Florence Williams: How Spending Time In Nature Has a Scientific, Measurable Impact on improving our health and mood - especially depression!

Florence Williams shares the scientific research behind the benefit to our mood and our health when we spend time in nature as part of our daily lives. Her book, The Nature Fix: Why Nature Makes Us Happier, Healthier and More Creative is full of practical, intuitive wisdom that can be applied regardless of your lifestyle or circumstances. To that point, you'll be surprised at how little time it takes to have a significant impact on things like depression, anxiety, and stress as well as things like blood pressure and cortisol levels. You may have noticed feeling better after a walk in the woods; this episode will explain why by way of some fascinating research. This week we talk to Florence Williams Florence Williams is a contributing editor at Outside Magazine and a freelance writer for the New York Times, New York Times Magazine, National Geographic, The New York Review of Books, and numerous other publications. She is also the writer and host of the new Audible Original series, Breasts Unbound. She is fellow at the Center for Humans and Nature and a visiting scholar at George Washington University, her work focuses on the environment, health and science. Her first book, BREASTS: A Natural and Unnatural History received the Los Angeles Times Book Prize in science and technology. Her latest book is called: The Nature Fix: Why Nature Makes Us Happier, Healthier and More Creative. In This Interview, Florence Williams and I Discuss... The Wolf Parable Her book, The Nature Fix: Why Nature Makes Us Happier, Healthier and More Creative. The research that supports the fact that when we spend time in nature it can boost our mood That 15 minutes in a forest environment can reduce our cortisol levels Natural Killer Cells (T-cells) The roll of Cypress aerosols Taking in nature as a whole as the benefit That the benefit of nature as a whole being greater than the sum of its parts Nature Deficit Disorder and trying to fill it with other more modern-day things Nature being a better option for some people than meditation Paying attention to our surroundings Achieving a more relaxed, restorative state The effect of the sound of birds The benefits of walking alone in nature The benefits of walking with others in nature Attention Restoration Theory The effects of spending time in nature on different parts of the brain The amount of time we should spend in nature Biophilia Please Support The Show with a Donation See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.