Brandon Butler: Time in nature improves mental health

Nature is healing. It doesn’t matter if you climb the tallest mountain, go for a stroll on a trail in a local park, cast a lure to fish in a farm pond or simply sit on a bench and listen to birds chirp. The power of nature will bring your blood pressure down, calm your thoughts, and help you see the important aspects of your life more clearly.

Many of us know this because we’ve experienced it all of our lives. It seems so rudimentary to even say, yet there are countless urban and suburban dwellers who rarely, if ever, venture into natural environments. If they would do so, they’d likely find peace and serenity hard to locate in a concrete jungle filled with noise and light pollution.

According to a recent study led by a team at the University of Exeter, just hearing the sounds of nature calms us. In the study, data was collected from 7,500 people who listened to sounds from a range of natural environments — including coastal and woodland settings in the United Kingdom and a tropical rainforest in Papua New Guinea.

According to the outcomes, participants reported therapeutic effects from listening to landscape elements such as breaking waves or falling rain. Hearing wildlife in these environments, and bird song in particular, enhanced their potential to provide recovery from stress and mental fatigue even further.

Alex Smalley, who led the research at the University of Exeter, said in a press release, “As towns and cities fell quiet in recent lockdowns, many people rediscovered the natural sounds around them. Our findings suggest that protecting these experiences could be beneficial for both mental health and conservation behavior. But they also provide a stark warning that, when it comes to nature, memories matter. If we hope to harness nature’s health benefits in the future, we need to ensure everyone has opportunities to foster positive experiences with the natural world today.”

The press release states, crucially, that the team’s results also suggested these outcomes could be strongly influenced by people’s past experiences. Those who had memories triggered by the sounds not only found them more restorative, but this increase in “therapeutic potential” fed directly into their desire to protect the soundscapes for future generations. Worryingly, soundscapes without the sounds of wildlife — reflecting a decline in environmental quality — reduced this potential for psychological benefits, with people’s motivation to protect those ecosystems also appearing to follow suit.

Becky Ripley, producer of BBC podcast series Forest 404, said, “The planet is undergoing unprecedented ecological collapse, and with it, the sound of the world is changing around us. Yet how we might experience these changes has never previously been explored. Our findings demonstrate that people not only highly value the sounds of birds and animals, but they also feel a loss when these sounds are missing.”

I lost a lifelong friend to suicide last week. He left behind three young children (6, 4 and 2), and his wife who has no idea of how she’s going to make it on her own. This friend never really knew nature. He moved to Chicago immediately upon graduating from college and began his failed pursuit of becoming a dominant player in the financial world. His aspirations outpaced his achievements, and all I can come up with to rationalize his last decision is that eventually the stress of chasing the unattainable wore him out.

I have never shied away from discussing mental illness. Nathan “Shags” McLeod and I even produced an entire episode of our Driftwood Outdoors Podcast called “Getting Your Mind Right” that featured my friend who is a licensed therapist. We did this on an outdoors-themed podcast because we know how many people struggle with depression and other mental illness issues. We want to make it very clear that there is no shame in seeking help for your mental health, just as you would for your physical health.

While I don’t dare proclaim all one needs to do is go outside to get their mind right, I will stand behind saying that I believe time in nature, hearing natural sounds and seeing natural sights, is good for your mental health. If my friend would have spent more time taking his kids for walks in the nature preserves near his house instead of watching the stock tickers online, would he still be here? I don’t know. But I have to think there’s a chance he would be. If he could have just found the glory in life’s simple pleasures.

Fishing, hunting and all outdoor activities are my therapy. When I’m outdoors breathing fresh air and letting my skin soak in some sunshine, my problems take a back seat. I can clear my head and think more deliberately. I believe appreciating and interacting with nature puts in perspective what truly matters in life, which is your people, food and shelter. The rest is clutter. Carrots dangling from sticks.

If you are struggling with your mental health, please seek help. You may not realize it in the moment, but you are loved. You are loved by those closest to you, and in general by your fellow man. Seek help. It’s out there waiting for you. And get out of the house. Turn off the electronics. Find a trail and go for a walk. Listen to the birds. Look at the beautiful wild flowers. Take deep breaths of fresh air. Such experiences will help you.

See you down the trail …