The stress of maintaining the balance between our personal and professional life can cause stress and anxiety affecting your mental health. Still, there are those who manage to find the time to take little trips, walking a trail, or strolling around a park. Taking time for a trip in the outdoors has been proven to reduce stress and anxiety and promotes good vibes!

How the outdoors impacts improves mental health.

Many studies have taken place to see if mental health can be improved with changing your environment and they have come quite close to the conclusion that spending time in nature is great for a person’s mental health.

In the studies it is evident that the subjects that spend a lot of time outdoors in nature had their stress and anxiety levels reduced. On the flip side the subjects that spend most of their time indoors with little to no nature trips suffer with poor mental health more.

Switch off the Flight Mode

During stressful situations our body can flip between the flight-or-fight mode and the rest-or-digest mode. In summary this means our body’s nervous system has a sympathetic side and a parasympathetic side to it.

The sympathetic side is a state of excitement which prepares our bodies to take significant action or indulge in an activity. While the parasympathetic mode lets the body rest and digest.  This mode is where the body is calm and gets to recover from any trauma or stressful situation.

How Does Being Outdoors Help Us?

Being outdoors amongst nature means that your mind gets enough rest. Being in nature helps to boost the immune system and promotes better heart health by stabilising blood pressure.

Tips on how to let nature into your life and improve your mental health.

  • Add some greenery around your work station.
  • Take a 10 minute walk outside every day.
  • Think about things that make you happy while you are outdoors.
  • Try to exercise more. Whenever you plan to go to the gym work in some outdoor activity to get closer to nature.
  • Go camping often- Camping is perfect for physical exercise and has a calming affect to your soul.
  • Trekking with friends on flat trails is also a good way of relieving stress.

So, leave your air-conditioned offices and houses and wander around in the outdoors explore new places, go with your family and friends and feel close to nature.

See how it affects your mental health. Tell me how has it improved after you tried these tips.