Heal Yourself: Get Back to Nature

Even the most anti-outdoorsy type has to admit that they feel calmer when they smell the fresh air and see the sunlight filtering in through the leaves. It fills us with a sense of comfort and relaxation.

 

Not only does it make us feel good, but it also heals us from the inside out. It shows in how we think more clearly and how our moods are restored when we’re around nature.

Keep reading to learn more about how to heal yourself through nature.

 

Why Do We Feel Good When We’re in Nature?

 

Getting back to nature acts as a reminder that we’re all part of the natural world. We’re all connected somehow, which is why you feel at peace when you’re in a quiet forest or a meadow.

 

Think of when you walk barefoot on the beach or a patch of green grass. You know that pleasant feeling you get? It feels like you’re home, comfortable, relaxed, and at ease.

 

The best part is all the stress and tension you’ve been holding onto melts away somehow. It’s like a weight has been lifted off your shoulders, and you feel freer and lighter.

 

How Can We Reconnect with Nature?

 

Finding opportunities to reconnect with nature and take advantage of its healing benefits can be a challenge in our hectic lifestyles. Yet, you don’t have to go camping in the middle of nowhere to enjoy nature. Instead, there are ways you can do just that right in the comfort of your own home.

 

Take a look.

 

Gardening

 

Don’t lose hope if you’re not into hiking or camping outdoors. You can still be close to nature but in a different way.

 

For example, you can plant a vegetable garden in your yard. Tending to plants allows you to spend a good deal of time with nature and connect with the earth.

 

You get to breathe in the fresh smell of the soil and the plants themselves. But, of course, that’s even more enjoyable if you’re planting fragrant plants, such as jasmines, roses, or lilies.

 

You also get to connect to nature in a hands-on, visceral way that, for some people, can become very personal. In fact, many gardeners say that when they’re tending their gardens, they feel a deeper bond with nature they hadn’t felt before.

 

Many also feel that gardening makes them feel that they’re part of something bigger than themselves. This special connection allows them to bridge the gap between our hectic, modern world and the natural world.

 

Mindfulness Meditation

 

Being outdoors is such a wonderful opportunity to slow down and breathe. Look around and see all the colors around you. Take in how the light plays through the leaves or reflects off a big, shiny rock.

 

Next, close your eyes and take a deep breath. Inhale as much fresh, clean air as you can to cleanse out your lungs from the smog and fumes, we’re so used to taking in.

 

Then, stop and listen. Really listen to the birds and crickets chirping, as well as any other creatures, big or small.

 

Also, if there’s a brook or stream nearby, pay close attention to the sound of the water. Studies show that the sound of running water is calming and can even have an anti-depressant effect.

 

Yet, the best thing to listen out for in nature is nothing. That calm quietude has become so rare that we sometimes don’t know just how much we miss.

 

Forest Bathing

 

‘Forest bathing,’ or ‘shinrin-yoku’ in Japanese, is the art of moving slowly and mindfully through a forest. The aim of this Asian practice is for you to engage all your five senses along the way.

 

So, with each step, you take in all the sights, sounds, and smells of your surroundings. This experience is similar to mindful meditation, which we mentioned above.

 

Yet, it goes beyond stimulating the parasympathetic nervous system or reducing your stress levels. Forest bathing also helps increase anti-inflammatory properties in your body and boost your immune system, all thanks to the terpenes you inhale as you’re walking through the forest.

 

Conclusion

 

More and more, people are starting to realize that the best way to heal themselves is by getting back to nature. It’s true that the more time we take to relax and unwind in nature, the better off we’ll be.

 

4 Benefits of Connecting with Nature

You know how good it feels to get out and relax in nature, right? It’s time out from the stresses of everyday life, space and clean air, to breathe and take some time for yourself. But did you also know that there are scientifically proven health benefits to connecting with the natural world? It’s so beneficial you could even call it nature therapy! Here’s how being in the great outdoors is great for you.

 

Nature reduces stress and anxiety

 

Being out in nature has a measurable effect on your stress levels. They go right down, also lowering your risk of anxiety and depression. Even if you live and work in high rise glass and steel buildings, having a dose of the natural world can help lift your mood, your cognitive function, and your mental health. Whether it’s a walk in the park or even having a plant on your desk or being able to look out of the window, any connection with nature will help. 

 

Connection with nature is healing

 

Studies have shown that even being able to see a natural landscape can help hospital patients recover faster. 

 

It also helps your immune system function better. Scientists have found more than twenty pathways or connections between exposure to nature and improved health, protecting you from heart disease, depression, and diabetes.

 

Nature changes your perceptions of the world

 

Researchers have found that walking through a rural area changed the study participants attitude toward their to-do list. They saw their tasks as more manageable than participants who walked through city streets. 

 

People who exercise outdoors move faster, have a lowered perception of effort, enjoy their exercise more, and are more likely to stick to their routine than people exercising in a gym. 

 

Nature is great for your mental health

 

Remember how good it feels to be near the ocean, a river or a waterfall? That’s because the air near moving water is full of negative ions that can act as natural anti-depressants. It’s the same effect as the change in the air after a thunderstorm when the air is no longer oppressive but clear and fresh. 

 

There are now many studies which show that people living in green areas, or who have access to green spaces in cities, have significantly better mental wellbeing than people who live cut off from nature. 

 

Even having an aquarium, houseplants, or a view onto green space can help. 

Find Inner Peace - Get Back To Nature

Do you ever feel disconnected? Maybe you're so preoccupied with everything in your daily existence that you hardly even have time to realize what's going on around you.

 

Perhaps the only moment you observe nature is when the weather meddles with your to-do list. Perhaps you can't recall the last time you were inclined to simply inhale and sit outdoors.

 

There is indeed a great deal of proof that spending time in nature has a considerable beneficial influence on both mental and physical health. Strolling in a green space has been demonstrated to help with mental health issues such as depression and ADHD. 

 

According to VeryWellMind, “On days when you’re struggling with negative thoughts about your body, many different coping mechanisms can help. But new research suggests you should get outside and spend time in nature to soothe those feelings. Negative body image is a risk factor for behaviors like disordered eating, which can have disastrous consequences for one’s body, mind, and relationships. Nowadays, it can be harder to avoid negative body thoughts when navigating social media."

 

Time spent in nature is a wonderful way to focus oneself in addition to treating particular mental health challenges and enhancing mental and physical wellbeing. 

 

For some of us, it is the start of a meditation practice or a heightened spiritual understanding of how we are all related. For others, it is simply a fantastic method to relieve tension. 

 

Here are a few excellent techniques to get started bonding with the natural world around you, no matter where you want your time outside to take you.

 

1. Slow down to the speed of nature

 

Walking slowly causes you to breathe more slowly, making you feel instantaneously more relaxed. Slow down and start seeing the environment around you. It may be a speck of lichen in a crack in the sidewalk or a tree you've never spotted before. Look around you carefully and deliberately to see what you discover as you sink into this more natural rhythm of being.

 

2. Experiment with barefoot breathing

 

We people are the only animals that put a shoe between our feet and the Spirit of the Earth. The act of taking off your shoes and standing barefoot on the ground satisfies a primitive urge for connectivity. 

 

Find a peaceful spot outside—a park nook, a quiet spot in your garden, or your favorite wild location. Shut your eyes and take 100 deep, soft breaths while feeling the sunlight on your face, the breeze on your body, and the warm heart of the ground via the soles of your feet.

 

3. Dine outside

 

Take your lunch or a book outside to enjoy on a park seat or picnic blanket. While you dine or read, take in the fresh air and natural sunlight (or both).

 

4. Give a tree a hug

 

Which words come to mind when you think about trees? Sturdy? High? Statuesque? Tenacious? Primitive? The world's oldest trees have been alive for thousands of years, and we rely on them to create the oxygen we need to live. 

 

Although the term "tree-hugger" is sometimes used ironically, hugging a tree is an easy method to boost your energy levels by mopping up all that energy and oxygen-rich deliciousness! Close your eyes and press your cheek on the trunk. Feel the bark on your flesh as you spread your arms to embrace the tree.

 

Also Visit a greenhouse or a flower shop. Soak in the aroma of green vegetation and a plethora of flowers. Step into a flower shop's refrigerated department, which is brimming with freshly cut bouquets. 

 

Give heed to the tiny weeds and wildflowers that sprout up in sidewalk cracks. Consider the persistence and perseverance of that small creature to take root and flourish in such a challenging environment whenever you observe this. Take a moment to send your best wishes and consider how you could connect to that type of strength.

The Power of Nature Walks

Here’s something that many of us simply don’t do enough of: walking in nature.

Going for a nature walk is one of THE most effective ways to feel calmer, to help improve your overall health, and even to stimulate creativity.

 

Walking of any kind is in fact extremely good for stimulating creativity and encouraging calmness. The reason for this, is that when we go for a long walk, we are engaging in a form of low-level activity. We need to think a little about where we’re going and how to coordinate our feet, but nothing too strenuous. This in turn prevents us from getting bored and frustrated, while freeing our minds up to explore other diverse topics.

 

And more specifically, it triggers what is known as the ‘default mode network’. That in turn, means that you’re going to find yourself daydreaming and thinking more creatively about the future.

 

This is why many people had their best ideas while going for long walks – countless famous authors, scientists, and others have expressed the same.

 

What’s even more potent though, is to take a walk-in nature. Why? Because the natural surrounds of a forest walk or seaside stroll can help to make us more relaxed, which in turn stimulates further creativity. 

 

The reason is evolutionary: in the wild, the sight of lush green trees meant that we were approaching shelter, supplies, and resources – nourishment. Today, even looking at the color green on its own has been shown to lower the heart rate and to help improve calmness.

 

There’s more to this as well. For example, walking outdoors is also a brilliant way to boost your health. Walking outside not only means getting some exercise and burning some calories/fat, but also increasing your production of vitamin D. Vitamin D acts like a ‘master hormone’ and can help to boost other hormones that improve mood and encourage a more ideal physique.

 

The fresh air likewise will help in all kinds of ways: it will increase your energy at the time, and going forward. It will also help you to sleep better the following night, significantly improving your stress levels the next day.

 

So, make time for walking – not just as a way to get from point a to point b. Walk for the sake of walking, and take some time to breathe deeply, drink in the sights, and listen to the birds. It’s good for the soul and even better for your brain.

 

Backyard Birds

You don't have to travel far to relish the delights and happiness of bird watching. Our own backyards may serve as the amusing place where new birders may begin learning the fundamentals. 

 

To build the most beneficial birding area in your backyard, you are able to make use of bird feeders. Make certain you research how far-off from one another the feeders ought to be. What to feed them is a different thing that you ought to know something about. 

 

Just like the feeders, the food that you choose ought to depend on what sort of birds you're hoping to pull in and where you reside. A few of the basic types of bird feed are sunflower seeds, cracked corn, and thistle. Frequently found in a mix, pour this sort of seed into a hopper type self-feeder to meet the needs of a lot of different species at one backyard bird watching place. 

 

Since you've built some feeders, which are a good way of pulling in the birds, you should see to it that you have a complete view for backyard bird watching. Take out low hanging branches that might block your view. Accomplish this when there are no birds around feeding on the self-feeders as a sudden alteration in surroundings might disrupt their behaviors.

 

Now that you're ready to start watching, you'll discover that you require some sort of magnifying device to watch the birds better. A common pair of field glasses to watch is commonly sufficient for novices, though you might find it more beneficial to mount a spotting scope near a picture window in your house. These visual devices will greatly step-up your ability to distinguish birds by their distinct marks and demeanors.

 

The spacing between trees and bushes is a crucial factor when taking into consideration our bird friends. It's crucial to think about providing open spaces that ought to be well protected from wind and street disturbance, since these disturbances don't appeal to birds.

 

Increasing the number of plants in your backyard guarantees more birds will be show up. You are able to even try to produce a layered garden to supply richness and diversity in your garden. You are able to add layers by planting bunches of shade loving small trees, shrubs and ground cover below taller trees. 

 

A great thing about birding or maintaining a birding atmosphere in your backyard is that your garden tends to be an organic garden. The birds help in curbing the garden pests and diseases without an arsenal of chemicals. 

 

A functional knowledge of organic gardening is crucial to someone intent on attracting birds. Utilizing plants native to your area cuts back the need for pesticide use as native plants are resistive to local pests and disease. 

 

There's nothing better than viewing colorful birds fly around a natural garden. This makes sure that birds will be coming back as well. Birding is an interest many individuals can enjoy and do without leaving your home or the city. 

Garden Friends

If we could garden without any disturbance from the Enemies which attack plants, then indeed horticulture might be an easy matter. But day in and day out we must look out for these little enemies... Small in size, but enormous in the mayhem they cause.

 

As human sickness might frequently be precluded by sanitary conditions, so pests might be kept away by rigorous garden cleanliness. Batches of waste are housing for the multiplying of insects. I don't think a compost heap is included but unkempt, uncared-for places appear to invite hassles. 

 

There are particular aids to holding back pests. The ceaseless agitating of the dirt by earthworms is a help in keeping the soil open to air and water. A lot of our common birds feed on insects. The sparrows, robin redbreast, chickadees, larks and American oriole are all illustrations of birds that help in that way. A few insects feed upon other and adverse insects. Some forms of ladybugs do this as well. The ichneumon-fly helps also. And frogs are marvels in the number of bugs they can eat at one meal. The toad merits very kind handling from all of us. 

 

Every gardener ought to attempt to make her or his garden into a place magnetic to birds and frogs. A great birdhouse, grain scattered about in early springtime, a place for water, are invitations for birds to remain a while in your garden. If you want frogs, ready things up for them as well. On a red-hot summer day, a frog likes to take a breather in the shade. By night time, he's ready to go forth to eat up some bugs, since toads favor live food. How may one "arrange things" for frogs? Well, one thing to do is to ready a retreat, placid, dark and wet. A couple of larger sized stones underneath the shade of a bush with possibly a layer of wet leaves would look really perfect to a frog.

Defending Plants

The devices and tools utilized for battling plant foes are of 2 sorts:

 

(1) Those utilized to yield mechanical protection to the plants; 

(2) Those utilized to utilize insecticides and antifungal agents.

 

Of the first the most valuable is the covered frame. It consists commonly of a wooden box, a few 18 inches to 24 inches square and about 8 high, covered with glass, protecting fabric, mosquito webbing or mosquito wire. The first 2 coverings have, naturally, the extra advantage of holding heat and protecting from low temperature, making it conceivable by their use to plant earlier than is otherwise safe. They're used extensively in attaining an extra early and safe beginning with cucumbers, melons and the additional vine vegetables. 

 

Simpler devices for protecting newly-set plants, like tomatoes or cabbage, from cut-worms, are stiff, tin, cardboard or roofing paper collars, which are made numerous inches high and big enough to be place around the stem and infiltrate an inch or so into the dirt. 

 

For utilizing poison powders, the home gardener ought to supply himself with a powder gun. If one must be limited to a single tool, it will be better to get one of the hand-power, compressed-air sprayers. These are utilized for using wet sprays, and should be furnished with one of the many forms of mist-making nozzles, the non-cloggable automatic type being the most beneficial. For more extended work a barrel pump, put on wheels, will be suitable. Extension rods for utilization in spraying trees and vines might be obtained for either. For processes on a very little scale a good hand-syringe might be utilized, but as a general thing it will be most beneficial to invest a couple of dollars more and get a small tank sprayer, as this casts a continuous stream or spray and holds a much greater amount of the spray solution. Whatever sort is procured, get a brass machine it will outlast 3 or 4 of those made of cheesier metal, which gives in very rapidly to the, corroding action of the strong poisons and chemicals utilized in them. 

As a concluding word to the intending buyer of garden tools, I'd say: 1st exhaustively investigate the different types available, and when purchasing, don't forget that a great tool or a well-made machine will be giving you satisfactory use long, long after the cost is blanked out, while a poor one is a ceaseless source of irritation.

Wild Flower Frenzy

A lot of individuals say they've no luck at all with such a garden. It isn't a question of luck, but a question of discernment, for wild flowers are like individuals and each has its personality. What plant life has been accustomed to in Nature it wants all of the time. In point of fact, when withdrawn from its own kind of living conditions, it sickens and fails. That's enough to tell us that we should copy Nature herself. Imagine you're tracking down wild flowers. As you Pick certain flowers, observe the soil they're in, the place, conditions, the environment, and the neighbors. 

 

Imagine you discover dog's-tooth violets and anemones growing near together. Then put them so in your own garden. You get the point, right? If you want wild flowers to grow in your garden, make them feel at home. Trick them into believing that they're still in their native environment.

 

Wild flowers should to be transplanted when blooming time is over. Carry a trowel and a basket into the forest with you. As you scoop up a couple of columbines, or a liverleaf, make sure along with the roots you get some of the plant's own soil, which must be used when replanted. 

 

The bed these plants are to go into had better be prepared cautiously before getting the plants. Don’t bring the plants back to hold off over a day or night before setting them in the ground. They should be planted at once. The flower bed needs soil from the forest, deep and rich and replete of leaf mold. The sub-drainage system should be first-class. Some individuals believe that all forest plants ought to have soil drenched with water. But the forest themselves are not soggy. It might be that you'll need to dig your garden up really deeply and position some stone in the bottom then top soil and on top put the rich dirt you took from the forest.

 

Prior to planting, water the dirt well. Then as you create holes for the plants put some of the forest soil in each. 

 

Flower types and when they're available:

 

It's quite nice plan to have a wild flower garden that provides a sequence of blooms from early springtime to late autumn; so let us kickoff with March, liverleaf, Claytonia lanceolata and saxifrage. Then arrives April turning out in its arms the beautiful aquilege, the tiny bluets and Geranium maculatum. For May there are the dog's-tooth violet and the Anemone nemorosa, Solomon's seal, Arisaema atrorubens, wake robin, bloodroot and violets. June will impart the campanula, flannel leaf, bee balm and foxglove. I'd pick the gay butterfly weed for July. Let turtle head, aster, purple boneset, and Daucus carota make the rest of the season brilliant till frost.