Forest Bathing

On the Japanese art of Shinrin-Yoku

We stood in the reception area at the rustic Dawn Ranch, pottering in the moments of check-in, and noticing an Activities listing on a poster. On the list for Sunday morning was something I’d never heard of, and that Carolin had mentioned on the drive… Forest Bathing. 

The idea of tip-toeing in and out of a secret pond in the forest felt perfect in the fast-warming late summer morning. But seeing the words ‘bathing’, my brain pictured a pristine pond in the Sonoma redwoods to dip in, and sighed at again forgetting my swimming shorts on this trip.

Until I was corrected… 

So, back in the 1980s the Japanese formalized the practice of deliberate time slowing down in forests, and called it Shinrin-Yoku, or Forest Bathing. The zaniness of aspirational corporate life, and the life-loathing that was creating for the Japanese salarymen, was being observed to dissolve when taking a walk in the woods. Just hanging with the effervescent complexity of a forest was leading Japanese salaryman who tried it to feel quite different about their lives when they emerged. 

Researchers soon followed, investigating the physiological changes, and the Japanese Ministry covering forestry coined the term Shinrin-Yoku - or Forest Bathing - to capture the practice of connecting with and absorbing the forest atmosphere through all five senses. 

So showing up on this Sunday morning, Carolin and I had the chance to spend an hour with the calm and wonderfully attuned spirit of Jenny Harrow-Wheeler. Jenny devoted a Masters thesis to this art, and then launched EcoWisdom to devote her career to help people slow down and connect with themselves in the natural rhythm of forests.

We started to head down the path behind the property into ever taller ancient redwoods, 600 - 1200 years old, and found a small level patch of grass next to the understory of a massive 1000-year old Dawn Redwood.

And we sat and listened and learnt, hearing about the history of the practice and some of the fascinating science behind the metabolic benefits. Jenny guided us to notice the scents, the warming of our faces in the radiance of the morning light, the chaotic birdsong appearing and disappearing. And as she weaved a hypnotic voiceover to the morning murmurs of nature, it was fascinating to hear how forest air is rich in compounds called phytoncides - pronounced “figh-ton-sides” - the essential oils trees emit to protect themselves from germs and insects. 

Phytoncides are a forest effervescence that will have the effect on humans of decreasing cortisol (the stress hormone), reducing anxiety, increasing pain thresholds, lowering blood pressure, and bringing antibacterial properties (see Jenny’s Master’s Thesis EcoCoaching- An Integrative Health Coaching Model of Forest Bathing and other resources on Shinrin-yoku).

Even with swimming trunks not needed, bathing is the perfect word. Gently lowering ourselves into the grounded sensations of a forest, closing your eyes and exhaling, is like slumping into a bath for the senses.

And, for me, like baths, probably something I might slot into life a little more often…