The twittering of birds. A soft rustling in the tree tops. Lush greenery in different shades and the aromatic fragrance of resin. Stress fades away with each step and the pulse slows. Forest bathing is an alternative approach to treating high blood pressure and metabolic disorders and has become a popular trend in recent years – not only in Germany.
“The idea originated in Japan and is linked to Shinto, the oldest Japanese religion,” says DAAD alumnus Josko Kozic, a visiting researcher at the Nanzan Institute for Religion and Culture in Nagoya and at Sophia University in Tokyo. “Certified guides take people to the most beautiful locations and show them how they can experience the forest with all their senses and enjoy ‘shinrin-yoku’ – forest bathing.”
For his PhD at Heidelberg University, Kozic studied Shugendo, a fourteenth-century Japanese religion that is likewise closely associated with forest bathing. “The idea of ‘mountain asceticism’ combines ascetic practices, rituals and meditation with the direct experience of nature,” he explains. Followers of Shugendo believe that nature has a spiritual power that can be experienced through physical and mental discipline. “It is a very immediate and far-reaching practice that is currently enjoying a renaissance and appealing to more and more people from different backgrounds,” says Josko Kozic. —