Becoming Grounded | Thoughts on Mental Health, Nature & the Outdoors
Last week was Mental Health Awareness week, and while I don’t think that just one week should be dedicated to thinking about looking after our minds, it does make for a great time to talk more about these topics and spread awareness of them. Mental health is a wide and vast topic to cover, and I’m certainly not an expert. I can only write from personal experience, and actually my own mental health wasn’t something I ever really thought about for most of my childhood and teenage years. Perhaps that makes me lucky, as I would say that my mental health was fairly consistent… Good days, bad days and those in between. I threw myself into sport and I imagine that helped massively. Not a lot of time went by when I wasn’t swimming, cycling, running or rowing, and so the benefits of exercise on mental health are all too evident to me. But something I do often wonder is if incessant exercise can be a way to cover up deeper, darker feelings inside and causes greater mood swings…? So I think that finding balance is essential.
When I was 17, my best friend died by suicide after suffering from anorexia, bulimia and depression for many years. Her death was shocking and the reasons behind it are something I can never understand, but over time I have realised that I do not need to understand the why but just know how important looking after our mental healths are. I was so young and the trauma around Rowena’s death is never something I have addressed fully. It is only in recent years that I have linked it to other behaviours throughout my life; difficulties in forming close friendships, but an unhindered yearning for a life built around happiness. I ran away to London for university and then New Zealand and America. I spent years feeling a little lost wondering what I should do and how I can live in a way that offers me peace, happiness and purpose. I am still very much on that journey.
But the outdoors has always been there, through it all. Whether it was rowing with my best friends on the River Thames, riding my bike down Highway 1 in America or to Mount Cook in New Zealand, or hiking in the Lake District with my gorgeous Oslo. Outside was always where I felt most myself, most calm and present. I have followed that calling to where I am today.
I hate to build a story of my life around tragedy, but in a way these events have been most significant in my life and have had the greatest impact on my mental health. And so I take you to March 1st, the day that my brother and father were killed in a car accident. I have written about this before here and I am not going to write about the emotions surrounding that time again. Instead, I’ll tell you about the now — one and a half years later.
There is a cliche that such significant death will have a life-changing impact on you, and of course on a superficial level it does — a person that was once here now is not — physically at least — and that of course changes your life hugely. But on a deeper level, those changes don’t just happen overnight. In fact, it even surprised me that after their deaths, I was still able to just carry on with a strength I found in my family and in the world around me. One and a half years later and I now feel that a shift or transformation so to speak is taking place. For me that comes as a yearning and passion to discover a deeper connection to nature and the outdoors — for my own mental wellbeing and that of others — because I know how important it has been in my own life.
For me, finding peace, calm and wellness comes in nature… whether that be hiking up a mountain, writing in my garden, or taking time to focus on the smaller details. It comes in finding balance of mind, body and soul. Recently I have been exploring some new practises that I have found to be massively beneficial for my mental health, so I wanted to share those with you here; little ways that I care for myself each day, finding clarity and calm away from the noise of everyday life…
Journaling — For the Mind
A new practise for me is journaling. This simply means writing in a journal everyday. I write whatever springs to mind; how I’m feeling, what I’m worried about, what I’m grateful for. It might sound simple, but what I think is significant about journaling is taking that time out to really focus on yourself, your thoughts and your mind. Journaling is part of my morning routine that I do with my morning coffee; normally outside in the garden sat on my bench listening to the morning bird song. I have come to love that time I give myself — before the day really begins. It isn’t forced or a chore, but a moment of joy in the morning. Something you may find useful when starting out with journaling is writing in bullet points and answering the following questions:
How am I feeling right now, in this moment?
What I am grateful for? What is making me happy in the present?
What am I worried about?
Perhaps write a short to-do list to empty your mind of the things that you need to do that day.
Movement — For the Body
Dedicate time to moving your body — whether that be walking, cycling, running, yoga, stretching, swimming, surfing... My daily activities are walking, climbing and yoga.
When I walk, I feel powerful; I let my heart rate get up, and I feel grateful for my health and the landscapes around me. I walk Oslo every morning and, though sometimes it is hard to get out of bed, I find I always feel much calmer afterwards.
Climbing is a way to really connect with the earth in the physical act of touching rock; using the weaknesses of nature, like cracks and ledges, to take you higher up a cliff face. There is also the wonderful feeling of finding flow when moving on rock; connecting with your mind and body.
Yoga is a new form of movement for me that I have quickly developed a passion for. Like climbing, yoga is also about controlling the mind but in a different way. You control your mind to find balance and strength from within. I feel very excited to continue developing my yoga practise and would love to go on a yoga retreat one day, somewhere surrounded by nature.
Of course, there are so many other activities I love like cycling, surfing, and swimming — and every one of them has something that I find incredibly beneficial for my mental health. It doesn’t matter what you do, but I would just really encourage you to dedicate some time to moving each day.
Grounding — For the Soul
I came across the practise of grounding when I was doing some research on nature connection. I attended an online webinar with the Natural Academy which involved grounding throughout the session, and it has become something I do each day. It is a very new practise for me and I am still learning, so the video below takes you through a 10 minute grounding session. For me, it is about being outside or if inside looking at nature out a window, placing two feet on the ground, and focusing on what I can see, what I feel against my skin, what I smell and what I hear. I see it as a way of physically and mentally grounding myself by connecting with nature; focusing on my surroundings and then focusing with my mind.
I’ve never allowed myself time to get into meditation, but this is a form of meditation that I really love. I think grounding can also be going for a walk and really focusing on the nature around you. This is something I am finding myself doing more and more, especially on my morning walks with Oslo. I usually do grounding in the morning, on my bench, before or after journaling. I focus on the feeling of the sun on my skin, the breeze through leaves, and the birdsong around me and it becomes a moment of silent meditation before the day begins.
I hope that sharing my own mental health journey and some practises I do each day might help you. Even if you commit to just starting one this week, I think that slowly over time you will start seeing the benefits. Something else I just want to mention is that I don’t think you should be afraid of sadness, grief and pain. When those feelings come, embrace them and let your body do what it needs to do. I know for me, when I lost my dad and brother I just wanted and needed to grieve, to cry, to feel sadness. I didn’t want to hide from it. The important thing is learning to control your pain; to let it come and go when it needs to, but know that you’re going to be ok and good things will come again. This really is so so important.
Thank you for taking the time to read this blog and I wish you all so much love and happiness.
Speak soon,
Athena x