THE QUIET CURE

Latife discusses making nature part of one’s daily life in this self-help guide.

Each of this book’s short chapters provides a nature-focused meditation on an antidote to the cognitive fatigue caused by the unnatural busyness of life in the digital age; these include forest bathing, restoring attention, digital detoxing, reconnecting with the body through movement, finding nature in urban environments, living in harmony with the seasons, honoring transitions, coexisting with grief, and recognizing the sacredness of the small. These topics build on one another, but can be absorbed separately as needed. The closing reflections in each chapter offer the reader a way to sit with the teachings and provide instructions to practice them (the personal anecdotes sprinkled throughout make the work seem simple). Though Latife alludes to many scientific studies about the importance of nature, the author names few specifics, instead conveying a wisdom that feels instinctual and ancestral—the work serves as an expanded contemplation for anyone who found comfort in ‘touching grass’ during the Covid-19 pandemic. The author discusses biophilia, “our innate, biological connection to the natural world”; the health benefits of natural soundscapes; and the ways in which water can produce a “calm, meditative state” called Blue Mind. Filled with soothing sentences and gentle calls to center the senses (noticing the “coolness of shade on your skin,” “the last leaf clinging to a branch before drifting silently to the ground,” or the way a spiderweb “glimmers with dew”), the text evokes the careful attention of an artist. This slim volume would sit well next to Aldo Leopold’s A Sand County Almanac (1949) or Undrowned: Black Feminist Lessons From Marine Mammals (2020) by Alexis Pauline Gumbs as a reminder of how rekindling a relationship with nature can return us to our better selves.

A quiet yet forceful call to reconnect with the natural world.