Noticing and Noting Nature: The Experience of Being Alive

I love Twitter. I love the way it gets me reading such interesting things, blogs and articles I would never have found if I'd just been surfing the web all alone. Last week I was quite unwell with a double whammy of a throat infection and a chest infection, so the old attention span was, at the best, minimal. But Twitter is great. 140 characters - I could manage that! And browsing through my Twitterfeed I found links to two articles that made me think. Both were concerned with the way we connect with the natural world, and how this can be beneficial to our health and well-being.

The first article was by by Adam Frank, an Astrophyicist at the University of Rochester. On the 13.7: Cosmos and Culture website, Adam talks about how we lead such busy, frantic lives that we miss out on the experience of actually being alive:

In this permanent state of hyperventilation, the issue for us all is not stopping to smell roses. It's not even noticing that there are roses right there in front of us. Joseph Campbell, the great scholar of religion, hit the core of our problem when he wrote, "People say that what we're all seeking is a meaning for life. I don't think that's what we're really seeking. I think that what we're seeking is an experience of being alive."

Adam's answer to this problem is to make time to seek out your inner 'scientist', the scientist you were when you were a child, when you noticed stuff all the time, and asked endless questions about the way things are. When you were so close to everything that it almost seemed part of you. This is how you start experiencing being alive again:

This is where it begins, with simple act of catching seeing the smallest detail as an opening to a wider world of wonder and awe.

He suggests a walk in the woods is the best way to find that world of wonder and awe, a walk where you open you mind to what you can see. He suggests counting things (trees, petals), listening attentively, noticing patterns, colours, shapes. And it doesn't need to be a passive activity -  he suggests climbing onto a branch of a tree to get a different perspective, taking notes, making drawings.

It struck me very forcibly, though, that he wasn't just describing the inner scientist. He was also describing the inner poet. Isn't that what poets do? Notice things? Look at things differently? See the patterns and the strangenesses? Write them down? It certainly is. Adam Frank says that although not everyone can be a Scientist with a capital letter, they can be a scientist. And I say, in the same way, everyone can be a poet.

Look closely at a dead tree stump.
Why is some of it rotten and crumbling,
while the rest is still strong?

The second article that I came across, by Applied Psychologist Miles Richardson in Finding Nature, is very closely related to this idea of finding your connection to life in close attention to nature and its infinite detail. However, it goes one step further by suggesting that connecting to the natural world will make people more likely to want to live in a way that promotes environmental sustainability. To quote from the Finding Nature website:

The first finding nature research paper was published Februrary 2013 in the Humanistic Psychologist and is available online. It explores the rewards of nature that can be found in a familiar semi-rural landscape. The case-study paper informs current quantitative research which will explore practical ways to connecting to nature in the local landscape, which is more sustainable and fits better with the everyday lives of many. As an emotional connection to nature predicts pro-environmental attitudes and behaviour, the work presents a simple first step towards more sustainable human behaviour through a connectedness to the local landscape; so that, for once, our own well-being might lead to natures well-being.

Richardson, M., and Hallam, J. (2013). Exploring the Psychological Rewards of a Familiar Semi-Rural Landscape: Connecting to Local Nature through a Mindful Approach. The Humanistic Psychologist, 41(1), 35-53.

Read more: http://www.findingnature.org.uk/
Create your own website for free: http://www.webnode.com

The first finding nature research paper was published Februrary 2013 in the Humanistic Psychologist and is available online. It explores the rewards of nature that can be found in a familiar semi-rural landscape. The case-study paper informs current quantitative research which will explore practical ways to connecting to nature in the local landscape, which is more sustainable and fits better with the everyday lives of many. As an emotional connection to nature predicts pro-environmental attitudes and behaviour, the work presents a simple first step towards more sustainable human behaviour through a connectedness to the local landscape; so that, for once, our own well-being might lead to natures well-being.

Richardson, M., and Hallam, J. (2013). Exploring the Psychological Rewards of a Familiar Semi-Rural Landscape: Connecting to Local Nature through a Mindful Approach. The Humanistic Psychologist, 41(1), 35-53.

Read more: http://www.findingnature.org.uk/
Create your own website for free: http://www.webnode.com

The first finding nature research paper [...] explores the rewards of nature that can be found in a familiar semi-rural landscape. [...] As an emotional connection to nature predicts pro-environmental attitudes and behaviour, the work presents a simple first step towards more sustainable human behaviour through a connectedness to the local landscape; so that, for once, our own well-being might lead to nature's well-being.  (1)

So far, so good, you might say. That makes sense - indeed it might be considered stating the obvious. (Although research has proven that the 'stating the obvious' response is often fundamentally flawed!) However, Miles Richardson is going one step further. As part of his new research project he has released an Android app which aims to 'measurably increase people's connection to nature'. The app tests how connected people feel to nature before they begin using it, and then encourages them to note three good things in nature each day for five days. This can be written notes, or a photo, 'be it the song of a robin or the first buds of spring'. After five days it measures how much more connected the user feels, and encourages them to share their notes and experience via Twitter. And this is part of a greater research purpose. To quote again:

Developing a closer connection to nature is great for our wellbeing and our attitudes towards conservation, but users are not just helping themselves: by opting in, you can take part in a study of people’s interactions with nature run by researchers at the University of Derby, helping them to find the best ways to encourage people to connect with nature.

At present there is only an Android app, but if it takes off, an  iPhone version might be forthcoming, and the researchers are also working on a web-based version with email prompts.

I thought this was a brilliant idea, incorporating the technology that has become so embedded in our lives to help people make a connection with nature, and thus encouraging them to become more positive about caring for the environment. And it linked so nicely to Adam Frank's article about practising noticing, that I decided I'd incorporate a version of both into my life and this blog, despite the fact that I don't have an Android device.

So yesterday, the first day I really felt well enough to go out of the house, I took a little walk around the garden and the village with the purpose of noticing and noting three good things in nature. I took photos, and chose three good things to share. Here they are:

An enormous fallen willow branch,
on a pile of wood waiting to be logged.
So full of life that it is shooting after being cut.

Apple blossom.
Foreshadowing the fruit.

The amazing angles and shapes of thistle in the hedgerow.
Spiky fractals.
Eccentricity and concentricity

Of course, I'm lucky. I live in the country, and I feel pretty connected with nature already. But I don't always pay close attention. And I don't always make time to look and notice. So this mini resolution to note three good things a day will help me to experience what I have. 

And I believe that anyone can do it, whether they live in the country or the city. Nature is everywhere, from the breathy cooing of pigeons on the rooftops, to the lone dandelion forcing its way through broken concrete, to the smell of the rain on dry ground. There's even a word for that last one: petrichor. So, let's make time to go out and notice it!

(1) Richardson, M., and Hallam, J. (2013). Exploring the Psychological Rewards of a Familiar Semi-Rural Landscape: Connecting to Local Nature through a Mindful Approach. The Humanistic Psychologist, 41(1), 35-53

All photos © Sally Douglas