Why you Should Take Micro Breaks in the Garden

Taking simple, 5-minute micro-nature breaks can improve the rest of your day and transform your mental health (source). These short, intentional interactions with the outdoors can improve mood, reduce cortisol levels, and boost focus while reducing long-term stress. 

Whether you’re working from home or just getting the chores done, our garden experts have assembled some easy garden-based micro break ideas.

The Science Behind Micro-Nature Breaks 

Outdoor break spaces can help you feel good immediately, but science also shows that regular garden breaks can have a cumulative effect, helping your mental health improve over time. Even a few minutes spent in the garden, or simply sitting in your garden office can:

• • Lower stress hormones: Cortisol is a hormone produced by the adrenal system and is an indicator of stress levels in the body. Spending just a few minutes in nature can lower cortisol levels and reduce overall stress.
  • Improve focus: The brain enjoys connecting with nature and taking breaks from computer-focused tasks. Regular wellness breaks, particularly outdoors or within sight of the garden can improve focus for the rest of the day. Contrary to what many of us were taught, more breaks can make us more productive at work. 
  • Connect with nature: Maybe you haven’t stopped to listen to birdsong in years. But taking time outdoors reconnects your mind with the beauty of the world around you. Let the natural world inspire you and watch your creativity in the office soar. 
  • Expand your living space: Gardening might be a popular British pastime, but most people don’t make good use of their outdoor space. When you start to use your garden as a regularly enjoyed living space, your home feels bigger. This shift can boost your mood at home and make your space feel brand new.
  • Better sleep: Being cooped up in an office or cubicle all day can detach us from the world outside. Taking regular outdoor breaks keeps your circadian rhythm in check, signalling to your brain with the right hormones for quality sleep. When your brain is connected to the time of day and the season, your sleep improves, and you feel more rested. 

• Create positive habits: New habits can take a few weeks to become permanent, but habits to boost your mental health are well worth investing in. By reducing your stress and boosting your productivity, your new outdoor space can help you implement even more positive habits to improve physical and mental health. 

Garden Micro Break Ideas

You can put your outdoor space to better use in a lot of ways. But what could be more important than your health? The more time you spend outside, the less likely you are to feel stressed and overwhelmed, even during your days off. Committing to 5-minute wellness breaks is a good way to boost your productivity and create good habits that will last a lifetime.

We put together a few ideas to embrace 5-minute nature breaks in your own outdoor space. Relaxation takes many forms, whether it’s quiet mindfulness or hands-on activities to calm your mind, you can create a space and a practice to lower your stress. 

The Garden Room Reset Space

A few minutes in a summer house or cosy outdoor shelter can drastically change your outlook and even change the direction of your day. Just looking at outdoor greenery or pottering in a shed with your hands in the soil can cause big changes in your stress levels, blood pressure, and productivity for the rest of the day.

Some Brits are even starting to enjoy full-time garden office work, as insulated sheds make it easy to work around nature. You might not be there just yet, but even a few minutes outdoors at a time can make a big difference to your overall mental health.

Create your dedicated outdoor office escape with:

• A summer house or garden log cabin with a view of the outdoors
• Easy to access potting materials to quickly tend your plants or herbs for a few minutes at a time
• Outdoor speakers for relaxing music if your garden backs onto a main road
• Warm rugs and comfortable outdoor furniture to make your garden an on-site retreat 

Outdoor Meditation

You may enjoy meditation before bed, or not yet know what the fuss is about. A quick meditation in your garden is one of the easiest ways to implement mindfulness and maintain a relaxed state of mind. 

A fast way to reconnect with your inner self, meditation requires no special equipment, and you can truly start anywhere. But starting in nature can take the results to the next level. 

You can enjoy meditation on a sun lounger, or just as easily stand or sit on a blanket laid out on the patio or lawn.

Meditation can take many forms, including:

• Guided audio meditations and visualizations
• Gentle and relaxing music to calm your mind and soothe your nervous system
• Silent meditations to fully embrace your peace
• Breathing techniques to calm your nervous system
• Chanting and repetitive scripts to help clear your mind
• Listening to affirmations to help your brain embrace ease

Al Fresco Mindfulness for Lunch

Eating outdoors can transform the feel of your day and ensure you are taking time to nourish your body and soul. Countries like Italy, France, and Spain take al fresco dining seriously, and you can create a space and a routine to ease your stress.

You don’t need to wait for your next holiday to dine outdoors, and it doesn’t need to be summer, either. Enjoy the sunny garden rays or bundle up with a toasty fire pit in the winter. You might be surprised at how relaxing this simple change is. 

For quick breaks outside of meal times, embrace wellness in nature with:

• Relaxing herbal teas for quick breaks
• Health-boosting smoothies 
• Revitalizing coffee breaks
• Hydrating water-infusions for a spa-like ambiance
• Protein-rich snacks to fuel the rest of your day

Garden Path Mindful Walk 

For some people, staying still is almost impossible when they try to meditate. If fidgeting, time-pressure, and fear of “doing it wrong” make meditation difficult for you, consider a walking meditation as an alternative. 

Walking meditation involves the same calming mindfulness techniques as sitting meditation, but keeps your body active at the same time. 

Building a meditation walking path into your garden can help set the scene for this intentional me-time. 

Walking meditation can:

• Incorporate your whole outdoor space
• Boost energy levels for the rest of the day
• Help you enjoy meditation when you thought it wasn’t for you
• Keep you physically active
• Help you get started right away

Work With Your Hands in a Tool Shed

The great thing about working with your hands is the flexibility to pick it up and put it down as you need. Creating with wood, building models, or fixing things are great ways to reconnect with our natural instincts. 

Setting your tool shed up in the garden provides a perfect escape for short breaks away from your screens. Enjoy the greenery around you as you focus on building and making as a way to lower your stress levels. 

This practical use of an outdoor shed can:

• Free your mind of work stress with a focus on a task for a few minutes
• Help you refocus when you get back to work
• Give you precious time to complete projects
• Rekindle a love for making things you may have forgotten in adulthood
• Spark your creativity and build your confidence

Creating Micro-Nature Break Spaces 

To create your outdoor wellness space, you can start with what you have. And over time, your personal garden escape will be your favorite part of the home. As you design your break space and expand your practice over time, there are still some things you should consider to make your new outdoor routine as effective and comfortable as possible. 

• • Consider the seasons: Even for 5 minutes at a time, popping outside at lunch can be pretty cold in the wintertime. Using an insulated garden room can keep you warm in the winter, but consider walking meditations and Mediterranean-style outdoor lunch during the summer time. 
  • Add greenery: You may have a plush, emerald lawn to gaze at from your shed. But many folks are working with a patch of concrete. You can slowly build your little paradise escape by adding potted plants, window boxes, and healthy climbing plants. Ensuring you have greenery in view is key to making the most of your outdoor space.
  • Notice the sounds of nature: Even if you love a good guided meditation, most of the time, enjoying natural birdsong and the sound of wind rustling through the trees can relax your nervous system very quickly. Incorporate silence with a background of nature when possible, for the best connection to the natural world. 

• Work with your space: Large and small gardens both have their pros and cons for creating a relaxing space. But sheds, summer houses, and outdoor dining areas can work well in any thoughtfully designed space. Use walls for stability and shade where possible, and study your sunlight before making decisions, so your new garden retreat is placed in the ideal spot.  

• Embrace uplifting scents: The sense of smell has a big effect on mood. We experience it when we get a whiff of a familiar smell. It could be a scent that reminds us of holidays, or the nurturing warmth of autumn. If your outdoor space could use a better scent, incorporate incense, aromatherapy, or scented candles into your outdoor routine.   

• Weatherproof your space: The weather doesn’t need to stop you from enjoying the outdoors, but you do need to prepare for it. Investing in high-quality furniture fabric and weather-friendly outdoor buildings can reduce the time you need to spend maintaining your space. 

• Add heat for ultimate comfort: Don’t let the chilly seasons slow you down. Patio heaters and fire pits can keep you toasty warm while you refocus your mind in the garden. Design your shed with warm upholstery and add insulation for reliable comfort all year round. 

Reclaim Your Peace 5 Minutes at a Time

Micro-nature breaks are a simple but powerful way to reclaim your peace and improve your quality of life. Just a few minutes every day can make all the difference to your stress levels and overall mental health. By creating your wellness space over time, your garden will become a natural extension of your home as you plan, decorate, and arrange it to suit your needs. 

Before long, you’ll wonder how you ever got on without mindful breaks. With a few intentional changes — whether it’s a cosy shed, fire pit, or a comfortable chair with a view — your garden can become a natural extension of your wellbeing routine. At BillyOh, we offer the outdoor essentials to help bring that vision to life.