By Mareike Sophie Drünkler
There is no foam or tingling salts in this bath. You still feel calmer and cleaner afterwards. Forest bathing is becoming increasingly popular. BZ tried it out.
With forest bathing master Helen Jahn (38) in Schöneiche near Berlin (Oder-Spree district), the course participants can learn how to hug trees properly – and thus become or stay healthy.
Jahn: “Every forest is a source of strength. But this forest is really something very special.” A few snowflakes fall from the sky as we make our way to a small clearing, “the headquarters”. Her eyes light up when she talks about her “love of the forest”.
Helen Jahn (38) is a certified forest bathing master Photo: Ralf Gunther
Six years ago, the singer and musician moved from Friedrichshain to Schöneiche. Job stress, city noise, sensory overload. Jahn wanted out of the city. She found healing in nature: “I had no idea how powerful trees really are!”
Science agrees: Visiting the forest reduces stress, strengthens the immune system and improves mood. That is why forest bathing is also known as forest therapy. There are now 189 certified forest bathing masters in Berlin and Brandenburg alone – trained by the “German Academy for Forest Bathing and Health”.
Jahn’s dream: “A forest music academy. I’m currently looking for a house, fellow campaigners and sponsors with whom I can open an alternative music school here.” Because for this forest fairy, forest bathing and music belong together.
Aids such as mindfulness exercises, individual or team tasks are intended to help course participants to get involved with the forest Photo: Ralf Gunther
And how do you bathe in the forest? “It’s about childlike amazement and opening up,” says Jahn. We stop, close our eyes, feel the forest. We smell the earth, listen, marvel at our surroundings, lean against trees and let them hug us.
Finally a concert. On stage: mushrooms, a tree trunk and Helen Jahn. She knows that some people smile at her work, but she doesn’t mind: “If I succeed in taking away people’s fear of the forest, or I can get a serious, stressed lawyer to drum on a tree trunk, I am I happy.”
2-3 hours for small groups (2-4 participants) 65 euros per person, solo courses 110 euros.