book if I was out for a walk with my dogs, but I didn't bookmark any sections & doubt i'll listen again. He interweaves stories with his life lessons and common sense, but I wanted more evidence or a little more research beyond amicable musings and storytelling. Also, there were a lot of parts he didn't explain... when and why did he live in a monastary? He talks about "finding your vibration" to connect with plants and animals, but how do you do that? As someone interested in gardening, unfortuantely many of the plant references I couldn't relate to as I live in a different climate outside of the US and we don't have the plants he mentioned - so I couldn't picture them in my head to get his analogies.
I'm glad I got the audiobook, as his voice made a huge difference in telling his story. As a hardcopy book, I don't know if I would have finished reading it.
It's all very common sense and spoke to like a friend. I'd probably recommend this to particular people, but not to everyone.
Hope he writes another one, I'd love to see his sophomore work!
For the man, 5 stars!! He comes across as incredibly interesting, self-aware, holistic, gentle, fun, multi-talented, grounded, natural and an all-around great person. When someone asks "who is one person you'd love to have coffee with, anyone in the world" - he comes to mind. I didn't find his voice to be soothing, per se, but he was very easy to listen to.
For the book, though, 3 stars. It's a good first book, and I'd like to see him do more, but I pushed myself to get through it. I think the content is better suited to a podcast series. I enjoyed listening to the book if I was out for a walk with my dogs, but I didn't bookmark any sections & doubt i'll listen again. He interweaves stories with his life lessons and common sense, but I wanted more evidence or a little more research beyond amicable musings and storytelling. Also, there were a lot of parts he didn't explain... when and why did he live in a monastary? He talks about "finding your vibration" to connect with plants and animals, but how do you do that? As someone interested in gardening, unfortuantely many of the plant references I couldn't relate to as I live in a different climate outside of the US and we don't have the plants he mentioned - so I couldn't picture them in my head to get his analogies.
I'm glad I got the audiobook, as his voice made a huge difference in telling his story. As a hardcopy book, I don't know if I would have finished reading it.
It's all very common sense and spoke to like a friend. I'd probably recommend this to particular people, but not to everyone.
Hope he writes another one, I'd love to see his sophomore work!
April 1, 2024
I warned you that I would be reading more gardening books this year. I listened to the audio on my way to and from work and it was a great listen. I loved how he weaved gardening and life lessons. I loved his Marcus tales. I felt positive about my own garden and definitely learned some new things. I also felt more confident in what I am doing with my garden/my own life, which was something I didn't expect. I will say that sometimes, he repeated himself and sometimes, I felt like I didn't get why this gardening specific thing applied to this life thing; I felt he grasped for straws there.
But I think even if you didn't have a garden or into gardening, this book does help you look at your life a bit differently.
But I think even if you didn't have a garden or into gardening, this book does help you look at your life a bit differently.
Read
December 31, 20222.5 stars I think.
I don't read much self help, though occasionally I get the desire. I follow Marcus on TikTok and when the book popped up in my audiobook subscription app I thought I'd give it a go. I struggled with three aspects of the book: culturally I'm far from Marcus (non-religious non-US person here), I found some of the stories as lessons too contrived and I felt that when he was sharing about himself he was holding back a little too much.
I frequently find that for me self help books would have been better as memoirs or an essay or two, and this suffers from that as well. I do appreciate Bridgewater's approach to life and his general attitude of observing oneself and the world around, and the comparisons between self-care (and community care) with gardening. I note that he and I have similar approaches to a lot of things, and very different to other things. He got bullied for his speech impediment and started practicing IN FRONT OF other kids at his school, taking every opportunity to do so. Me? I got bullied (appearance) and stopped talking to people unless they talked to me first and did my very best (and failed) to develop anorexia 😅
I also wish he was a little bit more transparent with his spirutal background? Not that we don't know some of it, but I wanted more as I felt the perspective of a church uprbining, his stay in the monastery etc, but wanted more detail. I hope he writes a memoir or essay collection in the future, as I think that would be more interesting to me. Either way I think this is a more chill approach to self development than a lot of the other options even though I cannot do that kind of dicipline.
I don't read much self help, though occasionally I get the desire. I follow Marcus on TikTok and when the book popped up in my audiobook subscription app I thought I'd give it a go. I struggled with three aspects of the book: culturally I'm far from Marcus (non-religious non-US person here), I found some of the stories as lessons too contrived and I felt that when he was sharing about himself he was holding back a little too much.
I frequently find that for me self help books would have been better as memoirs or an essay or two, and this suffers from that as well. I do appreciate Bridgewater's approach to life and his general attitude of observing oneself and the world around, and the comparisons between self-care (and community care) with gardening. I note that he and I have similar approaches to a lot of things, and very different to other things. He got bullied for his speech impediment and started practicing IN FRONT OF other kids at his school, taking every opportunity to do so. Me? I got bullied (appearance) and stopped talking to people unless they talked to me first and did my very best (and failed) to develop anorexia 😅
I also wish he was a little bit more transparent with his spirutal background? Not that we don't know some of it, but I wanted more as I felt the perspective of a church uprbining, his stay in the monastery etc, but wanted more detail. I hope he writes a memoir or essay collection in the future, as I think that would be more interesting to me. Either way I think this is a more chill approach to self development than a lot of the other options even though I cannot do that kind of dicipline.
September 13, 2022
I first discovered Garden Marcus by accident on Instagram. I was instantly drawn to his beautiful smile, gorgeous & soothing speaking voice and his calm & gentle vibe. Then I focused on what he was actually saying and I was hooked. So when I found out he’d written a book, I needed it.
Then I found out he’d recorded it as an audio book, so it was an absolute no brainer. I cancelled the pre-order book and got it on audio. I now regret that (I want both), as there was too much for me to take in by listening alone. I found the pace of the audio book a bit too fast. I don’t know if it was actually to fast or I thinking along with it too slowly. I think that a great accompaniment to the audio book would be a work through book, as Marcus gives us many suggestions and tasks to work on. Be nice to have a Garden Marcus note book to work through them in. Ooh and a Year Long Garden Planner too!
My absolute highlight of the book was Marcus Tales. I wish there was more of them. Each chapter had one to illustrate how he’d applied what he was talking about to his own life. He’s such an interesting man and the book hinted at elements of his life. I would have enjoyed a more complete biography (if he was happy to share it).
This is definitely a book I will return to as it’s full of interesting observations and life tips.
Then I found out he’d recorded it as an audio book, so it was an absolute no brainer. I cancelled the pre-order book and got it on audio. I now regret that (I want both), as there was too much for me to take in by listening alone. I found the pace of the audio book a bit too fast. I don’t know if it was actually to fast or I thinking along with it too slowly. I think that a great accompaniment to the audio book would be a work through book, as Marcus gives us many suggestions and tasks to work on. Be nice to have a Garden Marcus note book to work through them in. Ooh and a Year Long Garden Planner too!
My absolute highlight of the book was Marcus Tales. I wish there was more of them. Each chapter had one to illustrate how he’d applied what he was talking about to his own life. He’s such an interesting man and the book hinted at elements of his life. I would have enjoyed a more complete biography (if he was happy to share it).
This is definitely a book I will return to as it’s full of interesting observations and life tips.
January 22, 2023
Marcus showed up in my Instagram feed from time to time and I loved them. He had very interesting things to say, and I appreciated his general outlook of life. And I like the sound of his voice. After several weeks, I just decided to follow him. The journey has been fun. He published a book (this one), and started doing live Instagram’s which I do join from time to time. It took me a while before I decided to read his book, though, no reason I just didn’t get around to it. I’m really glad I finally did! This is another book I’m going to buy several copies of for gifts. He has some really good advice, logical, thinking, fair and kind observations of life in general, and some really good reasons to just be a good person. He does all of this while comparing it to his biggest hobby of gardening. Which he also has some pretty good gardening tips too.
I think almost everyone needs to read this book, and I think a lot of people should follow him on social media, but that’s entirely up to you.
I think almost everyone needs to read this book, and I think a lot of people should follow him on social media, but that’s entirely up to you.
July 26, 2023
I'm giving this book 5 stars because of the positivity behind each lesson and chapter. I respect and admire Bridgewater and resonate with his message of peace and harmony. Many gardeners write books about their failures and successes but Marcus writes about his deeply rooted empathy for nature and how it connects his story and daily life. I didn't read this book to learn gardening tricks or tips. I enjoy his outlook, his input and his voice.
If you love gardening and haven't discovered Marcus Bridgewater yet I recommend looking him up on social media and YouTube 🖤 He is a spoonful of positive energy and peacefulness.
If you love gardening and haven't discovered Marcus Bridgewater yet I recommend looking him up on social media and YouTube 🖤 He is a spoonful of positive energy and peacefulness.
April 16, 2025
When I read this one, I was looking for something for mental health and self-care, but I also wanted something about gardening. I felt like I got all three with this one, with added bonuses. I enjoyed reading about the author's personal experiences. It made everything seem less daunting.
I learned quite a bit while reading this one. This book got me outside, and it helped me with some of my preparations for this years spread - I even got some seedlings started.
I liked how there was spirituality included, but in a way that it doesn't exclude anyone. I appreciated the layout of the book and all the topics covered.
We are basically little plants - he's here to remind us why.
I learned quite a bit while reading this one. This book got me outside, and it helped me with some of my preparations for this years spread - I even got some seedlings started.
I liked how there was spirituality included, but in a way that it doesn't exclude anyone. I appreciated the layout of the book and all the topics covered.
We are basically little plants - he's here to remind us why.
October 26, 2023
There's not enough stars available for me to rate this book. It was phenomenal. Not only does Marcus provide a positive, but also realistic outlook on how to tackle life and grow yourself to your fullest potential. I first followed him on tiktok for months before I found out he was also an author. I listened to the audiobook back in March and I still carry with me many of the things he mentioned. I'm happy to have listened and supported him. I really enjoy how he is able to link his lessons to previous events in his life and tell his story.
August 4, 2024
I struggled to finish reading this book as the author was so vague about everything he relates in it. I picked it up because the author indicated he lives in Florida, but aside from saying he lives in the central part of the state, I got nothing else. A book about his garden, but not a single photo to show his amazing gift with plants? I was dying to see photos of his porch, overflowing with healthy plants according to him, but got nothing. Instead, I got one sentence repeated after another and a hopscotch recollection of musings in no chronological order to help me understand his journey.
February 27, 2024
This is a self help book, that I thought was about gardening.
I found it very inspiring, a bit repetitive, but I came to revalue lifelong learning. How plants
and humans can grow with care, positive attitude and not afraid of making mistakes.
I would recommend this to beginning gardeners and young adults.
I found it very inspiring, a bit repetitive, but I came to revalue lifelong learning. How plants
and humans can grow with care, positive attitude and not afraid of making mistakes.
I would recommend this to beginning gardeners and young adults.
April 5, 2024
I loved reading this book a chapter a day. I looked forward to it each day to help be a calm time at the end of the day. His stories were great and his habits have made me think about some of my own. I loved that this book encouraged self reflection, but also brought gardening into the mix. I am definitely rethinking some of my own gardening choices now. I would highly recommend.
July 4, 2024
I liked the "Marcus stories" where he gave his life experiences, but I found the analogy to plants was a difficult stretch at times. I think I would have preferred a printed book, but I was able to access the audiobook with a subscription I already had, so I listened instead. I find it more difficult to remember the key points of each chapter from the audio.
July 16, 2022
This is a great self-help book, full of wisdom and simple lessons that we all need to hear. While it isn't just for gardeners, Marcus uses gardening as an analogy for each part and parcel of life making things quite easy to understand.
July Tonal book club
July Tonal book club
October 1, 2022
Simple and practical advice about how we can grow into better people, told through taking care of a garden and ultimately ourselves.
Marcus’ actionable steps outlined here offer readers tools that are easy to implement for real results and meaningful changes.
Highly recommended!
Marcus’ actionable steps outlined here offer readers tools that are easy to implement for real results and meaningful changes.
Highly recommended!
January 1, 2023
A refreshing take on applying and viewing self-care practices. I really enjoyed this book, especially the spiritual awareness section. The physical fitness section was also a breath of fresh air and much needed encouragement.
April 11, 2023
This book is beautifully written and has encouraging, insightful guidance on how to develop a positive mindset- Marcus uses plant care as an analogy for cultivating our own mind garden and it’s so gorgeous. I am obsessed with this man!!!!!
June 7, 2022
Beautifully written and deeply inspiring, I strongly recommend this book!
September 19, 2022
Quite a pleasure to read, a very calm voice for me to listen to. So many great points of view to see the world and ourselves.
December 7, 2022
so wholesome🥰
January 1, 2023
This book is absolutely amazing! Everyone should read it!
February 16, 2023
Loved it!!...This book was very enlightening and I really liked the the gardening analogy he used in the book,overall a very good self grow book
April 25, 2023
I liked how he compared gardening to everyday life. It all makes sense. This was a short but enlightening read.
May 25, 2023
So wholesome and warm hearted! It is an easy ready with some really great life lessons. I very much enjoyed this book!
October 1, 2023
Inspiring, personal, and encouraging look at how personal growth and natural growth mirror and inform each other. An accessible and comforting read.
November 13, 2023
Self-help book with gardening tips and tricks. A good combination. Easy reward, and quite deep sometimes.
March 26, 2024
Beautifully written and gracefully executed. The author uses personal life stories and experiences within in his own garden to connect thoughts and ideas that are perfect for self reflection.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 41 reviews