2:35 / play interview

I’m Chris Wolf. I’m the co-founder and operations manager at Growing Veterans. Before working at Growing Veterans, I worked at a food bank farm where all the food we grew went to the local food bank, and that program actually closed, so the farm was empty and I was without a job. And miraculously I heard about this cool idea that some veterans had gotten together and decided to start a farm for military vets. I just had one of those moments where you see the path ahead of you and you just know what you need to do, so I called up Chris Brown, the director [at the time], and said, “You don’t know me, and I’m not a veteran, but I have a background in organic farming and a background in mental health counseling and working with trauma and traumatic brain injuries, and I would really love to work with veterans and I’d really love to teach them farming and use that therapeutically. So we got together and had a cup of coffee and talked for several hours and then we said, “Okay, let’s do this.” We ended up renting the same farm land that I had worked on previously, and started the first little Growing Veterans farm, about three acres, and after a couple years that was so successful that we added another farm, and then another farm, so now we’re running three really awesome farms. Getting soil on your skin or breathing it on a hike in the woods actually has an antidepressant effect on the brain that can be measured. And that’s in addition to the fact that getting sun exposure fights depression, getting physical exercise fights depression, eating more healthy, fresh fruits and vegetables helps with a lot of mental and emotional conditions. Not to mention the social aspects of working alongside other people, having a purpose, having a mission, feeling like you’re part of something valuable, all of those things fight depression. So we really see the synergistic effect of all of those different angles when we farm together. Growing Veterans has changed my life a lot. I’m the kind of person who really needs to have a purpose in my life. I need to be doing something important in the world, and Growing Veterans has really given me a mission that I can dedicate myself to and everything I do every day, I know that it’s going to help people, to help the planet that we live on. I just feel really, really good about the work that we’re doing. So it’s tremendously fulfilling to me, even when it’s really hard work. I still absolutely want to be here, absolutely want to keep doing it, and it’s very motivating to me.