How to boost mental health by connecting with natural world
Anxiety is the theme of this year’s Mental Health Awareness Week (May 15-21) - and the South Downs National Park can help to manage that by connecting with nature.
Anxiety is the theme of this year’s Mental Health Awareness Week (May 15-21) - and the South Downs National Park can help to manage that by connecting with nature.
Kate Drake, Health and Wellbeing Officer at the park, believes there are five pathways that can help boost your mental health.
Kate’s five pathways to nature connectedness are:
Senses: Go into your garden or local park and listen to the sound of birds; Listen to the sound of the sea or the trickling of a stream.
Take a stroll through a green space and notice what you can see, hear, smell and touch (taste may be a bit more difficult)
Focus only on the present moment, not the past or future (phone on silent and in your pocket can help).
Emotion: Go for a walk, run or cycle on one of the 3,300km public footpaths in the SDNP and breathe deeply. Exercise is known to release feel-good hormones such as serotonin.
Forest bathe – spend an hour or so in peaceful woodland and notice how your sense of urgency diminishes and calmness develops.
Beauty: Head to a stunning location and soak up the picturesque views, such as St Catherine’s Hill, Butser
Hill, Devil’s Dyke, Kingley Vale or Ditchling Beacon. Meaning: Incorporate a walk in nature at least once a week.
Keep a nature diary and jot down things you see and how you feel; Take photographs of wildlife. Compassion: Micro-volunteering, such as a litter pick or taking part in a wildlife survey.
Help wildlife by planting wildflowers, keeping a ‘wilder’ area of your garden, or creating a mini-pond in your garden. Recycling, buying local where possible and using less water. *Mental illness accounts for 23 per cent of all ill-health in England.
With over 50 per cent of the population living within one hour’s travel of a National Park, the parks can help improve health and wellbeing objectives.
The South Downs National Park has a population of 117,000 and 2.2m people live within 10km of its boundary.