Tag: nature’s remedy

I have been obsessed with weather news lately. My own experiences living my life and observing the shifting moods of other people according to weather events have led me to believe that human beings’ emotions and behaviors are more fundamentally affected by climatic elements than we are aware of or are willing to admit. I started thinking about how weather phenomena affect our bodies, emotions, psyche and life activities 20 and a half years ago in Missouri, USA, when I went to the hospital to give birth to J1. The nurses there told us of a curious phenomenon being that many women would go into labor during snowstorms. I myself notice that there are usually more ambulances rushing on the street whenever there are inclement weather events such as heatwave, thunderstorm or snowstorm.

I especially noticed weather’s effects on people’s health and emotions while living in Kentucky where summer is hot and humid and winter is usually unpredictable. During summer in Kentucky, the atmosphere always feels heavy due to the oppressive high humidity, and the people themselves would look heavier in their bodies as well as feel miserable in their soul. The air would feel thick like transparent soup and the community would suffer a health slump. All my health problems leading to anxiety and depression started during summer 2018 during such a collective health decline. The summer mood of people in Kentucky would always correspond with the weather which would usually be stale and stagnant.

Along the same vein of how weather controls human health, emotions and behaviors, earlier this year, as the winter cold gradually gave way to a warmer spring feel in the air, the heavy burden of my marriage crisis started feeling lighter on my heart and mind. As the trees and flowers started coming back to life, D and I both felt that our relational wounds were on the mend.

As the sunshine became stronger and nature resurrected, we started doing what we do best: walking together hand in hand to witness the beauty of nature around us. We walked together on our lake trail to see the pine trees coming back to life and the saplings pushing their ways upwards through the earth. We took longer walks around our neighborhood and area to notice the budding of wildflowers or the flowering of plants in people’s gardens. In this area, spring showed off such exquisite flowers as peonies, rhododendrons, azaleas, irises and some others.

We especially took a delight in noting the budding and flowering in and around our own little garden.