You’ll never be a successful gardener without first killing a few plants.

Growing things and making things is a skill not a talent. As a kid, I remember people talking about what I was or was not talented at all the time. I was a “talented artist“ and a “talented actress“ but I was never a talented student or a talented engineer. The led to a lot of frustration and insecurity when I went to college. In my mind, my success or lack of success was due to talent.

It wasn’t until I met my husband that I learned that very little comes of talent and a lot comes from the qualities he shows every day; hard work, self care, and patience. He's a very unique person.

These days, we expect to have exactly what we want immediately. Entertainment (Netflix), food (UberEats), transportation (Uber or Lyft), stuff (Amazon) is all at our fingertips and on our doorstep within an hour. Living in this new economy of immediate gratification means that it’s really easy to forget that sometimes it takes time to get what you want.

If you want to make something that’s beautiful, delicious, or helpful you’ll have to be ready to embrace failure and iterate based on what you learn. That process takes time and navigating the ups, downs and frustrations of that process is a skill that you have to cultivate through practice. Start making things and you’ll become kinder, more patient, and more skilled at doing just that … making things.