Healing Gardens: Calming Soundscapes

The power of therapeutic healing gardens, a six-part series. 

Part 5: Calming Soundscapes

There are many different ways to manage anxiety. The list of strategies ranges from meditation and yoga, to drinking alcohol, to taking pharmaceuticals, marijuana, and/or CBD. Even the tried-and-true technique of screaming into a pillow can make a big difference! There are many ways to calm anxiety, and a different combination works for every person. 

In a modern world, it often feels impossible to escape environmental sources of stress and anxiety. The neighbors' leaf blower, construction in the neighborhood, your teenagers' love of Spotify in combination with really big speakers, sirens, car alarms…These are all things that contribute to an elevated baseline of stress, leading to a higher risk of cardiovascular disease, compromised immune system, insomnia, brain fog, inattentiveness, and the like.  

While it’s not possible to remove many of the sources of noise in an urban environment, natural sounds such as flowing water and/or birds can create a masking effect. There is even some support for the idea that the sounds of nature can have positive physiological effects, as I read in some research from Chiba University in Japan, which demonstrated that the sounds of a creek induce changes to blood flow, increasing relaxation. 

Study here:  https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2793347/

So there you have it: flowing water or listening to bird sounds (or even better, both) in the morning start your day off MUCH better by decreasing fatigue as well as lifting your mood.  We at Garden Girl happen to know exactly how you can get that!