Research continues to demonstrate the healing power of nature. People in hospital rooms that have windows overlooking a garden recover faster than those who do not. People who swim with dolphins recover from depression more quickly than people who take antidepressants. Children with ADHD who play outdoors regularly display fewer symptoms than those who do not. These are just a few examples of the many beneficial effects of the healing power of nature. Mindfulness-Based Ecotherapy (MBE) helps you to connect to this healing power

11.0 Animal as Healer

Humans are mammals. Mammals nurture and care for their young. During this period of nurturing in infancy, we form bonds that affect how we approach others for the rest of our lives. There is a whole area of psychology, called Attachment Theory, which studies how these relationships are formed, and how they cause us to act in the ways we do. If you’ve had negative attachments in your childhood, it may be difficult for you to connect with other people in positive ways. Pets afford people who’ve experienced negative attachments the opportunity to form positive attachments in non-threatening ways.

Animals have been used in schools, in therapeutic settings, and in nursing homes to help individuals form positive attachments. The reason this works is that people have a natural instinct to nurture and to be nurtured. Through this nurturing, we are healed.

11.1 Animal Assisted Healing

As mentioned in Section 0.6, there is a branch of psychotherapy known as Animal-Assisted Therapy. In this broad category of ecopsychology, animals help to facilitate therapeutic interventions. When animals nurture us in this manner, healing takes place in a realm beyond the words of traditional “talk therapy.”

Our furry and feathered therapists

Since animals cannot rely on words for communication, they are much more sensitive to other means of communication. They can read our body language, our pheromones, our facial expressions, and the tone of our voices. This ability makes them excellent assistants in more experiential forms of therapy.

Studies compiled by Palley, et al in 2010 have shown that spending time with pets has the following effects on humans:

  • The breathing rate slows down
  • The heart rate slows down
  • The blood pressure decreases
  • Stress hormones are reduced
  • Endorphins (the body’s natural painkillers) are increased
  • The immune system is strengthened
  • People become calmer and more relaxed
  • Perhaps not surprisingly, the animals also become more relaxed!

All of the characteristics listed above are obviously healing characteristics, so animals are great natural physicians!

To experience some of the healing power that animals can offer, try the Animal-Assisted Healing exercise on the next page. If you do not have a pet of your own, you may borrow one from a friend or visit a petting zoo. This exercise may be performed with any friendly four-legged friend. If you have allergies, take that into consideration when selecting your animal “therapist.”

Optional Activity:  Medicine Stick

A Medicine Stick, also known as a Prayer Stick or a Spirit Stick, is used by many Native American tribes to make offerings and petitions to the spirit world for healing.

It is a stick, usually about the length of your forearm, which has been decorated with feathers, bits of leather, stones, shells, or other natural objects. Once it has been completed it is usually consecrated in some sort of blessing ceremony. Thereafter it is held when praying, making offerings, or asking nature for permission to use her resources.

For this activity, create your own Medicine Stick. If possible, try to use objects that you have found in nature yourself rather than purchased objects. This will give your Medicine Stick more persona meaning to you. Decorate it with signs and symbols that mean something to you personally. You may carve them into your stick or paint them on it.

When you have completed your Medicine Stick take it with you the next time you go to your sacred space. Hold it overhead as you ask permission from your sacred space, and when you give thanks to nature for your blessings. The more you use it, the more special it will become to you. The more special it becomes, the more you give it the power to heal.

Medicine Stick

 Animal Assisted Healing             

For this exercise you will need an animal assistant. You may use your own pet for the exercise. If you do not have a pet, you may wish to borrow one from a friend or neighbor, or visit a petting zoo if there is one near you. Don’t attempt this exercise with a wild animal. If you have allergies, select an animal you’re not allergic to, if possible.

To engage in the Animal Assisted Healing exercise, complete the following steps, then go on to answer the questions on the next page.

  1. Find a space, preferably outdoors, where you and your animal assistant may be undisturbed for the duration of the exercise.
  2. Begin by taking your pulse. Write down your heart rate on the worksheet on the next page, or just make a mental note of it for now.
  3. Ask your animal assistant for its permission and help in completing this exercise, and wait for a reply. Read the animal assistant’s body language for signs that permission has been granted. If it has not, or if the animal seems uneasy in any way, postpone the activity until another time.
  4. Once permission has been granted, thank your animal assistant by giving him or her a treat of some sort.
  5. Bond with your animal assistant by grooming or petting it.
  6. When you feel a bond has been established, think of a situation in which you need healing help. If you do not have such a situation, just enjoy the experience of being with your animal assistant.
  7. Play with your animal assistant in some way. If your animal assistant is a dog, you may toss a ball or a stick. If a cat, you may offer it a bit of string. If some other animal, find a way to engage in a playful activity with it.
  8. When you have finished playing with the animal assistant, thank it once again and express your gratitude by offering it another treat.
  9. Take your pulse again.
  10. Dismiss your animal assistant in a kind and gentle way.

When you have completed all 10 steps above, go to the next section and answer the questions in your journal.

Animal Assisted Healing

RESTING HEART RATE AT THE BEGINNING OF THE EXERCISE: __________ beats per minute

How did your animal assistant grant you permission to do the exercise?

How did choose to bond with your animal assistant? How did he/she respond?

How did your animal assistant grant you permission to do the exercise?

Before playing with your animal assistant, did you think of a situation in which you needed help? Did playing with your animal assistant change the way you thought about the situation? How?

Did you notice any change in your thoughts, feelings, or overall mood after the exercise? If so, what?

How might animal assisted healing help you to live more fully in your True Self?

RESTING HEART RATE AT THE END OF THE EXERCISE:                    __________ beats per minute

Did your resting heart rate increase or decrease during the exercise (circle one)?  INCREASE   |   DECREASE

11.2 Reflections on Animal Assisted Healing

If you are like most people who engage in the Animal Assisted Healing exercise, you probably experienced a decrease in your heart rate from the beginning of the exercise until the end of the exercise. Of course, if your play with your animal assistant involved running or jumping, the opposite may have been true, but overall most people become calmer and more relaxed after engaging in animal assisted healing.

McConnell, et al (2011) revealed that people who owned pets enjoyed the following health benefits:

  • Pet owners are less likely to die within 1 year of having a heart attack than those who do not own pets
  • Medicare patients with pets (especially dogs) had fewer physician visits than similar patients without pets
  • HIV-positive men reported less depression than similar men without pets
  • People with severe ambulatory disabilities (e.g., spinal cord injuries, traumatic brain injury) who were given a service dog showed well-being improvements

In addition to the research by McConnell, here are some more studies on the power of animal assisted healing:

  • Covert, et al (1985) found that children trust their pets and confide in them when they have a problem. They also play with their pet when feeling stressed.
  • Fine (2000) Demonstrated that having animals present in a therapy session helps to modify the emotional climate of the room. Pets seem to have a calming effect that moderates strong negative emotions.
  • Salomon (1995) found that nine to thirteen year olds with higher scholastic performance reported seeking more emotional support from animals when they suffered with internal discomfort or felt lonely, compared to those with lower scholastic performance.
  • Levine and Bohn (1986) found that children who live in homes where a pet is considered to be a member of the family were more empathetic than children in homes where there was no such pet.
  • Covert et al. (1985) found that adolescents who owned pets had higher self-esteem scores.
  • Melson (1990) found a positive association between attachment to pets and self-esteem in kindergarteners.

There’s a reason that humans have had relationships with our four-legged brothers and sisters for millennia. They nurture us, and we nurture them. By their nurturing, we are healed.

11.3 Material Possessions and Healing

As mentioned in Section 4.0, the only things we really need are food, clothing, shelter, and love. Everything else is a luxury item. The society we live in conditions us to believe that material possessions are the key to happiness. We tend to reinforce this when we buy each other gifts in an attempt to purchase love and affection. But what we’re really teaching each other when we do this is that the gifts are more important than the giver.

This belief that owning things is the key to happiness is not very conducive to developing healing relationships with other people, or with nature. In fact, many of the things that cause us stress come from our desire to purchase more and more in our never-ending pursuit of happiness.

To illustrate how material possessions can interfere with healthy relationships, go back to your Things That Cause Me Stress from Section 2.1. How many of those things have to do with material possessions? List them in the exercise on the next page.

Anxiety from Material Possessions    

Go back to your Things That Cause Me Stress from Session 2.1. How many of those things have to do with material possessions? That is, on your list of things that cause you stressful or depressing thoughts, how many of them have to do with the purchase, rental, or ownership of material goods? For purposes of this exercise, “material goods” may also include intangible goods such as stocks, bonds, insurance policies, medical bills, rental and lease fees, etc.

Once you have identified these items from your Things That Cause Me Stress list, write them below:

  1. _____________________________________________________________________________
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Now go back again to Chapter 1 and look at your list of Top Ten Things That Keep Me from Feeling Connected. How many of those things have to do with material possessions or the worries they cause? List those in the exercise on the next page.

Look at your list of Things That Keep Me from Feeling Connected from Session 7.1. How many of those things have to do with material possessions or the worries they cause? List them below:

  1. _____________________________________________________________________________
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Now find your list of Ways I’d Like to Feel Connected from Session 7.3. How many of those have to do with material possessions? List those in the exercise on the next page.

Material Possessions as Aids to Connection

In Session 7.3, find your list of Ways I’d Like to Feel Connected. How many of those have to do with material possessions? In other words, you are looking for items on the list in Session 7.3 that are material possessions that help you to feel a spiritual, divine, or numinous connection to nature, to your loved ones, and to yourself. When you have identified those items, list them below.

  1. _____________________________________________________________________________
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What did you learn about yourself from doing these lists? What did you learn about your relationship to material goods?

11.4 Connecting and Healing

There is a relationship between feeling spiritually connected and healing. In a 2007 meta-analysis on this relationship, Dyer found that the odds of survival for people who scored highly on spiritual measures were 29% higher than those who scored lower in spiritual involvement.

Dyer also examined a number of studies that indicated that meditation is associated with positive changes in immune function, reductions in cardiopulmonary and gastrointestinal tract symptoms in cancer patients, beneficial changes in blood pressure and heart rate, and decreased mortality risk, all of which may be related to long-term health.

This meta-study also found that the type of spirituality wasn’t as important as the fact that participants had some sort of spiritual practice. For purposes of this study, agnostic and atheist Buddhists were included, with similar results. Using our definition of “spiritual” as “connected to something larger than self,” even people who have no concept of a higher power or of the divine can reap the healing benefits of connecting.

Looking back on your lists on the exercises Anxiety from Material Possessions and Material Possessions as Aids to Connection, did you learn anything about the relationships between material possessions and spirituality? Do material possessions act more often as aids to spiritual connection, or as deterrents to spiritual connection?

If spirituality leads to healing, and material possessions often act to hinder us from achieving high levels of spiritual connection, what does that say about the relationship between material possessions and healing? Perhaps there is a reason that so many advanced practitioners of spiritual paths around the world practice asceticism.

11.5 Chaos and Order

Nature is all about balance. In order for new life to begin, old life must pass away. The seeds that fall in autumn contain the beginnings of new life in the spring. The circle of life and death is neither good nor bad. Each half of the cycle depends on the other for its existence.

Consider the seasons. The winter solstice marks the longest night of the year. From that day forward, days get longer and longer until the summer solstice, which is the shortest night of the year. At midsummer the days begin to grow shorter and the nights grow longer until the winter solstice returns again, marking off a lighter part of the year and a darker part of the year.

All life on earth exists in a perpetual balance of chaos and order. Chaos represents the forces of death, darkness and decay, and order represents the forces of life, light, and growth.

Humans and animals live balanced between these forces of chaos and order. The ideal life is one that strives for a balance between these forces. To live a life ruled by chaos is to live without direction and purpose. Such a life is one of death, darkness, and decay. On the other hand, to live a life ruled by order is to become obsessive about everything, always chasing after an orderly perfection that does not exist in the natural world. Finding balance between the forces of chaos and order allows one to live a life of purpose without engaging in compulsive, controlling behavior.

Carl Jung believed that all human beings contain within them the potential for all behaviors, both “good” and “bad.” According to Jung, the Persona is the mask we wear in our everyday lives. It is the face we present to others. The Persona represents who we think we are, and who we would like to be. The Shadow, on the other hand, represents all those traits we wish to suppress in ourselves. All our anger, fears, and negative emotions and behaviors are pushed down into the Shadow and denied expression in the Persona.

Jung believed that the key to mental health was a process called individuation. Individuation involves striking a balance between the Shadow and the Persona. The Shadow represents the forces of chaos and darkness within an individual, and the Persona represents the forces of order and light. While the Shadow contains all of our darker and more negative emotions, it is also the seat of creativity. To deny the existence of one’s Shadow is to deny one’s own ability to be creative. However, allowing the Shadow to rule one’s life creates a situation where the individual is ruled by the forces of chaos and darkness. Jung saw psychoanalysis as the process by which we balance light and darkness within ourselves, thus achieving individuation.

Some moral, religious and ethical systems try to deny the existence of our darker impulses. These systems focus solely on the Persona: The face we present to others. The more such systems suppress the darker impulses in the Shadow, the more unbalanced the individual becomes. In such a case, the Shadow becomes a pressure cooker with no means to release the pressure. In extreme cases, the pressure cooker blows, leading to dysfunction and even psychosis.

Mindfulness-Based Ecotherapy recognizes the need to balance Persona and Shadow. By acknowledging our darker impulses, we open the door to creating this balance, leading to individuation. Many people think that acknowledging our darker impulses means having to act on these impulses. Nothing could be further from the truth. Suppose someone has done something that leads you to be angry with that person. Your first impulse might be the desire to retaliate in some way by returning anger for anger, or by hurting that individual in some way. Those who focus only on the Persona would attempt to suppress and deny this impulse, even though the desire to retaliate is a perfectly normal reaction to being angered. The angrier such a person becomes, the more he tries to suppress that anger, until he reaches boiling point and reacts explosively to the situation.

In Mindfulness-Based Ecotherapy we seek to restore balance by acknowledging this impulse. Instead of swallowing our anger, we would recognize it as a darker impulse. But instead of returning anger for anger, we strive to express that anger in positive ways; perhaps by confronting the source of the anger and saying to the person, “You know, I really felt angry when you did _________. I don’t want to be angry with you. What can we do to resolve this situation?”

As much as we might sometimes like to think otherwise, we are not separate from nature. A huge body of research confirms that our environment and the seasons affect our moods and behavior. If you think about it for a moment, you will probably find this to be true for yourself as well. Do you find yourself becoming more contemplative and introspective during the winter months? Do you become happier and more outgoing in the summer months? Does a walk in the woods improve your mood? If so, you are not alone.

The tools of Mindfulness-Based Ecotherapy allow us a tangible symbolic representation of these inner states of being. Just as the seasons move back and forth between cycles of light and darkness, so our own moods and feelings cycle between lighter and darker times. Celebrating the changes of the seasons and the cycle of life allows us to acknowledge both our lighter and our darker impulses in a contemplative and meditative way. By acknowledging them, we restore balance to our lives and to our own spiritual journeys.

11.6 Healing Rhythms

Mindful awareness helps us to know our bodies and their complex cycles. Mindful awareness also reminds us that when troubles come, whether in mind or body, it is helpful to remember that “this too shall pass.” A step in becoming aware of how these cycles influence us is to actually chart them and look for any patterns we may find. The following page is a journal page you can use to monitor the comings and goings of your various cycles.

Here’s how to use the journal page: You may wish to make several copies of the page so that you can chart your progress for a number of weeks or months. The page is divided up for each day of the week. For any situation in which you feel the need to monitor what your body’s cycles are doing, note the day and time, then move to the next block and describe your mood. It’s a good idea to monitor both your positive and negative moods so that you’ll know when you are more likely to have each. Next, move to the Situation block and record what’s going on at the time. Try to avoid the obvious; for example, if you just had a fight with your boss, then it’s perfectly understandable that you might be in a bad mood. Try to note subtler shifts of mood; we’re plotting your body’s natural biorhythms here, and those natural biorhythms can be corrupted by outside influences like fights with your boss.

Next, in the columns marked Outdoor and Indoor write whether you were indoors or outdoors when you made the observation. See if being outdoors has any different overall effect than being indoors, and vice-versa. You may wish to write a specific location under the appropriate column, to see if there is a specific location that may be affecting your mood.

Keep doing the chart until you feel confident that you are mindful of your body’s various cycles and moods. You can use this information to your advantage by avoiding any major decisions or interactions when you’re cycling towards a less productive mood, or by saving the important activities for when you are more likely to be operating at peak efficiency. For example, if you know you tend to be more tired and irritable in the evenings at the first of the week, you might want to postpone any important decisions until the mornings of the later days of the week.

When you have established a fairly consistent pattern with your moods and their cycles, you may use this information to your advantage to heal yourself and your relationships.

 
Biorhythm Journal Chart

Name: ________________________________________________________ Date: _______________

DAY TIME MOOD SITUATION OUTDOOR INDOOR
MONDAY          
TUESDAY          
WEDNESDAY          
THURSDAY          
FRIDAY          
SATURDAY          
SUNDAY          

11.7 True Self and Healing

 We are nearing the end of our journey together. The next session, Living in True Self, has been the ultimate destination, and we are almost there. Upon finishing Session 12 you should have a much better understanding of who you are, and how to live as the person you were meant to be.

So how does one live in True Self?

When a person has integrated Shadow and Persona and has balanced the forces of chaos and order, that person has the ability to live in True Self.

We all have a vision of how we see ourselves, called the Perceived Self. We all also have a vision of how we would like to be. This vision is called the True Self. When the Perceived Self and the True Self are evenly matched, a person feels calm and at peace with herself and with the world, but the farther apart the Perceived Self and the True Self are, the more chaotic and stressful her journey will be.

When the Perceived Self and the True Self are far apart, there are two possible solutions to bring them back into balance. The first is to bring the Perceived Self more closely in alignment with the True Self. The second is to bring the True Self more closely into alignment with the Perceived Self. In reality, most people achieve individuation, and therefore the ability to live in True Self, by moving the Perceived Self and the True Self more closely towards each other so that they meet in the middle.

The Perceived Self is ruled by chaos, and the True Self is ruled by order. The way to move the Perceived Self more closely towards the True Self is to see that a truly balanced person needs a little chaos in their lives, because that’s where the creativity comes from. The way to move the True Self more closely to the Perceived Self is to see that a person needs a little order in their lives as well, because that’s where stability and confidence come from.

The way to determine which direction to go when aligning your Perceived Self and your True Self is to think about the seasons of the year, and the cycles of life and death they bring. These cycles are a dance between the forces of chaos and the forces of order. Both light and dark are necessary in order to find balance, as are life and death, growth and decay, Shadow and Persona. Do you have more chaos in your life, or more order? Do you have a balance between the two? Are you comfortable with finding that balance if you do not have it?

A person who is perfectly balanced between the Perceived Self and the True Self is a person who is spiritually connected. Such a spiritually connected person does not need material possessions to feel better about themselves. Their self-esteem and self-confidence are generated from within. Their sense of value comes from what they are, and not from what they own.

When we attain this level of balance and mastery, the power of nature has healed us.