Blog

The deep connection between body psychotherapy and ecopsychology is engaging a new generation of clients. Emma Palmer, a relational body psychotherapist and wild therapist, contemplates the continuum between these two practices from her green(ish) corner of Bristol.

How can taking photos of nature help clients to process grief? Following a sudden bereavement, professional photographer and transpersonal arts counsellor Sisi Burn started taking walks with her camera. The result was a powerful and transformative dialogue with herself – an approach that could be accessible to any client with a cameraphone.

At first, the pandemic forced therapy online. Now, it is encouraging us to step outdoors. Ecopsychotherapist Lara Just has been meeting clients on Hampstead Heath and in rural locations for years. As we continue to mark Mental Health Awareness Week, with its 2021 theme of ‘nature’, the founder of The Walking Therapist recalls how a forest path provided just the challenge one client needed.

Many have rediscovered a deep connection with nature during the pandemic, as the theme of this year’s Mental Health Awareness Week attests. But what is it like to start offering therapy outdoors? From tripping over tree roots to stumbling across transformative metaphors, counsellor Sheila Pope shares her – and her clients’ – journey into ecotherapy.

While ecotherapy is on the rise, many eco-therapists don’t have a clinical training. Yet, explains Dr Joe Hinds, working in nature is no soft option. Taking client work outside taxes our attentional capacities, necessitates a solid theoretical frame, and often – as the co-editor of Ecotherapy has discovered – demands deep reflexive practice.