Bird Therapy – the benefits of engaging with nature for mental health
This weeks #BookSnapSunday photo is of a book that popped up somewhere on one of the many feeds I seem to subscribe to but I can’t remember where exactly perhaps it was on goodreads, anyway, I pretty much ordered a copy straight away. This is a book I am looking forward to reading this week. Bird Therapy deals with a subject I find fascinating, specifically the mental health benefits of close and regular engagement with nature. I can speak for such benefits at a personal level, having discovered that regular contact with the natural world, with going bush, greatly enhances my own ability to manage my mental health, in fact it has become an essential tool in my mental health arsenal. It is one reason why I go camping so regularly, weekends in the bush help me remain functional during the week and long term, bird watching has been a growing interest connected with those experiences.
Bird Therapy began as a blog, you can check it out here: https://birdtherapy.blog/ and if the therapeutic benefits of nature are of interest to you I urge you to do so. Related to that topic is the idea of engaging closely with the nature that is close to us, even in our urban environments and even with physical restrictions placed on our ability to get outdoors, I recently stumbled across the wonderful blog Living with nature written by Vicki, a blogger restricted largely to her immediate environment by health issues, her blog is joyous and beautiful in its close observation and fantastic photography of the bird life that visits her Melbourne location, I urge anyone with an interest in bird life or the natural world to check it out also. Finally I have included a BBC clip of Joe Harkness talking about Bird Therapy below.
For anyone who might stumble across this, #BookSnapSunday is a weekly instagram meme I do featuring a book, if you would like to join me in this endeavour, please feel free to do so and leave me a link to your post, would love to see what everyone else is reading.
Gum trees and Galaxies 
Hi Sharon, I love the design of that cover, so simple, yet so beautiful. I certainly agree with your thoughts about the benefits of nature and we are very blessed in Toowoomba with many opportunities for getting out in nature in close proximity. One of the things that I am really looking forward to in our new place, is creating a garden that will attract birds and butterflies. The sights, sounds and smells of nature are so healing and soothing to a frazzled brain.
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I look forward to seeing posts on your garden as you create it and yes Toowoomba is so lucky in having so many opportunities to get out into nature. Watch the heat in summer, I lost a couple of trees in pots last year with the heat and my not watering enough. Good luck with the new place, very exciting.
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