The Twelve Gifts from the Garden is the perfect guide for helping readers take a walk through a garden or any natural environment and make discoveries about life’s lessons along the way. Every chapter is an example from Charlene’s own experiences in nature and shows us how to do this, starting with how to be present and how to carefully observe what we see, be it a plant, a tree, roots of a tree, an animal, an insect – anything that catches our attention – and to observe it from all sides and angles so that we don’t jump to hasty and possibly mistaken conclusions. Being open is only one of the many lessons in this book. Every chapter offers something valuable. I appreciate how Charlene often uses personal examples from her own life to help us understand the lesson and see how it applies. In one chapter, Charlene recalls seeing the damage on Sanibel Island for the first time after Hurricane Irma and asking, “How do we maintain equanimity through all of life’s losses and gains?” It was not until I read this chapter a second time that I saw its relevance to the difficulty I was having in moving past the sadness of my mom’s passing. Charlene’s answer to the question, at least in part is: “Noticing the good, finding the gifts, and recognizing the blessings.” Without even noticing, I had been focusing attention primarily on my loss rather than on the blessing that my mom has always been in my life. I did not judge myself for this as Charlene reminds her readers. I did shift my focus and started a daily practice of acknowledging Mom - and all my blessings - and giving thanks. Thank you, Charlene, for your guidance in this chapter and all the other lessons you have shared in this remarkable book. Linda Simon