Where to begin with forest bathing
“Feeling stressed?” asked Suzanne Harrington in the Irish Independent. Then “find a forest and spend a few hours absorbing its quiet magic”.
That’s the essence of forest bathing or shinrin-yoku, a concept introduced in 1982 by director of the Japanese Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries, Tomohide Akiyama. He believed spending time outdoors and purposefully reconnecting with nature could be the “antidote” to burnout from the fast-paced, tech-filled modern world.
The psychological benefits of forest bathing are well documented, said New Scientist. But as well as “reducing anxiety and stress”, a new study by researchers at Tokyo University of Agriculture found that a two-night trip to a forest with gentle hiking and a group mindfulness meditation session also boosted physical health by “lowering blood pressure and inflammation”.
Japan’s Yoshino forests have a “restorative, spiritual quality”, said Oliver Smith in National Geographic. Standing beneath the “towering cedar trees”, watching the sunlight stream through the branches and “listening to birdsong drift on the breeze”, it’s hard to feel anything but calm.
Exhausted workers from nearby Osaka “flock to this mountain idyll” to practise shinrin-yoku and unwind at the ryokans (traditional Japanese inns with tatami-matted floors). Days are easy to while away “gazing at the hypnotic textures in the wood”; while “idle” evenings can be spent soaking in an open-air hot spring bath.
But you don’t have to go far to try forest bathing. In fact, it’s as simple as finding a nearby forest and walk “slowly and mindfully”, said Harrington. Leave your mobile phone behind if you can and “allow plenty of time for silence”, engaging each of your senses by breathing deeply, listening to any sounds, touching branches and smelling the aromas of the forest.
I headed to Wiltshire to try out Bishopstrow Hotel and Spa’s forest bathing experience, said Shadé Owomoyela in Cosmopolitan, and “it might just have changed my life”. Holistic health practitioner Sue Judge ran the two-hour session, which included a leisurely stroll through the woods, poetry readings and a short meditation session. “When burnout inevitably creeps in again, I’ll know exactly how to ground myself.”