We have a precious few months of summer in Canada, let’s not waste them! This season of warmth and sunlight is our collective exhale — a chance to recharge after what has been a particularly challenging year, to say the least.
There’s something profound that happens when we step outside on a warm summer day. We spend most of our lives indoors — especially in those long winter months — tethered to screens and artificial light, leaving our nervous systems starved for what nature provides. The simple act of moving outdoors becomes a form of therapy, engaging our senses in ways that indoor environments never can. When we walk, run, or simply sit in natural spaces, we’re accessing healing mechanisms that our bodies have evolved to recognize over millennia.
The Healing Power of Nature
When sunlight hits our skin, our bodies produce vitamin D, often called the “sunshine vitamin,” which plays a crucial role in mood regulation. The sounds of nature — rustling leaves, flowing water, birdsong — activate our parasympathetic nervous system, the part responsible for rest and healing. Even the simple act of feeling grass beneath our feet triggers what researchers call “grounding,” which has been shown to reduce inflammation and stress hormones. Summer doesn’t just feel healing; it literally is.
Clara Hughes has long championed the healing power of nature and movement. Since becoming the only athlete in Olympic history to win multiple medals in both summer and winter Games, she has become one of Canada’s most celebrated mental health advocates, helping to jumpstart the conversation on mental health in Canada. Clara is the founding spokesperson for the Bell’s Let’s Talk campaign and has openly shared her experience with depression to break down stigma and encourage others to seek help.
Clara retired from competitive sport in 2010 and has become an avid hiker, completing the “Triple Crown” of long-distance hiking — the Pacific Crest Trail, the Continental Divide Trail — and clocking thousands of kilometres of bike touring, adventure kayaking, and so much more. Moving through mountains, desert, and wilderness spaces have “allowed for a disconnection to the fast and furious pace of modern society, slowing things down to the pace of a human being.” It was through nature and the power of movement, Clara was finally able to heal.
Below, Clara shares the healing power of nature in her own words, and how, whether we live in a big city or mountain town, tuning into the natural world around us is a simple but profound way to recharge and reconnect with what matters.
The Medicine of Movement: Why Nature is Our Greatest Healer
Canada is known for its long, cold winters. While there is much to be said for the exhilarating sensation of breathing crisp winter air, summertime is here and there is no better time to get outside than in this season of abundant sunlight and warmth.
There is an epidemic of loneliness right now affecting so many people’s lives. Nature is a reliable, non-judgemental listener. If you tune into her sights and sounds, you will find hidden treasures to experience everywhere, and realize you are less alone. There is always something, big or small, to delight the senses and turn the tedium of everyday existence into a greater state of wonder, and possibly joy. So, while many of us are experiencing a lack of focus, and feel more stressed and stretched to the limit, spending time — connected time — in a natural space is a simple remedy for much of this.
Movement as Medicine
Movement is medicine and the best place to experience the endorphin boosting action of propelling your body forward by wheel or foot is outdoors. Stop and sit on a park bench, look around, gaze up and see if you can catch sight of the bird you might hear in the now full foliage of trees. Flowers are abloom in big cities, small towns, and even traffic roundabout have crews cultivating these spaces with the most glorious blooms. Do you know any by name?
Finding Adventure in Urban Spaces
Urban green spaces are a respite from the concrete jungles many of us live in. They host an array of trees both native and ornamental. How many trees can you identify? There are apps available for this, and libraries host a variety of nature books to open your world and see what and who is around you in bird, plant, and animal form.
There are parks, historic sites, and a multitude of corridors and connectors in every city, large and small, to stimulate adventure without having to leave the city limits. Toronto hosts an incredible network of ravine paths and trails for everyone to enjoy. A walk on the bike path along the Pacific Ocean in Vancouver’s Stanley Park might lead, if you’re lucky, to a whale sighting. Most days, eagles will be soaring above and gulls dancing in the sky.
The Simple Practice That Changes Everything
The key to this all? Leave your device in your pocket, take your ear buds out and tune in to the natural world around you. This is an easy, free and accessible mental health practice that might shift your mood and change your day.
This is how and why I get outside no matter where I am in the world. As hard as it is to find those ten minutes, or few hours, it’s always worth the effort. When this becomes a habit, you’ll not only feel the difference in your mood, but you’ll also discover a whole other world out there that’s been waiting for you to notice!
In her intimate keynotes, Clara Hughes explores the power of movement to change lives while candidly sharing her experience living with depression to inspire audiences to face their fears, find their voice, and become the champions they’re meant to be.
Contact us to learn more about Clara and to book her for your next event.
