Can spending time in nature help with anxiety?

Introduction

Anxiety can make the world feel very small. Thoughts circle, concentration becomes harder and it can be tempting to withdraw from the things we normally do.

For some people, getting outside can help interrupt that pattern. It might be a walk along the coast, ten minutes in the garden, sitting in a park or simply noticing what is happening around you rather than what is happening inside your head.

Nature is not a treatment for anxiety and it will not make difficult circumstances disappear. But spending time outdoors can be one useful part of looking after our mental health, particularly when it also gives us a chance to move, slow down or take a break from everything demanding our attention.

Why can being outdoors feel helpful?

There probably isn’t one single explanation.

Being outside can combine several things that we already know can support wellbeing: movement, daylight, a change of surroundings, time away from screens and opportunities to focus our attention differently.

Natural environments can also give our minds something relatively undemanding to notice. Trees moving in the wind, birds, waves, clouds or the sound of water do not require us to make decisions, reply to messages or work something out.

That can be particularly welcome when anxiety has left our thoughts feeling busy.

Research into nature and mental health is still developing, and the findings are not as simple as saying that time outdoors will reduce anxiety for everybody. There is evidence of benefits, but studies vary considerably in what they measure and how strong those effects appear to be.

The useful message is a modest one: nature can be one helpful resource, not a cure-all.

You don’t need to disappear into the wilderness

When we talk about the benefits of nature, it can conjure up images of mountains, forests and long countryside walks.

Those can be wonderful if they are available to you, but they are not a requirement.

A local park counts. So does a garden, a path beside a river, a bench overlooking the sea, a community allotment or a few trees on the route to work.

Even urban nature can offer opportunities to pause and change our surroundings. Recent research has also explored relatively short periods of nature exposure rather than assuming that benefits require hours in remote countryside.

That matters because useful wellbeing advice has to fit real life. Most of us cannot head for the Highlands whenever we feel anxious.

We might, however, be able to go outside for ten minutes.

Walking can give your mind somewhere else to go

Walking is one of the simplest ways to combine time outdoors with physical activity.

You do not need to walk quickly or cover a particular distance. For someone who has been sitting indoors feeling increasingly anxious, simply getting up and walking around the block can change the pace of the moment.

Physical activity itself can support mental wellbeing and can help reduce feelings of stress and anxiety.

There is also something useful about the rhythm of walking. Your attention can begin to move towards where you are going, what you can see and what your body is doing rather than remaining completely caught up in anxious thoughts.

That does not mean trying to force those thoughts away. Often, it is simply about giving them a little less of the available space.

Start smaller than you think you need to

If anxiety is making it difficult to leave the house, advice to “go for a lovely long walk” can feel hopelessly unrealistic.

Start with what feels manageable.

That might mean standing outside with a cup of tea, walking to the end of the street, spending five minutes in the garden or sitting somewhere nearby.

If that goes well, you can do a little more another time.

Small things still count.

Use your senses to come back to what is around you

Anxiety has a habit of pulling us into the future.

What if this happens? What if that goes wrong? What if I can’t cope?

One simple way of using time outside is to deliberately bring some of your attention back to what is happening now.

You could notice:

what you can see
what you can hear
what the air feels like
the temperature
what you can smell
the feeling of your feet on the ground
movement in trees, grass or water

This does not need to become a formal mindfulness exercise unless you want it to.

It is simply a way of moving some attention away from the stream of thoughts in your head and towards something concrete in the world around you.

You don’t have to make your mind go blank

People sometimes assume mindfulness means stopping thoughts altogether.

That is a fairly impossible standard.

You may still be worrying while you notice the sound of the sea. You may still feel anxious while walking through the woods.

The aim isn’t necessarily to make the anxiety vanish. It may simply be to create a little more room around it.

Green spaces aren’t the only option

The original version of this article talked mainly about “soothing greens”, but many of us are just as drawn to blue spaces.

The sea, rivers, lochs and streams can provide the same sort of opportunity to change surroundings, slow down and pay attention to something outside ourselves.

Here in Moray, that feels particularly relevant. Nature does not only mean heading inland towards woodland or countryside. For many people, the coast is the place they naturally go when they need some space.

You don’t need to decide whether green or blue is scientifically “better”.

Go where you feel comfortable and where it is realistic for you to spend some time.

Find something you actually enjoy doing

There is little benefit in turning nature into another wellbeing task you think you should be doing.

If you hate hiking, you do not need to hike.

Your version of spending time outdoors might be:

walking the dog
gardening
cycling
sitting with a coffee outside
birdwatching
taking photographs
visiting the beach
meeting someone for a walk
doing some conservation or volunteering
eating lunch outside
taking a different route home through a park
pottering in the garden

The activity itself does not have to look particularly worthy.

If it gets you outside and you find it helps, that’s enough.

Doing something outdoors with other people can help too

Nature and exercise are often talked about as solitary activities, but they do not have to be.

For someone experiencing anxiety, meeting a person for a walk can sometimes feel easier than sitting opposite them and being expected to talk.

Conversation can come and go. There are things around you to notice. Silence feels less conspicuous when you are both walking somewhere.

Joining a regular walking or outdoor group can also add something different: routine and connection.

In Scotland, Walking Scotland, formerly known as Paths for All, supports a network of accessible Health Walks and walking opportunities around the country.

And locally, Nature 4 Health continues to run nature-based activities in Moray and the Highlands, including walks and its Branching Out programme for adults using mental health services.

For someone who finds doing things alone difficult, having a time, place and group to turn up to can remove one of the biggest hurdles.

Don’t turn getting outside into another pressure

There is an unfortunate tendency for perfectly sensible wellbeing ideas to turn into rules.

You must walk 10,000 steps.

You must spend a certain number of minutes outside.

You should be exercising every day.

You should feel better afterwards.

That isn’t particularly helpful if you’re already anxious.

There will be days when getting outside helps a great deal and others when it doesn’t. There may also be periods when leaving home feels genuinely difficult.

Try to think of nature as something available to you rather than another standard you have to meet.

Ten minutes counts. Sitting counts. Going slowly counts.

And if today isn’t the day, that doesn’t mean you’ve failed.

Make it easier to get outside when you need to

When we are already feeling anxious, even small decisions can become another barrier.

If you know that getting outside often helps you, make it slightly easier to do.

That could mean keeping a coat and comfortable shoes somewhere obvious, having a familiar short route that requires no planning or knowing which nearby place you like to sit.

You could also build outdoor time into something you already do. Walk while making a phone call. Have lunch outside when the weather allows. Get off the bus one stop earlier. Take the dog somewhere you enjoy rather than treating the walk purely as another job.

The easier something fits into normal life, the more likely it is to happen when you could actually use it.

Nature doesn’t have to fix anything

Perhaps one of the most useful things about getting outside is that it doesn’t necessarily require us to achieve anything.

You do not need to use the walk to solve the problem you have been worrying about.

You don’t need to return home transformed, refreshed and full of perspective.

Sometimes you simply spend half an hour somewhere else. You move your body. You notice the weather. Your thoughts get interrupted occasionally by a dog, a bird, a view or the fact that your feet are wet.

And sometimes that is enough to make the next part of the day feel a little more manageable.