The Garden isn't only about recognising work that already happened — it's built to get people talking in the first place.
Asking For Help
Post a help request and say what you're stuck on. Every request is tagged with a Skill — that's required, not optional, and it's what lets the right people find it instead of it disappearing into a general feed.
Requests are visible on the Help board, where anyone in your Adventure can read and reply. When someone's answer actually solves it, mark the request solved. That closes the thread and records who helped.
Answering Someone Else
The Help board is the fastest way to be useful to people you haven't met yet. Browse open requests, find one tagged with a Skill you hold, and reply.
Helping is recorded as a real interaction, which means it counts toward Garden Missions and refreshes your connection with that person — their node returns to full colour in your Garden. And the person you helped can endorse you for it.
Direct Messages
You can message anyone in your Adventure one-to-one, from the Messages panel in the dock or from their profile drawer. Conversations are private between the two of you and scoped to the Adventure you're both in.
Unread messages show a badge on the dock button so you're not hunting for them.
Everything Counts As Contact
Messages, help given, endorsements, gifts, and wall posts are all logged as interactions. This is what drives the withering described in The Garden Overview — any real contact with someone brings their node back to life. There's no way to "keep a relationship warm" without actually interacting, which is intentional.