They say spending time in nature can change your life. But in a world packed with indoor life pressures, how can you make getting outside just a part of who you are?
Welcome to the Humans Outside podcast, where we explore life in the great outdoors from our perch in Alaska, all while hearing from fascinating outdoor-minded guests.
Hitting 1,300 days in a row of heading outside for at least 20 consecutive and starting work on a book proposal has Amy thinking about the gifts of building an outdoor habit and the things she’s learned from heading outside.
In this Outdoor Diary Amy shares just a few of the things she’s learned during her outdoor diary.
[:27] Amy’s outdoor experiment
[1:25] The first few things Amy learned
[1:52] What Amy has learned after 1300 days
[4:30] The gift of the outdoors
We’ve spent years thinking about and experiencing going outside impacts your life. But we never once realized that getting into nature would help us learn how to forgive. But all of that changed when we found the work of Sara Schulting Kranz. A wilderness guide, a life and leadership coach and a certified Multidimensional Partner Trauma Model therapist, Sara’s book, Walk Through This, guides readers through getting to forgiveness and understanding the freedom it gives by heading outside.
In this episode of Humans Outside Sarah shares her powerful story and insights on how nature and getting outside can bring you to a powerful place of forgiveness.
[2:11] Saraa Schulting Kranz’s favorite outdoor space
[3:38] How Saraa got where she is today
[10:41] What nature teaches about comfort zones
[14:57] How doing hard things outside helps us forgive
[16:51] The definition of “forgiveness”
[20:27] Why it’s different than forgetting
[22:49] Why nature is a great vehicle for healing
[25:47] The difference between goal and intention
[35:44] The journey of forgiveness
[39:59] How nature fits into that journey
[42:16] Sara’s most essential and favorite outdoor gear
[45:01] Sara’s favorite outdoor moment
How are you embracing spring? In Alaska it means marking the Vernal Equinox and finding ways to lean into those bright spring sunshine hours. Hear in this Outdoor Diary how Amy is doing that, plus details on how to submit your crazy wildlife story and appear on an upcoming Humans Outside episode.
[:30] The significance of Spring Equinox
[1:52] Finding your passion outside
[2:28] Pandemic reflections
[2:50] How Amy got outside this week
[3:32] You could be on the Humans Outside Podcast!
Hetty Key was so curious about how people experience the outdoors and what it does to their lives and attitudes, that she started her own research company to look specifically at women in sport. Her U.K-based firm, Women in Adventure, has now produced three studies on women in the outdoors. In this episode she walks us through her findings about mental health and nature, detailed in her 2019 report on her Mental Wellbeing Survey. We loved hearing her most surprising discoveries, and how we can use her findings to fuel our everyday life outdoors.
[1:54] Hetty Key’s favorite outdoor space
[2:59] How Hetty became someone who liked to go outside
[5:40] How she found something she likes to do outside
[9:45] All about Hetty’s research
[15:57] What Hetty’s research shows about mental health and adventure
[17:24] What is adventure?
[20:24] This many women thought adventure has a positive impact on wellbeing
[21:40] Breaking down mental wellbeing
[24:52] Why do some activities help mental health more than others?
[26:22] How does going outside impact how women see themselves?
[35:10] Why she didn’t look at “dosage”
[42:42] Hetty’s favorite and most essential outdoor gear
[45:12] Hetty’s favorite outdoor moment
One thing you may not know about Amy is that she hates birthday parties. Like, cannot stand them. In this outdoor diary, find out what the Bushatz family does instead and how they make heading outside part of every birthday!
[:27] Amy and Birthday parties
[:56] A Bushatz family tradition
[2:32] Ice fishing for Huck Day
[4:30] The PANTS!
[4:42] Back to running
So often when we think about heading outside, we think about what it’s doing for our body and emotions — how we feel. But time in nature and, specifically, doing things outside your comfort zone has a real impact on your brain, which then has an impact on everything else. And one of those brain things is creativity.
In this episode, positive psychologist and creativity expert Cordele Glass talks to us about how spending time in nature works with our brains to put us in what he calls an upward spiral, increasing our well-being and specifically making us more creative. He also tells us how we can harness that experience for our own lives.
[2:25] Cordele Glass’s favorite outdoor space
[4:27] How definitions impacted his outdoor journey
[6:55] How he got into the study of positive psychology
[18:41] What is creativity?
[21:09] Does everyone have creativity within them?
[22:51] The difference between being creative and being good at something
[26:03] The impact of mindset
[29:35] How nature impacts creativity
[33:44] All about the upward spiral
[37:51] How spending time outside impacts the upward spiral
[43:23] Two ways listeners can increase their creativity outside
[48:13] Cordele’s favorite and most essential outdoor gear
[49:32] Cordele’s favorite outdoor moment
If you’ve been following the Unplugging Challenge, you know Amy was trying to unplug over her outdoor time each day for a week. So what did the challenge teach her? Here she shares what she learned over the seven days of unplugging that you might want to know, too.
[:25] Amy’s technology problem
[2:08] Amy’s most recent challenge
[2:36] What she learned
[4:15] Alaska seasons
[5:16 ] This week’s Outdoor Hero
Tim Moss thought the key to having a life focused on outdoor challenges was to them his job. But instead the UK-based adventurer found that adventure work brought fewer adventures to his life, so he shifted his mindset to make adventure a part of regular life — and help others fund theirs through his Challenge Grants program.
Listen to Tim’s thoughts on leaving life as a professional adventurer and how to incorporate outdoor adventures into your normal, everyday life.
[1:28] Tim’s favorite outdoor space
[2:41] What is ‘Around the World in 80 Ways?’
[4:13] Psychological vs. physical adventure
[8:16] Why he left adventuring for a regular job
[11:45] Why adventuring doesn’t need to be full time
[16:04] How adventuring changes once you add kids
[20:31] All about Challenge Grants
[26:11] How to build an adventure during a pandemic
[27:52] Why our definition of “adventure” is too narrow
[33:00] Tim’s favorite and most essential outdoor gear
[36:07] Tim’s favorite outdoor moment
Learn about Challenge Grants on TheNextChallenge.org
Tim’s favorite outdoor gear: Helly Hanson base layers (affiliate link)
Did you know that the vast majority of New Year resolutions fail by mid-February? If your outdoor habit is feeling wishy-washy, it’s never too late to get it back on track. In this week’s Outdoor Diary episode, Amy talks about re-energizing a lost or slightly broken habit.
[:28] How is your outdoor habit going?
[1:35] Amy’s newest challenge
[3:08] Amy’s week full of snow
[4:03] How to see all our cold weather Outdoor Heroes
[4:15] Where to find Humans Outside
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Episode 95: How to Make Yourself Unplug and Head Outside
What to wear in cold weather
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Find full show notes at humansoutside.com/podcasts/ Join the Humans Outside Challenge: humansoutside.com/challenge/ Follow us on Instagram and share your outdoor life with the hashtag #humansoutside365.
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