Wellbeing & Meditation
WE ALL KNOW that ‘getting some fresh air’ is good for us.
It is only in the last 100 years that spending so much time ‘indoors’ has become the norm for most of us.
So much time at desks, doing email and office work, in class rooms, watching television; spending recreational time in gyms, pubs and theatres etc. For many, the time we spend outside is limited to moving from the car to whatever building we are entering.
What we all know intuitively is now being proven by science. For millennia we have spent a good portion of our day outside and in modern life, this has been turned on its head.
With stress being the epidemic of the 21st century and the adverse effects of it visible everywhere, we all need to incorporate ways to help us restore balance and to maintain wellbeing and be healthy day-to-day. Nature has a big part to play in this for all of us.
The Japanese ‘forest bathing’ is becoming more popular globally. Shinrin-yoku or ‘forest bathing’ was developed in Japan during the 1980s. It has very quickly become a cornerstone of preventive health and healing in Japan. Researchers have created a strong body of scientific studies on the powerful health benefits of spending time in a living forest.
The idea is simple: if a person visits a natural area and walks in a relaxed way they become calmer and achieve rejuvenating and restorative benefits to their health. It is amazing to understand how nature works. Many trees give off organic compounds that support our ‘NK’ (natural killer) cells that are part of our immune system’s way of fighting cancer.
The proven benefits of forest bathing include: reduced stress and blood pressure, improved mood, an increase in the body’s Natural Killer (NK) cells, increased energy, improved sleep, and a greater ability to concentrate. Regular forest