Mindfulness and Nature as We Age

2020 Submission to the Piney Woods Journal

Retirement, for the fortunate, can mean more opportunities to try to enhance their health and general well being. Many are forced, though, to concentrate a lot of their energy on addressing particular and serious health challenges. Few of us are medical doctors or mental/physical therapists. We don't have the knowledge or skills to be able to diagnose and treat successfully our minor or major health challenges. Even doctors and therapists can be so busy with their practices that they fail to recognize their own emerging health problems.

Certain subsystems within the human body often lose some of their previous operational efficiencies by the time we age into our forties, fifties, and beyond. A few of these subsystems, such as circulation or digestion, for example, can partially fail to perform well for individuals resulting in serious detriments to their overall quality of life.

Mindfulness can be defined as increased self-awareness that comes from directing more attention to our present thoughts and feelings as we are experiencing the world around us. The world and our lives in it can occasionally force upon us immediately jarring and "flight or fight" emotional reactions.

It's so easy with work and family responsibilities to put ourselves on "auto-pilot." We attend so much to our day-to-day tasks and responsibilities that we seem to have little "quiet time" to connect very personally to what we are really feeling. We can turn to escapist pastimes like "mindless" reality programs on TV as ways to relax and "discharge" from toxic work environments and from relationship frustrations. News and political commentaries from media sources often add to our stress levels though. While modest levels of stress are motivating and healthy for us, we know that high levels of recurring stress are very harmful.

Discussions of mindfulness often center on the benefit of meditation for creating powerful self-awareness. Perhaps like me, though, meditation never felt natural or seemed to work as a means for strong connections to my inner self. Even with book-gleaned advice and trials, I really couldn't stop some of the racing thoughts and cares in my head.

I discovered that I could more fully relax and be more mindful through listening to soft instrumental music or through casual walks in certain nature settings. Doing both at the same time didn't work nearly as well for me as either alone. I believe finding helpful cues for increased mindfulness is often a case of exploration or experimentation. What particularly leads us to occasions of self-dialogue, self-learning, and healing? Perhaps this can be in a spiritual sanctuary or place associated with calm and contentment from the long-ago past. Wherever this sense of inner peace and mindfulness occurs, don't rush the experience. It might take an half hour or more just to transition from normal thoughts and reactions to some state of mindful calm.

We do need to be mindful of our blessings, as the weathered words of advice suggest. We also need to be mindful of our challenges as we move to future life stages. This spirit of looking deeply inside and discovering emerging truths and personal values is vital for life planning. How can we decide what paths to take for the future if we don't have a good idea of who and where we are in the present tense?

We need to assess the perceptual and actual inputs into our current lives. By this, I mean the food that we eat, the physical exercise we get, and the many other types of experiences that we choose or we endure. The concept of "biofeedback" seems to have simple and practical implications for our future well being. We can begin to consider how our particular food choices, our physical activity levels, and other health-related experiences are affecting us in the immediate days and weeks afterward. We can begin to experiment very roughly with adding one healthier choice to our daily and weekly routines and then determine in the weeks or months afterward if that one change has made a positive difference and seems worth our continuing to practice it. If not, we can discard that choice and try another reasonable change.

When food or our other inputs seem only "comfort" or very short-term emotional fixes, but common sense tells us that these inputs usually lead to health challenges in the long run, we can learn. Not by listening to the well-meaning, but sometimes monotonous, advice of certain family members or friends. And not from reading self-help books or articles. We likely have heard and read basic health advice for many years, but find obstacles for actually heeding many such recommendations. Incentive for change can be somewhat influenced by previous advice or increasing evidence, but without "quiet times" and mindfulness of what is truly in our best interest and possible grasp, we aren't likely to change.

Please forgive me possibly for adding a bit to continuing health reminders, but my simple message is to seek out calming nature and outdoor experiences. Rushing to get hunting, fishing and other gear prepared for a stressful drive and family weekend outdoors probably won't cut it. A trip with buddies or even alone when there is concentrated pursuit of certain goals, scores, or outcomes also won't lead to the mindfulness that I've been discussing. Even many birdwatchers or nature photographers can miss opportunities for personal reflection and enhancement by much pursuit of bird identification counts or trying hard for the best-framed photo shots. Mindfulness and deeper mental and emotional enhancement through nature outings are possible, though, by distilling some potential outings to the very basics of human observation and sense experience.