June is National Great Outdoors Month—a time that also honors other important health-related observances such as Men’s Health Month, PTSD Awareness Month, and my personal favorite: National Give a Bunch of Balloons Month. (Yes, this is a thing!)
Whenever I speak with patients, I often say that there are four cornerstones of a healthy life—each more powerful and enduring than anything I or the entire medical system could ever offer. These cornerstones are also grounded in something deep and universal: our connection to nature.
Depending on how you define spirituality, nature reconnects us to something fundamentally basic and essentially spiritual—something that knows peace, beauty, patience, wisdom, and love. Here are the four nature-inspired pillars of well-being I firmly believe in:
1. What You Eat
Choose foods as close to their natural form as possible. Whole, unprocessed foods nourish not only the body but also align with the rhythms of the natural world.
2. How You Move
Exercise outside whenever you can- walk, jog, hike, kayak, bike. (If you get a routine going you may be able to ditch your membership fee to a gym!) Fresh air and sunlight add another layer of benefit to your health besides the cardiovascular fitness you will get. Could you walk or bike instead of drive—to the grocery store, your child’s school, the pharmacy, even your workplace? Could you take the stairs instead of the elevator at work?
3. Your Mental Health
Spend quiet time in nature. This is probably the most powerful inner “work” you can do on your own. Walk a wooded trail. Sit by a pond, river, or any body of water. Let stillness and the natural world settle your mind, calm your nervous system at the end of a long day.
4. Your Connection
Create quality, distraction-free time with other humans including family, friends, neighbors etc. Step away from screens, play games and laugh with others. Ask meaningful questions and discover something new about people you’ve known all your life. Curiosity is an antidote to boredom and opens many possibilities that can enrich your life.
Life is short—beautiful and painful all at once. While medicine has its limits, the gift of nature is available to all of us for healing.
At Saliglasa, I prescribe the gift of nature to all patients without qualifications!