Tending: the kind of care you can't do from a distance

Oct 6

Tend is a verb that asks you to show up. You can't tend a garden from the couch, and you can't tend a friendship by liking a post. It means going back to something again and again, noticing what it needs this week rather than last, and adjusting.

That's what makes it different from much of what gets sold to us as self-care. A candle, a bath bomb or an app subscription can be lovely, but each one is a thing you buy once. Tending is a practice you keep returning to. Research across psychology, nursing and social ecology describes care as an ongoing, two-way process that eases stress, builds meaning, and keeps both people and places well (Taylor et al., 2000; Finfgeld-Connett, 2007; Moriggi et al., 2020; Gopnik et al., 2025).

So let's look at what tending involves, and how to do more of it without running yourself dry.

When stress hits, we reach for each other

Most of us learnt about fight-or-flight at school. Less well known is the pattern Shelley Taylor and colleagues called tend-and-befriend. Under pressure, many of us don't only brace or bolt. We also move towards others: we protect the people who depend on us, and we look for company (Taylor et al., 2000).

There is biology underneath this. Oxytocin and the body's reward systems nudge us towards connection when things are strained. When that reach is met with genuine support, our stress response settles (Taylor et al., 2000). In other words, the urge to text a friend when a day turns sour is not weakness. It is a well-worn human way of regulating.

A few findings worth holding onto:

Listening counts as tending. Attentive listening built closeness and relieved stress quickly, even between women who had only just met (Malloy et al., 2021). You don't need years of history to offer someone steadiness.
Caring for others is linked with our own wellbeing. A recent meta-analysis found a modest but reliable link between compassion for others and our own psychological, cognitive and social wellbeing (Zhuniq et al., 2025).
Our attachment patterns shape how we tend. People with more anxious attachment tend to reach out more under stress, and people with more avoidant attachment tend to reach out less (Levy et al., 2019). Neither is a flaw. Each is a pattern you can notice in yourself.

The catch: tending runs both ways, or it runs out

Caring for others can lift us up. It can also wear us down. Which one happens depends on the conditions.

Among spouses caring for a partner, actively helping raised the carer's positive mood, especially where the relationship was close and interdependent (Poulin et al., 2010). But heavy, long-term caregiving, with long hours on call and high physical dependency, can take a real toll on the carer's own health (Schulz et al., 2020).

The difference is not how much you love someone. It is whether care is flowing both ways, and whether the carer is also being cared for. If you are the one who always notices, always remembers and always holds things together, this is your reminder: you are also someone who needs tending.

Tending beyond people

Tending doesn't stop at human relationships. Gardening, growing food and caring for plants and pollinators have been linked with a sense of capability, vitality and solace (Dupuis, 2024; Lynch, 2024; Moriggi et al., 2020). Caring for nature and caring with nature follow the same rhythm as caring for people: pay attention, take responsibility, respond, and repeat (Moriggi et al., 2020).

A pot of herbs on the windowsill counts. So does a walk where you notice what's flowering this month that wasn't last month. Small, regular attention to something living is practice for the kind of attention people need too.

Putting tending into practice this week

Map your tending. On one side of a page, list who and what you tend: people, pets, plants, projects. On the other side, list who and what tends you. Look at the balance. You're not keeping score. You're noticing where care is pooling and where it is thin.

Offer ten minutes of listening without fixing. Choose one conversation this week where your only job is to listen. No advice and no "that happened to me too". Notice what shifts, for them and for you.

Tend something that grows. Water a plant with attention rather than on autopilot. Check the soil, turn it towards the light, and notice any new leaves. Let it be a two-minute daily anchor.

Ask to be tended. Ask for one specific, small thing, such as a walk, a meal, or someone to check in on Friday. Tending that only flows outwards is eventually unsustainable.

Name your stress reach. Next time pressure builds, notice what you do first. Do you go quiet, get busy, or reach out? Then decide whether that is the reach you want to make.

Coach yourself

Who or what am I tending right now, and does that feel nourishing or depleting?
Who tends me? When did I last let them?
Under stress, do I tend to reach out or pull in? What would one small step in the other direction look like?
Where could I listen more and fix less this week?
What living thing, whether a plant, a pet or a patch of ground, could become part of my daily rhythm of care?
If care in my life were a garden, which bed is overgrown, which is parched, and what is one thing I could tend today?

Tending: the kind of care you can't do from a distance

When stress hits, we reach for each other

The catch: tending runs both ways, or it runs out

Tending beyond people

Putting tending into practice this week

Coach yourself

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Tending: the kind of care you can't do from a distance

When stress hits, we reach for each other

The catch: tending runs both ways, or it runs out

Tending beyond people

Putting tending into practice this week

Coach yourself

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