Shinrin-yoku is forest-bathing

Shinrin-yoku is forest-bathing

One very innovative approach to keeping great health is broadly becoming known as `forest-bathing´ and is becoming more and more popular in Japan.

I always enjoy finding out about people who are researching preventive health-solutions before the problems start, especially when they are as simple and natural as this.

It all starts in Japan, where scientists have now been researching on human immune- and body functional reaction to natural environments for years; various studies investigating the effects of a visit to the forest, from the leisurely 2 hour stroll to a day or more in the forest seem to prove that forest-bathing really does a lot for our immune system, our state of mind and over-all health.

The Japanese call this practise Shinrin-yoku which means `forest-bathing´ or `taking in the forest atmosphere´; Shinrin-yoku is supposed to have a similar effect as natural aroma-therapy.
According to senior assistant professor of forest medicine at Nippon Medical School and present president of the Japanese Society of Forest Medicine Dr Qing Li, forest-bathing is not so much about doing heavy physical exercise outdoors but more a matter of `enjoying the forest through the five senses´ meaning spending time in the forest, slowly walking relatively short distances in awareness of the scenery, the greeny- and browny colours, listening to the different sounds, from the singing birds to the wind rustling through the branches, smelling the wood resins and eating forest foods.

Various studies of people taking time in the forest, from walking regularly for approxamately 20 minutes to staying in woodland environment up to five days all proved to affect the immune system in a positive way, reduce stress and tension and lower blood pressure.

In field experiments of the Japanese Society of Forest Medicine in 24 forests across Japan, 280 subjects were exposed to forest- and then city environments, either by walking in them or by viewing them. Before and after viewing or walking everyone in the group was checked on salivary cortisol, blood pressure, pulse rate and heart rate variabilit. `The results show that forest environments promote lower concentrations of cortisol, lower pulse rate, lower blood pressure, greater parasympathetic nerve activity, and lower sympathetic nerve activity than do city environments.´ So called forest medicine is being researched in Japan as a part of preventive medicine.

In another series of studies individuals, both male and female, went on a 3 day/ 2 night trip to forest areas; blood and urine were tested on day 2 and 3, then on day 7 and day 30 after the experiment.
The results show clearly that urinal adrenaline was significantly lower during the forest stay, and also that the activity of natural killer cells (NK) was clearly raised during, and also up to 30 days after being in the woods; natural killer cells are a component of the immune system that fights cancer.
Li says that a higher NK activity enhances the immune strength which again boosts our stress resistance.

The director of the Center for Environment Health and Field Siences at Chiba University, Yoshifumi Miyazaki puts it this way: `Humans had lived in nature for 5 million years. We were made to fit a natural environment. So we feel stress in an urban area. When we are exposed to nature, our bodies go back to how they should be.´

Forest-bathing is so close to the MoveRoot concept. The idea would surely seem so absurd to our long passed ancestors who lived out in the wilderness because it was their natural home; but for modern mankind this kind of concept can be life-saving.

source of information: official website of the Japanese Society of Forest Medicine within the Japanese Society for Hygiene, http://forest-medicine.com/

GET OUTSIDE & MOVE TO YOUR ROOTS!
Wild-Horse 10/2014