Our surroundings are awesome. We see about us majestic mountains, the perfection of a tiny mouse, a new-born baby, a flower, the colours of a seashell. Each creature is most fully that which it is created to be, an almost incredible reflection of the infinite, the invisible, the indefinable. (Tutu, 2009, p.58)

Being outdoors in nature is not about embracing something new. It is about re-connecting with something we already know. It’s in our DNA.

In a world that embraces noise, pace and technology, “there is a counter-movement: one that recognises our essential quality as part of nature. This movement invites us to reclaim our pace in the universe, to remind us that we are organic relational beings who influence, and are profoundly influenced by the natural world.” (McGeeney, 2016, p.9)

One of the basic concepts of coaching outdoors is that nature provides a therapeutic setting. Nature is a live dynamic environment that is not under the control or ownership of either the coach or the client. It is an open independent space, which has existed long before their arrival and will remain long after they depart. Nature reminds us that the world has not been made by humans. “we have evolved amidst a complex web of nature.” (Kellert & Wilson, 1995, p.65). Many of us exist for most of the time in a world which is humanly arranged, themed and controlled. As technology has developed, we have moved away from nature, we’ve shifted from mystical, religious and tribal life in reciprocation with nature to an individualistic, capitalist urban life. We have forgotten that not everything is controlled by the flick of a switch, pressing a button or talking to ‘Alexa’. We’ve forgotten that we are a part of something bigger, wilder and more powerful than ourselves. Nature has her own rhythm, one much more connected to our DNA than a lap top ever will be. Nature poses profound questions about our focus, intent and contribution. Most importantly nature provides a sense of wonder, an experience of beauty, greatness and strength beyond anything we could create.

“Whether it is the dark swirls which water makes beneath a plate of ice, or the feel of the soft pelts of moss which form on the lee side of boulders and trees…. A snowflake a millionth of an ounce in weight falling on to one’s outstretched palm…. To hear how a hillside comes alive with moving water after a rain shower.” (Macfarlane, 2008, p.275).

It is no great surprise that our screen savers, wallpaper, pictures and paintings are not of computers, office furniture or our colleagues but of nature, animals or our family! “We are nature, it’s not us and other, we are in relationship with it.” (Allen, 2019)

You didn't come into this world.
You came out of it, like a wave from the ocean.
You are not a stranger here.'

Alan Watts

While in our office or at a laptop we are very much a part of the organisations system, we are experiencing it very vividly. Moving outside not only brings in physical movement but nature and perspective as we connect again to the ultimate system of the universe. Then, we see a beautiful simplicity the other side of all this complexity and stress in today’s world. Whenever we walk outside we are sub-consciously connecting to the footsteps of those that have gone before us, be that someone on the same path an hour previously or 10,000 years ago! One of the participants from the ‘Getting Started’ programme captured this beautifully when she wrote: “It’s funny isn't it how the outdoors takes us back to a time before we existed, when our ancestors lived their lives outside and it grounds us!” (Lesley-Anne Cantwell, July 2020)

For 99% of our time on earth we have lived as hunter-gatherers. No cities, no internet. Our ancestors only survived because they had an intimate connection to nature. For over 2.2 million years, our ancestors (in the genus Homo) etched out an existence within natural environments. To survive necessitated finding sustenance and shelter, and predator avoidance. These experiences have shaped many aspects of our modern brain function. They continue to influence emotion, motivation, learning, and reasoning in subtle ways. In addition, since our ancestral experience was mostly an outdoor one, sleep and mood-regulating circadian rhythms became coordinated by the cycles of natural light. Just imagine what a sedentary, centrally heated, IT focused, electrically lit, life is doing for us today both physically and mentally. Not to mention that many of us have lost the deep nature connection our ancestors had to; sense of direction, lighting and tending a fire, finding water, edible and medicinal plants, moving silently and making things with our hands.

And that’s just our ancestors. The earth has been here for 4.6 billion years. We are all related to the first cell on earth. Every single plant and animal can trace its ancestry to that first cell, which means we are all related to each other. Our spine, nervous system, heart and gut are all descended from fish. In the womb we breathe with gills and have a tail!

“A human being is a part of the whole called by us universe, a part limited in time and space. He experiences himself, his thoughts and feeling as something separated from the rest, a kind of optical delusion of his consciousness. This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few persons nearest to us. Our task must be to free ourselves from this prison by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty.” (Albert Einstein)

This letter (excerpts), sent in 1855 by Native American Chief Seattle of the Duwamish Tribe to Franklin Pierce, President of the United States in response to an offer to purchase the Dwamish lands in the North East of the US, currently Washington State, shines a very different perspective on the western worlds relationship with our planet.

The Great Chief in Washington sends word that he wishes to buy our land.

How can you buy or sell the sky – the warmth of the land? The idea is strange to us. Yet we do not own the freshness of the air or the sparkle of the water. How can you buy them from us? We will decide in our time. Every part of this earth is sacred to my people. Every shining pine needle, every sandy shore, every mist in the dark woods, every clearing, and every humming insect is holy in the memory and experience of my people.

We know that the white man does not understand our ways. One portion of land is the same to him as the next, for he is a stranger who comes in the night and takes from the land whatever he needs. The earth is not his brother, but his enemy, and when he has conquered it, he moves on. He leaves his father’s graves and his children’s birth-right is forgotten. The sight of your cities pains the eyes of the redman. But perhaps it is because the redman is a savage and does not understand.

There is no quiet place in the white man’s cities. No place to listen to the leaves of spring or the rustle of insect wings. But perhaps because I am a savage and do not understand – the clatter only seems to insult the ears. And what is there to life if a man cannot hear the lovely cry of the whippoorwill or the arguments of the frogs around a pond at night? The Indian prefers the soft sound of the wind itself cleansed by a mid-day rain, or scented by a pinõn pine: The air is precious to the redman. For all things share the same breath – the beasts, the trees, and the man. The white man does not seem to notice the air he breathes. Like a man dying for many days, he is numb to the stench.

If I decide to accept, I will make one condition. The white man must treat the beasts of this land as his brothers. I am a savage and I do not understand any other way. I have seen thousands of rotting buffaloes on the prairie left by the white man who shot them from a passing train. I am a savage and do not understand how the smoking iron horse can be more important than the buffalo that we kill only to stay alive. What is man without the beasts? If all the beasts were gone, men would die from great loneliness of spirit, for whatever happens to the beast also happens to the man.

All things are connected. Whatever befalls the earth befalls the sons of the earth.

“One of the first conditions of happiness is that the link between Man and Nature shall not be broken”

Leo Tolstoy

Nature is necessary for our physical and psychological wellbeing. Interacting with nature teaches us to live in relation with the other, not in domination over the other: We don't control the birds flying overhead, or the moon rising, or the bear walking where it would like to walk. One of the overarching problems of the world today is that we see ourselves living in domination over rather than in relation with other people and with the natural world. If only more people related in the way Jim Crumley does:

“Whenever I am in the company of great trees… the image that slips effortlessly into mind is that of a parliament of sages, exchanging essential truths about the world and its ways; discussing and refashioning the laws of nature. Their wisdom is the product of centuries of stillness, of rootedness, of loyalty to a sense of place and to nature’s guiding principles.” (Crumley, 2020)

“Nature is not a place to visit. It is home.” (Gary Snyder, Poet). What better place to have our coaching conversations? And, to engage with nature to support us. Totton (2013) believes that nature becomes a ‘third party’ in the relationship.

The power of wilderness/outdoor adventure therapy programmes may lie neither, or not solely, with the therapist and her/his therapeutic skills…. Rather, what may be equally critical if not more so, in bringing about change for the better may be due to ‘nature’ – being in interaction with the natural worlds. (Beringer & Martin, 2003, p.33)

Being outside in nature re-establishes our vital and fundamental connection with the earth. We relax and become more aware of what our intuition is telling us without all the ‘noise’ that usually blocks it out. Direct contact with ‘the grand vistas of time and space’ (Macfarlaine, 2003), offer the opportunity to reach new perspectives.

“The vitality in the outdoor space invites a dynamic resonance inside us that has the power to evoke and support all kinds of important experiences…. Understanding the physical environment much more as part of our identity; a way of being in westernised cultures we seem to have lost touch with, certainly on any conscious level. I believe that ‘minding our landscape’ also has implications for us developing more reciprocal relationships with the natural world; for, as a connective practice, it inherently evokes care for the place. Overall, this amounts to what I would term a sustaining transaction, where both individual and environment are potentially nourished by the contact.” (Marshall, 2016).

It was with this stimulus that I began my journey to discovery of identity and purpose which has ultimately led me to supporting the development of others, and in particular, a strong belief in the power and benefit of coaching outdoors.

References:

Allen, R. (5/11/19) BBC Sounds podcast, interview with Dr Ruth Allen, host Alys Fowler

Beringer, A., & Martin, P. (2003). On adventure therapy and the natural worlds: Respect natures healing. Journal of adventure education and outdoor learning, 3(1), 29-40

Crumley, J. (16/1/20). The Scots Magazine

Kellert, S., R. & Wilson, E., O. (1995). The biophilia hypothesis. Washington DC: Island Press

Marshall, H. (2016). Taking therapy outside – Reaching for a vital connection

Keynote Presentation at CONFER Conference Psychotherapy & the Natural World November

Macfarlane, R. (2008). Mountains of the Mind, A History of a Fascination. London: Granta Books

McGeeney, A. (2016). With Nature In Mind, The Ecotherapy Manual for Health Professionals. London: Jessica Kingsley Publishers

Totton, N. (2013). The practice of wild therapy. Retrieved from http://www.wildtherapy.org.uk

If you’d like to experience more insights to support you in your coaching outdoors work take a look at Getting Started Coaching Outdoors and Nature as Co-facilitator. We’d love to see you on our programmes.

Our Systemic Connection to Nature

Lesley

Psychological Safety when Coaching Outdoors

Coaching Outdoors in Context