Forest Bathing

A life-changing trauma I experienced six months before COVID struck was compounded by quarantining. Ragged remnants remain for all of us, but as 2020 recedes, we cling to hope and embrace new, healthy habits that will hopefully extricate us from our despair. Typically, as a new year begins, doctors, pastors, and loved ones offer strategies for ridding us of old, destructive habits. Newspaper columns and magazine articles abound with advice.

A common thread this year seems to be “Practice Being in the Present.” Don’t stew over past slights and hurts, or worry about possible future obstacles. Live in the here and now. Psychologists at Stanford University at Palo Alto suggest taking a break, just a few minutes each day, to stop what you’re doing and notice five things you see, four things you feel, three things you hear, two you smell and one you taste.

I don’t think the psychologists suggesting the invocation of senses meant to make more work for us, or require we go somewhere special, like a closet or garden. I doubt they intended we make it complicated. Experiencing the now can be practiced anywhere, even at the kitchen table, where bacon might be the overwhelming provocateur, or the couch, which may be covered in pet hair.

Another technique touted for being in the present suggests taking time to observe and control breathing with five minutes of yogic deep breathing. I’ve never been much into yoga. I didn’t even know yoga could be made into an adjective. Apparently, I can be yogic without going to a class, but I do need to take a little time out from the hustle and bustle for this exercise.

According to the University of  Michigan’s Health Library,  deep breathing is a great way to lower stress in the body because it sends a message to your brain to calm down and relax. Stress increases heart rate, breathing and blood pressure. Their recommended technique suggests you put one hand firmly on your belly, just below the ribs and the other on your chest. Take a deep breath through your nose and let your belly push your hand out. The chest shouldn’t move. Breathe out slowly. Feel the hand on your belly go in, and use it to push all the air out. Do these 3 to 10 times. How do you feel? I’ve never been a fan of anything that makes my belly expand, but the exercise is strangely relaxing.

An old technique for renewal of body and mind has picked up traction this year. A few miles north of Elkin, N. C, Forest Bathing was introduced. The Klondike Lake Trail is a one-mile out and back trail, the first designated forest bathing trail in the United States. It was built in early 2020 by an all-volunteer non-profit organization that has built several more trails in the area to enhance partakers’ quality of life.

Forest Bathing is nothing new. It originated in Japan as a type of nature therapy known as Shinin-Yoku—immersion—and is purported to improve mental, physical and emotional well-being and reduce anxiety. It better opens the senses and helps one to experience calm. Guess that means leaving the puppy home and the iPod in the car.

If you, like me, have trouble concentrating, and staying in focus, don’t feel you have to go anywhere special, say a forest. The forest has its own sights and aromas. But the incense of a sanctuary can be anything from perfumes and spices to foods to newly mown grass, depending on how determined we are to be in the moment and experience the world we’re in right here, right now.