Nature-Enhanced Capacities 1: Relaxation
Apr 15, 2024
I’m kicking off a series of articles of ‘nature-enhanced capacities,’ commencing here with relaxation. I’m passionate about teaching Partnering with Nature and the best place to start is to consider that we are literally made by, for and with Nature. For our neurobiology, nature is home and this makes it the ideal training ground to cultivate a variety of useful capacities.
Relaxation isn’t just for the sake of feeling good for a little while. Being able to activate the relaxation response is important for our physical and mental health, as well as being required for recovering from the negative impacts of stress and to be able to replenish ourselves after extended periods of focussed attention and mental effort. Relaxation is important for creative and clear thinking.
We focus so much on stress, that we forget that the opposite of stress is not stress management, it is relaxation. And there is some skill and depth of understanding that can be brought to it. Instead of battling with stress (and anyway, stress isn’t inherently bad), we could instead embrace relaxation.
How Does Nature Enhance This Capacity?
The evidence for nature being supportive of relaxation and dealing with the impacts of stress is well-established. Being in nature, nature sounds and nature images have all been shown to reduce stress levels, measured in a variety of ways, across hundreds of studies. For example, just 20 mins of nature experience significantly reduces cortisol levels, either sitting or walking in a place that feels to you like contact with nature. Research done in hospitals, offices, and schools has found that even a simple plant in a room can have a significant impact on stress and anxiety.
Some studies have compared the effects of doing the same activity, i.e. walking, sitting or viewing, in natural vs urban environments and measured the relative effects on stress and restoration. These studies show that there is something different about natural contexts which make them more effective at reducing stress/inducing relaxation.
In part, relaxation in nature is made easy because of the way we use our senses in a natural environment. Panoramic vision, versus a narrow, focussed vision, induces a relaxed state of being. Think of times you are in nature. It is only occasionally that you spend a significant period of time only looking at a single thing in front your face. More often then not you are looking at a scene, therefore more likely to use panoramic vision and more likely to experience feeling relaxed.
Previously I have also written about some fascinating research which looks specifically at the effects of viewing naturalistic vs non-naturalistic fractals. The research found that naturalistic fractals induces relaxed awareness. This indicates that there is something about the patterns of nature that we respond to at a very fundamental level.
Studies have also shown that rumination decreases in nature. Rumination (otherwise known as overthinking) causes stress and so this effect on mental activity is likely to play a role in aiding relaxation.
There is also a key theory in the literature, called Attention Restoration Theory (ART). ART says that nature demands much less ‘top-down’ directed attention than less natural contexts. Directed attention, which includes things like filtering out distractions and staying focussed on tasks that aren’t necessarily fun and engaging, draws from a limited pool of cognitive resources. Use that type of attention too much and we end up in ‘directed attention fatigue’ and can become distractible, forgetful and irritable, with impaired judgement and increased likelihood of accidents.
Not only that, says ART, but nature engages us in ‘soft fascination’, a kind of bottom-up involuntary attention which is not only effortless but also leaves space for light internal reflection. The combination of soft fascination and lack of directed attention demands is thought to result in a sweet spot for mental restoration.
(NB if you’re looking for references, keep an eye for a comprehensive article/white paper I will be publishing in the near future).
What I Have Observed
Most of the research has been done on short, single exposure scenarios, using mostly the visual sense. This in a large part is due to the need to control variables for scientific method. My experience of spending repeated and extended periods of time in nature, in an intentional way, has completed more of the picture for me.
In my early days of conscious practice with nature, relaxation was one area that I noticed the most obvious changes, I could more quickly and easily drop into a relaxed state. It was like I actually didn’t know what relaxation was before that. My nervous system learnt how to be relaxed and this benefitted me at all times, not just when out in nature.
As I’ve become aware of these changes and contemplated their importance, I’ve noticed that we tend to underestimate both the importance of relaxation and the effects of nature.
I’ve also paid attention to what it seems to be that is enabling the relaxation. A large part of it, I believe, is due to the senses. The research noted above mentions the proven relaxing effects of panoramic vision, but that’s probably just scratching the surface in terms of the role of the senses. To me it seems the role of the senses in relaxation is a function of both the opening and refinement of the senses, as well as how we use them (i.e. in panoramic).
As ART notes, there are far fewer jolts of sudden stimuli in nature. Which means we can use our perception and attention in a wider and softer way. There is also less intensity of stimuli overall, which is less agitating to the nervous system.
Beyond that, if we take the attitude of #partneringwithnature’, and pay attention to our real-time relationship with nature, a few other effects kick in.
One of the lesser reported aspects of nature helping us with relaxation, is that you get feedback if you’re too stressed… i.e. you scare all the animals away! This might seem like a long bow to draw in the context of making the case for nature enabling relaxation, but it becomes apparent quite quickly when you try it. On a recent States & Stages program, one participant noted this a key outcome for him; practicing with nature helped him realise how he would barge into places like a bulldozer. He realised that he needed to soften (i.e. relax) how he was at the point of contact with other human and non-human beings in order to have the kind of initial impact that he wanted.
Going Deeper
Once we realise that we are not the only one around, and become aware of the ‘beingness’ of the other beings of nature, we sense that we are a bit out of place if we are tense. I’m not into human exceptionalism at all, unless it is to say we are exceptional at holding onto things. Animals other than humans are masterful at shaking off stress. Just look at a bird shaking itself off after a fright. Once the threat is gone, it shakes, then gets backs to whatever it was doing, happy as can be.
I have also found that deep communion with nature has a life-changing effect on tension at the deepest level possible: existential angst. The visceral sense of being part of this great web of life, that will continuing ‘life-ing’ whether we try to control it or not, shifts a tension deep inside of us. This might sound like a long-term proposition, with years and years of dedicated practice, but I am happy to report that it can happen remarkably quickly given the right conditions. The right conditions I have found have been on multi-day solo Nature Quests/Vision Quests/wilderness fasts (although I’m sure people find it in other ways too). This has taught me that relaxation can be profound, as well as practical, and is remarkably simple.
What This Means
Ultimately, my point in all this is that we have a lot of opportunity to weave conscious relaxation into our lives with the help of nature, with great potential for benefit on a variety of levels. I suspect that we forget to utilise the relaxing and restorative effects of nature because it is so simple, it just requires some awareness.
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