How Nature Helps Us Heal
Unveiling the profound connection between nature and our well-being, we delve into the therapeutic power of the natural world. Explore how the serenity of green spaces, the rhythm of ocean waves, and the tranquility of forests contribute to our healing process.
One silver lining to the pandemic: with gyms, museums, and stores closed, many of us were forced to spend more time outside.
Dr. Hass was able to ditch her car and more safely pedal the 3.5 miles on pedestrian-friendly streets to work at Alta Bates Summit Medical Center in Oakland, where she work practicing hospital medicine
- She has been giving out old-school paper prescriptions for about two years now, prescribing non-pharmaceutical steps that have been proven to make people healthier.
What a prescription looks like
Researchers from Finland suggest that five hours a month is the minimum to have lasting effects
- For those with the resources, I prescribe breaks to a quiet cabin or tent for at least three days, once or twice a year
- House plants for home and office, microbreaks where you stop work to look out the window, or a couple short walks even if it is in an urban environment
- A walk with a friend outside is a Greater Good “three-fer”: exercise, friendship, and nature all at once
Nature is good for us
Luminaries like Charles Darwin, Henry David Thoreau, Virginia Woolf, and Albert Einstein have written eloquently about the benefits of taking in the natural world
- Starting with research on blood pressure and stress hormone levels, there is now a medical specialty in forest bathing-an activity in which more than a quarter of Japanese partake
- In Japan, the director of the ministry of forestry is a social scientist, not a botanist
- Trees are seen more as a mental health resource than one that can be extracted for profit
- The benefits of forest bathing include lower blood pressure, heart rate, and stress; improved mood and immune function; better sleep; and increased creativity
- There are surprising social benefits, too
Why nature is good for us
Since we evolved in nature, our senses and body rhythms are best suited for that environment
- Rachel Kaplan at the University of Michigan says “soft fascination” with the beauty and mystery of the natural world draws us in
- Nature is “enticing but not demanding”
- Looking at nature pictures let the hard-working executive function parts of the brain recover
- Emotion scientists believe there is something else going on as well
- The feeling we get from encountering something vast and wondrous that challenges our comprehension
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