Leaf Therapy For Your Brain

This 2-minute video about leaves will make your day.

Wherever you are right now, whatever you’re doing, I want you to hit the pause button for exactly two minutes and forty seconds, and watch this video about 3,000 leaves.

Yes, a video about leaves! For real!

I don’t know about you, but I’ve got some bleak midwinter going on outside my window, and the ground squishes brown beneath my feet. But in here, thanks to the pixels in your pocket or on your computer screen, there can still be green. And red. And orange and yellow. Oh, and turn your sound on, too, to get the full immersive effect.

By the way, there’s scientific evidence that suggests simply being in nature is good for our brains. In Japanese, there’s even a term for this — shinrin-yoku, or forest bathing.

And yeah, it would probably be much better if you got up and actually went outside. But it’s Monday, and if you’re like me, you’re on a deadline, and maybe you only have two minutes and some change to spare right now anyway.

Still Jonesing For Nature?

If you’ve still got the itch for some virtual nature content after that, read my latest story for National Geographic. It’s about the little piggies we just can’t seem to get rid of and the threat they pose to our endangered wildlife, our crops, our livestock, and perhaps, even our very selves.

You’ve no doubt heard about feral swine before. But there’s a lot most of us don’t know about these wildly impressive and invasive animals.

READ NOW: “Hogs are running wild in the U.S.—and spreading disease”