A thing is right when it tends to preserve the integrity, stability and beauty of the biotic community. It is wrong when it tends otherwise. Aldo Leopold
Given a chance, a child will bring the confusion of the world to the woods, wash it in the creek, and turn it over to see what lives on the unseen side of that confusion… Richard Louv
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Nature is not just window-dressing, not just a backdrop for our busy lives, it’s where we live and what we are. It’s what flows in our arteries and endocrine systems, it’s the wholegrain cereal that gives us energy to start the day. Nature directly meets our needs for air, food, fresh water, shelter, beauty, recreation, serenity, nutrient and waste recycling, disease prevention, flood control, climate regulation. Yet we abuse it.
In our chaotic world, the environment is often seen as a collection of problems rather than a living inventory of solutions. Really, only nature can heal us. In research studies, when people view slides of nature, their blood pressure falls and their brains release serotonin, a “happy hormone.” When those with ADHD spend time in nature, the results are as effective as the widely used drug, Ritalin. A classic ten-year study reported in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine documented that hospital patients with a view of trees went home sooner than those who viewed a brick wall. In a similar study, Michigan prisoners whose cells overlooked farmland had 24 percent fewer illnesses than those whose cells looked into the prison courtyard.
Eco-psychologist and author Robert Greenway describes a questionnaire from adult and child wilderness trips reporting that that 90 percent of the participants felt an increased sense of aliveness, well-being and energy; 76 percent of all respondents reported dramatic changes in quantity, vividness, and context of dreams; and 77 percent described a major life change upon return (in personal relationships, employment, housing, or life-style). Nature’s hard-wired into our genes, and into the human nervous system. Humans are blessed with what E.O. Wilson terms “biophilia,” the urge to affiliate with other forms of life.
Last Child in the Woods
When our parents used to tell us, “Go outside and play” it wasn’t just because they were sick of us, but (also) because the components of nature and the way they fit together are the most instructive and enjoyable curriculum on the planet, no tuition necessary. These days, though, parents aren’t as likely to urge their kids to go outside. Unfortunately, both kids and adults often perceive “outside” as a place that lacks stimulation and is also dangerous.
The engineered planning of towns and cities often reduces nature to concrete water channels, manicured petunia beds, and rectangular soccer fields, removing the rough, wildish edges which kids like the best. Many American schools have reduced or eliminated outdoor time, even as the epidemic of childhood obesity spreads. In fact, as Richard Louv points out in Last Child in the Woods, education boards in some states have “outlawed” recess, fearing liability issues, violence on the playground, and lower national test scores. On other school playgrounds, signs read, “No Running!” For example, some building codes prohibit the construction of tree houses and forbid climbing on trees in parks. More than half of American households now live in the watchful eye of Homeowners Associations who often frown on basketball hoops and skateboard ramps in driveways.
Louv interviewed a camp counselor who was awakened by an inner-city girl when she had to go to the bathroom. “We stepped outside the tent and she looked up. She gasped and grabbed my leg. She had never seen the stars before. From that moment on, she was a changed person. She saw everything, even a camouflaged lizard that everyone else skipped over. She used her senses. She was awake!”
HOW TO REDUCE “ECOPHOBIA” IN KIDS, AND ADULTS
In personal activities:
Protect “nearby nature,” such as a creek behind your house or a little woods at the end of the cul-de-sac.
Plant a shade tree in your yard to reduce air conditioning loads an average of $80 a year, reduce pollution, and absorb storm water runoff. Property values are 7 percent to 25 percent higher for houses surrounded by trees.
Become a more effective recycler to conserve natural resources; consider green alternatives to standard products like cleaners, personal care products, clothes, and building materials; become a habitual walker who observes the cycles of nature at the park or in neighborhood yards; let your thumb turn green, maybe starting with a single plant – maybe your favorite variety of tomato.
Learn about nature! For example, learn about “biomimicry,” that applies the designs of nature to products and designs. Instead of predictable “pop” movies, rent brilliant movies like The March of the Penguins, Winged Migration, The Wild Parrots of Telegraph Hill… or the great series, Life on Earth, that explains all the incredible variations in species.
In medicine:
Conduct research on the benefits of exposing children to nature instead of pharmaceuticals; incorporate the health benefits of nature into medical and nursing school curricula; encourage pediatricians to prescribe nature time for stress reduction and as an antidote to child obesity.
In education:
Assure that every school utilizes nearby nature; create partnerships between schools, farms, ranches and public parks. Example: a St. Paul magnet K-4 school partners with a 320-acre ecological education center and habitat restoration preserve located across the street, to link cognitive development and science scores directly with hands-on nature experience.
In government:
Launch programs like Connecticut’s “No Child Left Inside” initiative, designed to reintroduce children to raise public awareness of underused Connecticut state parks and forests. Through partnerships, increase contact with nature. Example: persuade AARP to create a “Take a Child to Nature” program.
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Lost Child in the Woods, found
When I was four or five, I wandered into the woods near our house with a young friend. My recollections of that distant morning include splotches of bright sunlight projected through the trees onto the dark forest floor; the earthy fragrance of leaves and rich Illinois soil; and knowing what it must feel like to be a butterfly. We fluttered further and further away from our yards, clueless that back home our moms were beginning to panic. After an hour or more of frantic searching, someone drove to the other side of the forest and found us near the highway, still in the throes of discovery and exploration. I seem to remember that everyone was very agitated, insisting that we’d gotten lost and could have been killed! But we didn’t see it that way. All we had lost was a sense of time, and a sense of imposed boundaries.
Adapted from Simple Prosperity, by David Wann
