Bringing the essence of the woods to me

I know a lot of people who suffer from depression, anxiety, social anxiety, fear, stress, migraines that are triggered by the above at times. I am one of those people.
While it can be hard to talk about at times because I know I am not weak, but while it is happening the feeling is that of helplessness. Also for me acknowledging it verbally is, well it is not something I generally like to do. It is as if I accept defeat by acknowledging it happens. I am a fighter and not one to lay down and roll over accepting defeat.

I have tried lots of herbal remedies for the above in single and multi herb blends. I have also tried vitamin, naturopathy, just not prescriptions. I refuse to take those particular prescriptions as I usually end up experiencing any and all bad side effects with prescriptions. I have taken prescriptions for migraines but they never showed any positive result, so I stopped taking them.

I was doing more research on the subject tonight and I was feeling frustrated that all I was seeing were all the herbs I already know and have tried.
Now this is not to say that some of those might not work for some people, but if you are like me at all, taking a sedative herb like passionflower, whether it calms your body down or not, your mind is what keeps you awake. Basically I end up laying in bed tired as all hell with no chance of falling asleep.

Some herbs help mildly if I happen to have them at the very beginning of that off feeling I get before something comes at me full force.

Most don’t even take the edge off. I would not accept that I have to live this way.
Everything could be fine and I could feel down or have a panic attack for almost no reason. It is scary to have something like that happen and not have a definitive reason for why you can’t stop the hurt feeling in your chest. I usually chalk it up to being stressed for too long and it finally catching up with me.

I am explaining this because I had an interesting thought… One I cannot wait to test out my theory on.

I was reading this article. Don’t ask me which because I read far too many tonight to even begin to remember… And in it this guy was talking about how a lot of peoples stress, depression, anxiety is caused by modern urbanization. This made a lot of sense to me.

One of the few places I am almost never stressed and feel my best is in nature, in a forest, by a stream, on an ocean shore, in my garden. I am not the only one. It is quite known that taking a walk through nature is a stress reliever. 
The writer goes on to talk about how people in more simplistic communities, such as the Amish, who don’t do things quite the same way, tend not to have as much of a problem with stress, anxiety, or depression.

I realized that yes, my fears also can drive depression, attacks, etc, but one common thing with almost all of these things is a feeling of being disconnected. Either disconnected to myself, others, my surroundings, a situation… Just over all feeling disconnected and not knowing how to feel connected and grounded despite meditation and will of mind.

After reading that article, which was very brief but really sparked some thoughts, I decided to go about this whole thing a lot differently. Or at least give it a try.

I am always talking about how I need to go out into nature more, or how I need to go forage, how nature is my sanctuary… A big problem is that aside from the occasional hike, or watering my garden, it is not enough for me. I just desire to be out tromping in the woods more than some might.
Knowing that it helps but also knowing I cannot get out in nature as much as my mind and body would like is frustrating to say the least.
Everyone *well, most everyone* has to work, has responsibilities, and other things that will take up most of their time. You can’t just do whatever you want to do every day of the year. You have to plan things out and sometimes plans fall through.

This is what got me thinking. Understanding what causes my triggers, and what helps keep them at bay, I came to an interesting thought. What if I had been looking at this herbal formulation the wrong way? None of those herbs quite do the job that are commonly used for stress, depression, anxiety… If the forest works for me, which is also probably why I am growing things inside and out… How can I bring that feeling I get when I walk through a wild landscape with me when I am in a urban concrete environment?

So this time when I am experimenting with a new herbal aid for these things, I will be trying to use ingredients and scents most commonly found in the woods. Try to bring the essence of the forest to my senses and see if it actually helps more than previous failed attempts. Honestly of everything so far, in theory this makes the most sense to me.

So now I have to come up with a list of (obviously safe to ingest) things to gather from the woods for my next herbal formulation. It needs to be well rounded and may take some time to mull over. Replicating some scents will not be easy as I will not be putting dirt in my herbal remedy laughs but I will do what I can to bring the essence of the forest into a little herbal concoction, smell or no smell, that will hopefully have the intended affect.
I also need to decide upon the type of preparation for the blend i.e tincture, syrup, lozenge, tea.

I will most certainly be needing to go on another wildcrafting adventure to gather fresh supplies for this once I get a list down.