Why 'biophilia' needs to be part of your next holiday

Engaging with nature on vacation can not only make you feel more rested and restored, it can also enhance wellbeing when you're back home.

It's a cool but sunny spring morning as I step over rocks and past mountain laurel bushes into a wooded Connecticut land preserve. Only the trill of titmice and robins overhead and the crunch of dead oak leaves underfoot punctuate the still air. "We're folding into the forest," says Regan Stacy, a forest therapist who's guiding me. Our agenda: forest bathing – something that increasing numbers of resorts and hotels, even museums, are offering their guests. As the world gets more tech-filled, noisy and distracting, nature's call becomes louder. I can't help but listen.

I've always felt calm and at peace in nature but never stopped to consider why. The reason is what's known as biophilia: the innate love for and connection we feel to the natural world. This desire to interact with all forms of life was popularised by the naturalist Edward O Wilson in his 1984 book Biophilia. The theory is that since we evolved as a species in nature, it's where we feel most at home and connected.

While I love jogging in the park or a strenuous mountain hike, this outing in the woods is different. "Often when we're exercising, our minds are not exactly where we are. We have a particular destination or we're trying to keep a particular pace," says Stacy. "It's not necessarily about being right where you are." Forest bathing, however, is. It slows you down, allowing you to focus on your surroundings and notice how – and what – you're feeling. "You're opening your senses to what is around you, being called in whatever direction you feel called to go."

Following Stacy's instructions – or "invitations" as she calls them – I veer off the trail to touch hard wood and soft moss, smell hemlock branches and earthy humus, and let my eyes wash over the rolling and rocky landscape. The different textures and temperatures, the details I wouldn't normally take the time to observe, like fungi on fallen limbs, curling like seashells, or the echoing drill of a woodpecker, feel comforting to my heart.

These peaceful feelings have real impact. Numerous studies, including environmental psychologist Rita Berto's The Role of Nature in Coping with Psycho-Physiological Stress, show biophilia reduces anxiety, restores mental capacity and supports emotional wellbeing, all of which can affect physical health.

"The parasympathetic nervous system, also called the 'relax and renew' system, has the function of returning [you] to a condition of homeostatic equilibrium following a stressful situation," explains Berto, who is also the research leader at the Laboratory of Affective Ecology (GREEN LEAF) at Italy's University of Valle d'Aosta.

This is what happens when a person takes a walk in nature, for example. It's the opposite of when the sympathetic, or "fight-or-flight" system, is aroused as it is in response to busy or stressful places. Not only is a fight-or-flight response fatiguing, but "if it remains engaged for prolonged periods it can lead to chronic cardiovascular and endocrine responses that adversely affect health", Berto adds.

There is a growing body of evidence that suggests spending time in nature can be good for us. One large study by scientists at the University of Exeter in the UK suggested that exposing ourselves to nature for 120 minutes a week left people reporting that they felt healthier and happier. But the evidence can be quite mixed. While many studies of forest bathing, for example, appear to show a benefit to physical and mental health, they are often small and of insufficient quality. Of the few randomised controlled trials to be conducted, they indicate forest bathing may be particularly useful for reducing depression.

Exactly why spending time in a forest can have this effect is up for debate, but theories like Attention Restoration Theory and Stress Reduction Theory make the connection between how the human brain has evolved to respond favourably to fractals, which are infinite patterns seen in natural objects like trees, clouds and rivers. In other studies, seeing these fractals have been shown to reduce stress and mental fatigue, and increase feelings of restoration.

Berto puts it more simply. "Exposure to nature is the most effective and cost-free way to recover from stress."

While the wellness industry has ballooned into a $5.6tn (£4.5tn) global behemoth that includes everything from gravity blankets and wearable devices to weight-loss pills, biophilia is comparatively simple. All that's needed is the great outdoors and some focus on your surroundings.

"People who notice the nature around them, their levels of wellbeing [are] higher," says Holli-Anne Passmore, associate professor of psychology at Concordia University of Edmonton and director of the multi-university Nature-Meaning in Life (NMIL) Research Lab. In studies she has conducted, not only do people feel less anxious and stressed after noticing nature around them, they feel calmer, happier, even excited. "It's this range of positive emotions that people get that's most important for boosting one's wellbeing," Passmore adds. "All these different kinds of emotions are really important to leading a full and flourishing life."

More than just spending time in nature, it's how connected you feel to it that can really make a difference. "When you engage more deeply," says Passmore, "you glean more benefits."

With activities like water-skiing or snowmobiling, the natural environment is more background to what you're doing, rather than something you're engaging with. In those situations, Passmore says, "you aren't really connecting with nature and getting those benefits." As such, more hotels and resorts are offering more intentional, focused ways to help you connect with nature.

At the Weekapaug Inn in Westerly, Rhode Island, resident naturalist Mark Hengen helps guests customise ways to interact with their natural setting on the Atlantic Ocean. For example, on a full Moon night, they might kayak on the property's salt pond, which heightens the senses in unique ways, like hearing the waves crashing in the distance or smelling the salty air. "It's such a different experience at night," Hengen says.

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They might then walk on the beach and look at the rings of Saturn and Moons of Jupiter through a telescope. Other naturalistic activities include engaging with the surrounding ecosystem, from clamming to crabbing to watching the local harbour seals. "Part of nature is to take your time and connect with the object, whether it's a bird or a rock or the cosmos," he says.

Greyfield Inn on Cumberland Island off the coast of Georgia also guides guests to immersive nature-based experiences in the nearby maritime forest, sand dunes and ocean. As lead naturalist Christina Nelson notes, the changing seasons, tides and animals ensure it's always a unique experience. "There are no scripted tours," she says. "We're on nature's timetable." This gives guests time and permission to slow down, look at small things and reconnect with themselves as much as nature.

Other lodges may not have naturalists but still bring you closer to nature. In the Tuscan countryside, Borgo Santo Pietro has more than 300,000 species of plants in its wild and manicured gardens that you can stroll through, as well as engaging experiences like flower picking and falconry. Keweenaw Mountain Lodge, on Michigan's Upper Peninsula, offers immersive activities across its 560 acres, such as birding, snowshoeing and stargazing. Desolation Hotel in California's lower Sierras intentionally doesn't offer Wi-Fi so you are more likely to make the most of the natural surroundings.

That's not to say you need a fancy resort to lead you to biophilic activities and their benefits. You don't. There's camping, kayaking, birdwatching, beachcombing – simply looking at a waterfall. The key is being present.

"Stand there and just absorb what's around you," says Passmore. "How does it feel? How does it smell? What are you hearing? How does it make you feel?"

After three invitations to engage with the woods during my forest bathing excursion, I am indeed feeling calm and more connected to the environment. Stacy has packed hemlock tea, which we sip overlooking a deep hollow, the sun higher in the sky and the season's "spring peeper" frogs waking up and making their distinctive peeping sound. There's a self-awareness that makes me feel more physically alive.

If part of the reason we travel is to slow down and replenish our proverbial tanks, biophilic activities are an essential part of a holiday. "If you start the aspect of noticing the nature around you on vacation, you're more likely to do that when you're at home," Passmore says.

In other words, nature could be the key that perpetual sense of wellbeing that we seek when we travel.

BBC Travel's Well World is a global take on wellness that explores different ways that cultures the world over strive for a healthy lifestyle.

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