Gratitude is Essential to Being a Farmer

by Nat Evans, Weavers Way Farms Field Assistant

November 1, 2024

At least a couple times a week at the farm, we harvest vegetables for market, and every day we make choices about which plants stay or go. At other times, we eradicate insects or unwittingly kill them by walking on them. Sometimes, a nest of baby mice dies when a tarp is removed.

So while giving life to so many plants and an ecosystem generally of our own design, we can also cause the death of other living creatures.

I have always been struck with the amount of death that occurs in the service of our own survival. My Zen Buddhist faith compels me to strive to protect life and consider all beings. So throughout the farm season, I have conducted a series of memorial services at home for all the beings whose death we caused at the farm — either intentionally, by harvesting or weeding, or incidentally. The term “memorial service” can imply sadness, and surely there is a certain amount of grief. But there is also gratitude.

Zen Buddhists chant the Daihishin Dharani (Sutra of Great Compassion) at memorials. The essence of it is, “Hooray! Wow, life — what a blessing to have popped up and gotten to be alive! Thanks for hanging out with us!” It is a message of gratitude and celebration that we got to share space out here on the luminous plane of existence for a while.

Taking time to express gratitude for the lives of plants and animals lost at the farm helps make us better stewards of the earth, and better farmers, too. Ceremony helps us walk a bridge back to the present moment. When we are more present with our lives, we can make deeper observations and better decisions in farming that can benefit all beings.

The next time you sit down to a meal, consider the gratitude for all the beings, known and unknown, that died in service of it. In the face of climate change, giving thanks for being here at all is surely an essential first step.