In some kind of magical post-holiday firecracker burst, a whole bunch of you have recently signed up to join us here in the Rx Nature family. (We’re about to top 500 subscribers. Woo-hoo!)
Many of you, I think, came via recommendation from Janisse Ray, the Southern environmental writer who’s also here on Substack. I first met Janisse nearly 25 years ago when I was a newspaper reporter and interviewed her as her magnificent debut book, Ecology of a Cracker Childhood, was coming out. Ever since then, Janisse and I have been traveling distant, but somewhat parallel, tracks. Any friend of Janisse (and that’s you, I suspect) is a friend of mine.
So first of all, I want to say Welcome to you newcomers! I’m genuinely thrilled to have you here, and I will work hard to provide you with a steady stream of thought-provoking and heart-gladdening content about the human-nature connection.
If you saw the description of this newsletter, you know that I consider nature to be good medicine. It’s an antidote for anxiety, an elixir for depression. Maybe the sweetest balm we could find for our overstimulated, digitally-doped up, world-weary brains.
I personally think that time spent in the natural world can cure (or at least alleviate) almost anything:
anger
sadness
grief
fear
confusion
frustration
isolation
loneliness
shame
even the searing pain of heartbreak.
Which is why, some time back, I shifted the emphasis of my psychotherapy practice to nature therapy. That’s also why I launched this newsletter just over a year ago—so I could share the joys of nature’s healing power with a wider audience.
(That’s where you come in. Can you imagine how delighted I am that y’all are scattered all over North America, Australia, the UK, and South Africa? It’s a global thing! We nature lovers are everywhere!)
By way of introducing myself to you, I want to share a snippet from my upcoming book, Good Eye, Bad Eye: A Memoir of Trauma and Truth. The book will be out, hopefully, late this spring or early summer. It’s not specifically about nature therapy but there’s a chapter which traces the timeline of my development as a psychotherapist. In that chapter, I talk about how I discovered nature therapy—and why I call the Earth my “co-therapist.”
Even though the book isn’t out yet, I’ve started the process of recording an audible version, in my own voice. My friend BJ Callahan is a talented musician, piano teacher, and sound engineer who owns FNKY Music Studios.
Here’s me, getting ready to record the first few chapters at BJ’s studio:
And here’s me, reading a passage from Chapter 7, “The Brain’s Smoke Alarm.”
In closing, let me say again—actually, let me shout it from a mountaintop: I’m so happy you are here and that you too value the reciprocal relationship we humans have with the natural world. I know you understand how precious and fragile our Earth is. You get it. That’s why you’re here. That’s why we’re clustered in these little corners of the Internet, reaffirming to each other how much we care.
Blessings to you, good friends, and I’ll see you again soon,
Jeanne
I'm sending a virtual hug to 499 people. I can actually hug myself. I'm so glad to be here learning what you know, which is: we need to end trauma AND earth-trauma.
Love the audio and will look forward to the book. Bless you for following the path that opened up for you and making it a way for those you help in their time of dilemma.