tend your garden

Syllable breakdown

Dictionary meaning

attend to one's own affairs, responsibilities, and personal domain rather than interfering in others' business or wasting energy on things beyond one's control; derived from the famous conclusion of Voltaire's philosophical novella Candide — 'il faut cultiver notre jardin', we must cultivate our garden — in which the battered optimist abandons the grand philosophical debates about theodicy and the best of all possible worlds in favour of the concrete satisfactions of practical work; the phrase has acquired a second layer of meaning in personal development discourse, where tending one's garden means devoting care and attention to the growth and maintenance of one's relationships, skills, health, and creative life as a garden that requires regular cultivation to remain flourishing