Connecting to Nature: Ecotherapy with Fi Garrard

Why is our connection to nature so important? How can coaching and therapy in nature be more powerful than sitting inside a room? And if we know nature is so beneficial for us, how can we begin to deal with the grief of losing it?

Fi Garrard is an outdoor counsellor, youth worker, gardener and dreamer based in Cornwall, UK. Her work is primarily outside and all about helping people connect to and be healed through the natural world. "Whether this is expressing grief about the climate crisis in a group or learning about growing vegetables", Fi says, "every encounter brings us closer to our true nature and healing in our inner world creating, I believe real change in the outer world".

As one of my topics closest to my heart, Nature Connection will provide the backbone to the next few episodes. In this episode, Fi and I discuss her work as an outdoor therapist and the transformational power that being in nature can have on her clients, before we delve into the wider issues of dealing with climate grief, trusting in Gaia, and how we might explain our exploitative relationship with the earth.