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8 Sensory and Extra-Sensory Experiences of Nature
What is it that you feel when you are in nature?
A Longing to Be in Real Nature
Nature as therapy has long held a place in medicine. Hippocrates extolled the necessity of “airs, waters, and places.” Theodore Roosevelt was sent to a ranch to work roping horses and to experience the cure of rural scenery. As therapy, the natural environment is best experienced real.
Researchers have compared the benefits of relaxation either in a natural environment or in a simulated environment. Participants benefitted from the relaxation in either intervention. However, when in the simulated natural environment, participants reported a “sense of being cut off from nature’s sensory input” and “a longing to be in real nature.”
Sensory Experiences
So what is it about nature, that provides healing? Science is starting to unpack what we already know. We feel good after a day spent idling through a park or hiking a mountain trail. Our bodies grow and heal not only via our traditional senses but also through extra-sensory experiences.
Negative Ions
Negative ions are no longer the domain of aging hippies. Electrically negative air particles are dense in forests…
