What is 'Forest Bathing' and why should I do it?
🌲Shinrin-yoku🌲
It’s funny how we forget how good certain things make us feel and how healing they can be for our souls.
I woke up with some major anxiety on Thursday and did my normal quick go-to-cure-alls: made coffee (even treated myself with nutpod creamer!), queued up my morning coffee playlist, lit my favorite candle, journaled, and I even smudged my apartment). All of those tricks put the anxieties at bay for five minutes, then there they were again. I went back to my journal and started pouring out all of the ways that I used to cope with this anxiety that used to be part of my daily life when I was in the wrong environment (job, relationship, city). One stuck out for me: Secret Sundays.
Secret Sundays were something I implemented when I was working through some of the hardest times in my life AND starting to build the “I’m ok being by myself” muscle. I would rent a car for the day, put my phone on airplane mode, drive somewhere new and just take in nature. I’ve come to learn (this weekend) there is a term for this in Japanese: Shinrin-yoku or “forest bathing”. It’s the act of taking in nature through your senses. It is used as a method of therapy and that feels so accurate.
After realizing I was in desperate need for some shinrin-yoku — I rented a car; grabbed my surfboard, wetsuit, hiking clothes, downloaded a few moody playlists, and headed up to Malibu. I drove up random roads, found trails I could hike into, and just got outside. I took in the newness of the area, the vast mountains and my favorite healing place on earth — the ocean. I headed up the coast and pulled over at a new surf spot and ran straight into the ocean. I didn’t catch a single wave that day, but I sat out in the elements and just let my anxieties fall out of me, one by one.
My shinrin-yoku day / Secret Sun[Thurs]day didn’t solve all of my problems, but it did bring me to a place where I could slow down my thoughts and really parse out which areas need some attention in my life.
Do you have a practice of shinrin-yoku in your life? If not, I highly advise trying it out and seeing what happens for you. I want to hear about it!!
