Forest bathing, or Shinrin-yoku in Japanese, is a wellness practice that involves immersing yourself in a woodland environment to promote physical and mental health. It originated in Japan in the 1980s as a response to the increasing stress and health issues associated with urban living and has since found popularity worldwide.
Forest bathing doesn’t involve strenuous exercise, and it certainly doesn’t involve water; instead it is the practice of mindfully spending time in nature and engaging all of your senses.
It’s something that I do on a regular basis, all year round – in the small copse of trees at the end of my garden, where in spring blue and long tailed tits chatter as they flit from tree to tree, while the waves of cow parsley that make up the understorey at that time of year ebb and flow in the breeze, and in winter where the overhead branches and twigs clatter melodiously as the wind rattles them against each other; in the woodland adjacent to the village where I live, where Redwing and Fieldfare can be heard in late winter and early spring and there the lime green of early leaves are a welcome sign after a dark and wet winter; in a wood a few miles from me where bluebells carpet the floor in early May, and Firecrest, Nuthatches and Chiffchaffs vie for the airwaves; and in the ancient woodland of West Wales, where moss and lichen clothes granite rocks and drips from the branches, and the peaty smell of generations of fallen leave underfoot is rich and evocative.
If forest bathing isn’t something that you have ever tried, why not come with me now? Breathe deeply: can you smell the scent of the bluebells, the fresh green of the leaves? Listen: can you hear the chaffinches, and the distant drumming of a woodpecker? Touch: the bark of the trees, rough and ridged beneath your fingers, the fronds of newly emerging ferns. And stand still and just be.
