Nature and the end-of-the-year holidays. If you ask me, they go collectively, touring throughout Earth hand in hand at this particular time. Maybe that’s due to all of the evergreens, holly, mistletoe and poinsettias that we see in every single place we go.
Or it might be that that is historically the time for awe, contentment, pleasure and peace. And nature does, naturally, instill all these emotions, too.
In Celtic mythology, the oak was believed to be the controller of the sunshine half of the yr, and the holly tree managed the darkish, winter months. The Druids regarded holly as an emblem of everlasting life and fertility. Today, holly is hung in homes to accompany Christmas bushes.
In reality, a whole lot of research have proved that spending time in nature could make us really feel higher, each in physique and thoughts in a method that nothing else can. One 2017 examine from BBC Earth and the University of California revealed that even simply watching nature documentaries can enhance pleasure, contentment, curiosity, amazement, awe and surprise. Not solely that, but it surely was discovered that those that did had clear reductions of their emotions of low-energy and tiredness. Watching nature documentaries even alleviated stress, particularly amongst youthful viewers.
Those feelings that being in nature brings about—comparable to amazement, awe and surprise—have been proven by the Happiness Project, an initiative that was a direct results of the 2017 examine, to be the foundations of a robust type of actual happiness. Real happiness is a deeper, much less transient type of happiness that may positively have an effect on our well being and well-being.
For me, the tip of the yr and being in nature—or just watching a nature video—instills one thing else, too: hope.
So, in that vein, this week, I hope you’ll be capable to discover 4 minutes to look at the video beneath, produced by Eredus. It makes use of clips from the character documentaries Planet Earth: Africa (2013), Planet Earth II (2016) and Planet Earth: Blue Planet II (2017), all created by the BBC Natural History Unit and the Discovery Channel. Nothing will deliver you extra emotions of pleasure and peace than viewing this reminder of how stunning, complicated, various and intertwined the Earth is.
I feel there’s one other emotion being in nature and watching nature documentaries instills in us all: hopefulness.
I want for all of you that you’ve got a heat vacation season.
Here’s to discovering your true locations and pure habitats,
Candy