Tending Whats In Your Reach

Roots and Refuge Podcast

Jessica Sowards

Home & Garden, Leisure

5 • 646 Ratings

🗓️ 14 May 2025

⏱️ 47 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Hey there darlings, welcome back to the Roots and Refuge Podcast. Today’s episode is one I recorded as much for myself as for you. It’s a message I wish 22-year-old me could have heard—back when my dreams felt so big and my limits felt so loud.

If you’ve ever felt overwhelmed by what you can’t do, this episode is a gentle reminder that there’s sacred strength in doing what you can. I’m talking about tending your life like a garden—not in panic, not in perfection, but in presence. Whether you're in a season of limitations, raising babies, or just navigating a world that feels a bit too urgent, you’re not alone. There is wisdom in your limits. There is grace in your pace. And there is peace in choosing to be rooted right where you are.

This conversation touches on preparation, presence, performance, and the quiet rebellion of slow living. Let it encourage you to stop striving, to tend with care, and to trust that what’s within your reach is enough.

If you’ve found encouragement here, consider supporting the podcast on Patreon, where you can listen early and join our monthly Q&A.

As always, I bless you until next time.

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	Hey there, darlands, welcome back to the Roots and Refuge podcast. I am your host, Jessica Sauer.
0:14.2	It's my friends call me Jess, and I hope you will too. And here on my podcast, I talk about all
0:18.1	things homesteading, growing food by raising animals, growing
0:21.4	gardens, preserving, preparing, and enjoying that food, as well as trying to live more
0:25.8	mindfully in relationship with each other and with the earth. Today's podcast is one that I record
0:34.6	for you, but that I record with myself in mind. A lot of times I make content for the 22-year-old
0:44.4	me that I very vividly remember how she felt. And it's an interesting thing for me when I get
0:54.0	feedback on the content that I create because I do know that it meets a lot of people where they are and they may not be 22 years old they may be in any season of their life but they may be feeling a lot of the same things that I was feeling at that time. And honestly, I make content for the younger
1:12.4	me a lot just because I remember what I wished I could hear during that time. Today I want to talk to
1:21.1	you about a practice called tending what is in reach. I had written this down in a journal. I assume I saw it somewhere
1:31.1	a while ago. And as I was going back through some things and taking some notes, kind of pondering
1:37.2	different topics that I'd like to bring up in conversations with y'all, I started really pondering this idea.
1:45.8	And I went searching to try to find, like, where did I see that?
1:49.4	Who originally said that?
1:50.8	And I found a quote by a guy named Jack Cornfield that said,
1:55.0	10 to the part of the garden you can touch.
1:57.3	And I think that's probably where this originated from.
2:06.4	But it's really spurred a lot of thoughts in me. And I think it would be a great thing for us to unpack. I actually just got off the phone
2:11.3	with my little brother before starting to record. I would come to my office today to work on
2:15.6	some editing and podcast stuff. And he called me.
2:20.1	And my little brother's two years younger than I am. We've lived very separate lives. We have
2:26.3	very different lives in a lot of ways. You know, I have a mother to many on a farm. my brother is childless by choice a tattoo artist and
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Jessica Sowards, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of Jessica Sowards and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.