How the natural world can heal us (a reading list)
Sometimes if you’re feeling ‘bad in the head’, all you need is to get outside in nature. Here are some good books to inspire you, whether you need help for mental or physical issues.
A Year in the Woods is a wonderful book by a Norwegian writer, who takes 12 small journeys over the course a year, camping in the nearby woods. Evoking Henry David Thoreau and Walden, he decides to leave the city after work one day each month, and camp near the same tiny pond in the forest, and return to work the day. He keeps this up for a year.
His ritual is never perfect. One evening, he grows so cold in his tent that he hikes out before daybreak. But as Ekelund inevitably greets the same trees and boulders each month, he appreciates the banality of their sameness alongside their quiet beauty. He wonders how long they have stood silently in this place, and reflects on his own short existence among them.
Torbjørn Ekelund is a writer, author, and co-founder of Harvest, an online magazine documenting wilderness adventures, environmental issues, and our relationship with nature. He lives in Oslo, Norway.
Also read his other book In Praise of Paths. This was written about how he took to walking around Oslo in nature, to deal with a diagnosis of epilepsy, which meant he could no longer drive.
And found that rather than this be a sad thing, he stopped to notice things. He now says as he carries his backpack everywhere, that he finds it strange to see people driving everywhere, even to buy groceries.
A healing journey through ancient landscapes
Weathering explores our connection to the rocks and mountains that have withstood aeons of life on our planet – gradually eroding, shifting, solidifying and weathering. We might spend a little less time on earth, but we are also weathering – evolving and changing due to the shifting climates of our lives.
The author takes us on a journey through deep time and ancient landscapes, showing how geology can offer a new way of thinking on grief, change and boundaries. In a world shaken by physical, political and medical disasters, the book argues for a deeper understanding of the ground beneath our feet.
Originally trained as a geologist, Ruth Allen PhD has a doctorate in Himalayan mountain-building, and now teaches a woodland-based educational programme for teenage girls in northern England.
Wintering: the power of rest in difficult times
Wintering is a comforting meditation on the periods of life, when we must retreat to care for and repair ourselves. The author thoughtfully shows how to come through these times with the wisdom of knowing that, like the seasons, our winters and summers are the ebb and flow of life.
Read how to keep safe in snowy weather .
A moving personal narrative on the transformative power of rest and retreat, illumination emerges from many sources, not least the hibernation of creatures like sleepy dormice.
Plants and animals don’t fight the winter. They don’t pretend it’s not happening. Winter is a time of withdrawing from the world, and vanishing from sight. Its’ a time for reflection and recuperation. Slowing down, getting enough sleep, resting.
This is an invite to accept sadness, and find nourishment in deep retreat, and joy in the hushed beauty of winter, and an understanding of life as cyclical.
Katherine May is a renowned writer and speaker, whose work touches on nature, slow living and spiritualty. She is author of the popular Substack newsletter The Clearing. She lives by the sea in Kent, and loves walking, sea-swimming and cooking feasts.
How nature can help chronic illness
Land Beneath the Waves is a moving and honest memoir of a nature writer, who lives with chronic illness. She begins by researching the history of her local landscape and wildlife, realising her affinity with the wild, as she coped with a mother who also had debilitating chronic illness.
Now in her 40s (and struggling with mental and physical health herself), the author revisits her childhood to trace the natural world on her life. And as boundaries between self and land become increasingly porous, and the lure of the wetlands around her home, threaten to engulf her.
Nic Wilson is a writer and Guardian country diarist. She taught A-level English before working freelance for a gardening magazine.
How nature can help genetic illness
Some Of Us Just Fall is a unique book by a gifted writer, on how people with genetic illness can use nature to feel better. It traces a remarkable journey through illness – from misdiagnosis to wild swimming in the Lake District.
Polly examines her genetic inheritance, and her place in the natural world. After not getting results from doctors or her own body, she found relief in nature.
The Lake District is famous for its rain. The wettest inhabited valley in England lies only 10 miles over the fells from my home. This is weather pushed to the extremes of itself.
Polly Atkin is an award-winning writer and poet who lives in the Cumbrian town where Wordsworth lived (she wrote a biography on his sister’s later life and illness). She co-founded the Open Mountain Initiative, which seeks to centre voices on the margins for outdoor, mountain and nature writing.
