Episode 3: Mindfulness in Nature
Welcome to episode three of Nature Therapy Online! Click on the black player above to listen.
In this episode, I talk about the simple but powerful practise of mindfulness in nature. How does it feel not to label everything we see, and to experience it as clearly as we can? I can tell you: awesome (as in awe-some, full of awe, the original meaning of the word). It is potentially life-changing. I know this personally from spending so much of my life walking about lost in endless thoughts. The day I practised mindfulness in nature for the first time is the day when my life started to slowly change for the better.
Today on the show, I share some simple ecotherapy exercises for bonding with nature.
Have you ever pondered how the very act of applying human language to things can sometimes get in the way of really seeing the beauty around us? For example, once we learn the name of a tree that we have just discovered, there can be a tendency to not look so closely next time we see it. We can ignore it’s mystery and uniqueness by applying a label and moving on. ‘I’ve seen one of those before’.
Eco-therapy asks us to look closer at nature, and yet to take a step back at times too.
Here is a simple little ecotherapy exercise to try, from my free e-book, Nature Therapy for Everyone:
Not Naming Things. Take a walk and try your best not to name things, e.g. ‘a tree’, ‘a bird’ etc. Approach each thing as a living being in a unique form. Look closely at things you might usually ignore. Practise ‘unlearning’ for a little while. Take regular deep breaths, focusing on your breath, what you experience, letting thoughts come and go.
This can be really hard to do, but if you struggle, it can be fun to treat it like a game. Pretend that you just landed in this earth from another place and have never experienced trees, birds, or even a blue sky before. How does it feel to look at things with these fresh eyes? Mindfulness is not only about watching our reactions to things, but also at looking at what is going on around us with the freshest eyes possible.
I hope you enjoy this week’s radio show, which goes into more detail on this topic than the blog post. Please comment, subscribe, get in touch, everything! I’d really love to connect with you and hear more from you. Green hugs, Stephen x
