INTRODUCTION:
FROM EDEN TO ECOTHERAPY

I’m optimistic by nature, and seldom morbid, but when I’m feeling low, one of my favorite places to wander is Green-Wood Cemetery in Brooklyn, New York. It is glorious and green and quiet—very quiet. When roaming its 478 acres (193 hectares) in the middle of the most populated city in the United States, I’ve seen warblers and water lilies, gathered acorns and my thoughts. The verdure, the serenity, and the frogsong all bring me back to life.

I am by no means the first person to have this regenerative experience. Regardless of who we are or where we live, what we all know intuitively—and have done since paradise was envisioned as a garden—is that going outside is good for us. I call this the green cure: connecting to the natural world so that we can thrive physically, cognitively, emotionally, and even spiritually. In 1973, the social psychologist and philosopher Erich Fromm coined the term “biophilia,” “the love for humanity and nature, and independence and freedom.”¹ Just over a decade later, the biologist E.O. Wilson expanded on the idea with his own biophilia hypothesis, explaining that humans are designed with “the urge to affiliate with other forms of life,” including trees, streams, and flowers.² In his own way, each pointed to a path to wellness and wellbeing that costs nothing and needs no equipment: the green cure.

A foundation of current science and neuroscience underlies the health-giving benefits of being outdoors. Day after day, as I was working on this book, I’d come across new and interesting reports and discoveries. Just as Western doctors and psychologists are now prescribing traditional Eastern practices such as meditation and yoga, they are also recommending that people spend time outside to remedy all sorts of ailments. According to the distinguished physician G. Richard Olds, few healing procedures work as both prevention and therapy, but being in nature is a notable exception.³

This current scientific understanding is proving what humans have known for millennia. Almost every mythology describes an archetypal natural realm without sickness or death, be it the biblical Garden of Eden, the Sumerian utopia of Dilmun, or the heavenly Hindu Nandankanan. Temples of Asclepius, the ancient Greek god of healing—perhaps the first sanatoriums—were built in the countryside far from centers of population. The twelfth-century mystic and saint Hildegard of Bingen, who is considered the originator of the study of natural history in Germany, often wrote of viriditas—usually translated as “greenness”—describing the divine healing power of green, of nature. The transcendentalists of nineteenth-century America reached the same conclusion, among them Ralph Waldo Emerson, who famously proclaimed in his essay Nature (1836): “I feel that nothing can befall me in life … which nature cannot repair.”

Yet, the idea of the green cure is not the exclusive domain of philosophers, mystics, and poets. There have been many manifestations of the concept—from Chinese medicine to native American healing practices—but in some ways, the green cure was most clearly articulated by Dr. Roger Ulrich, an environmental psychologist. His article “View Through a Window May Influence Recovery from Surgery,” published in Science in 1984, indeed opened the window for modern scientists to understand how nature can heal us. He sparked much of the thinking that led to this book, and explored the science that underlies it.

Understanding and applying the idea of the green cure is a matter of taking what the medical sociologist Aaron Antonovsky termed a salutogenic approach—involving the origins (Greek: genesis) of health (salus)—the preventative converse of the pathogenic model of seeking out the disease. Instead of focusing on the causes of disease and lack of wellness, we cultivate actions and environments that support health and wellness, which help us to thrive. Antonovsky wrote: “Life for even the fortunate among us is full of conflict and stressors, but there are many breathing spells.”4

Thinking about those curative breathing spells brings me to meditation and neuroscience. Although I love to read about neuroscience, my understanding of it is amateur at best, and boils down to this often-quoted line from the American psychologist and writer Dr. Rick Hanson: “The brain takes its shape from what the mind rests upon.”⁵ That’s why I’ve included several meditations in this book, and why I see them as a key part of the green cure. With such twentieth-century breakthroughs in technology as functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), meditation and contemplation left the temple, the pew, and the ashram and entered the laboratory for observation. Researchers are now able to take pictures of the brain to discover how our neural circuits work. There is mounting scientific evidence that contemplative practices can heal us psychologically (from diminishing stress to boosting creativity), physiologically (from increasing immunity to improving heart function), and even on a cellular level.⁶ As we’ll see in the following pages, meditation, particularly mindfulness meditation in natural environments, can be especially restorative.

Burgeoning new fields such as ecopsychology (the study of the connection between human beings and the natural world) and ecotherapy (nature-based health treatment programs) are gaining acceptance among physicians and psychologists. Some of these practitioners call themselves “bioneers,” looking to nature to remedy the ills of our bodies, our communities, and the planet. Like me, they believe nature can help to heal our bodies, our minds, and even our spirits. Often, it’s just common sense, something as simple as taking a moment to pause, notice, and breathe. Vacation days aren’t a requirement; we can connect with nature even when we’re very far from the countryside or seashore and can’t leave our home or workplace to be outside. There are myriad ways, both large and small, to seek out nature in our day-to-day lives. It may be a view from a window or a potted plant on a desk, but the green cure is almost always available and free for the taking.