How Birding Can Help Our Mental Health

It's 2022 and 45-year-old trauma survivor Kelly Sue O'Connor groans when she awakens. From the knots in her stomach and the feeling of doom, she knows this is going to be one of those days when she'll have to fight the urge to end it all.

So she drives down to Erieau Beach in search of birds. The only things which can settle her mind when her thoughts go off the rails. When O'Connor arrives, she throws herself onto her stomach, burrowing down into the soft sand. A few minutes later a Ruddy Turnstone, a shore bird with neon orange legs, alights and starts hopping around her, foraging for food.  

As she locks her eyes on the exotic being descended from dinosaurs, she's awash in wonder. Questions about the creature — What does he eat? What is he thinking? — pick apart the tangled web in her brain, and her struggles loosen and drift away.

For O'Connor, who lives in Blenheim, Ontario, and suffers from complex post-traumatic stress disorder, birding — the methodical search for, identification, feeding and photography of birds — improved her mental health after more traditional approaches like medication and meditation had failed. Her curiosity about them shifts her thoughts away from her burdens and outwards onto nature's bounty. "When I can connect to things bigger than me," says O'Connor, "it gives me something else to think about."  

She is mesmerized by a moment of magic. As she connects to the Ruddy Turnstone dancing around her, she's liberated from the prison of her preoccupations and enters into a larger sphere of being. "I think of how big the world is and how little my problems are," she says. Two hours later, she stumbles to her feet, shakes the sand from her clothes and drives home. She feels cleansed and composed.

This epiphany infuses her universe with meaning and chases out the earlier thoughts of suicide. "When I see those birds, she says,"it makes me want to keep looking," says O'Connor. "It gives me a reason to be here."

O'Connor is not alone. According to a U.S. Fish and Wildlife Survey, the popularity of birding has more than doubled since 2016. In 2022, 96.3 million Americans enjoyed birdwatching, 58% over the age of 55.  Many of them are retired and have more time to spend on leisure activities,  says licensed marriage and family therapist Tammah Watts, who lives in San Diego, California.

Cutting-edge research is corroborating the benefits of birding. In a 2024 study conducted by Professor Nils Peterson from North Carolina University, researchers randomly allocated participants to a weekly birdwatching hike (where students counted birds), a nature walk, or no specific activity. Afterwards, the nature walkers reported more positive feelings and less distress than the control group, but the birdwatchers' wellbeing trumped that of the other two.     

Academics are pinpointing the mechanisms behind these findings. For starters, nature is a force of healing, says Professor Cynthia Frantz of Oberlin College and Conservatory. Surrounded by greenery, far from our cell phones and computers, our blood pressure, heart rates and stress hormones all decrease.   

Our mental energy is also revitalized by nature. According to Attention Restoration Theory, the brain tires when it spends too much time laser focused on tasks, a mode of concentration called "hard fascination." But natural objects engage us spontaneously and effortlessly, giving our minds a break. This replenishes our attentional capacity and ability to problem solve.

Being in nature also promotes a feeling of connection. Since we evolved in the wilderness, we still feel most at home there, says Frantz. Our ability to merge with our environment alleviates loneliness and satisfies our primal yearning to belong. This sense of kinship with the external world lessens our self-absorption, enabling us to find creative solutions to problems, adds Frantz.

O'Connor has reaped all these benefits from nature. Hiking on a trail, she feels "calmer" in her body and "quieter" in her mind. She also thinks more clearly. "I'm … able to make better decisions," she says. Connecting to the wilderness is also therapeutic. "There's nothing better than feeling a part of nature," she says.  

Enjoying this experience with fellow birders strengthens O'Connor's ties to other people. "I feel so revived by having those friends and shared interests," she says. Hoping to inspire others to join her ranks, O'Connor is creating a documentary, "Birder Brain," which recounts her healing journey as well as that of others.

O'Connor had been in rough shape before birding came into her life. She suffered from depression, anxiety and a severe eating disorder, and was often holed up in her apartment, crying. "I wasn't really sure what my life purpose was," she says.

Then one day O'Connor found an abandoned yellow canary in a back alley. She scooped him up, took him home and made him her best friend. She cycled everywhere with Banana Bird, celebrated his birthdays and let the tone-deaf pet accompany her when she composed music. O'Connor began looking after herself for his sake, drinking less and coming home earlier after work. "If something happens to me," she thought, "who's going to take care of this bird?"

After he died, O'Connor transferred her love for him to a passion for all avian creatures. On her first birding expedition to Toronto's High Park, she was so bent on locating a Baltimore Oriole that she forgot everything else. Soon O'Connor began hiking on nature trails twice a week to search for, identify and photograph birds. But on other occasions she let her mind drift as she watched them and wondered about their lives.

"There are so many different parts to a bird to understand," she says. "It piques my interest so much." Whether she's engaged in deliberate activities or just passively taking in the scene, the birds redirect her mind. "I'm so focused on the birds," she says, "and not really thinking about my challenges."  

Birding does, indeed, give us a holiday from our problems, says Peterson. As you're listening carefully and looking for colors and movement, your focus is outwards. "It sucks you in," says Peterson.  

Birding also absorbs us unconsciously. They're objects of soft fascination, says Watts, inherently interesting and able to draw our senses involuntarily to them. That diverts attention away from sadness, isolation and loneliness, says Watts, author of "Keep Looking Up: Your Guide to the Powerful Healing of Birdwatching."

Peterson agrees. "Birds are all different colors and shapes and sizes and do funny things," he says. "And looking at neat stuff makes you happy."

Birds can also generate a state of mindfulness. This is a mode in which you're fully aware of yourself and your environment. As you're immersed into the birds' lives — flying, swooping, hopping, chirping — your fears for tomorrow and regrets about yesterday recede, says Watts. "You find yourself in the present." This practice is known to boost our spirits.

Birding helped tether O'Connor into each unfolding moment. "As a person with pretty severe anxiety," says O'Connor, "I was always struggling with thoughts about the past and the future." But during her nature hikes these distractions abated. As O'Connor stopped, sat still, and trained her mind on the birds and other natural phenomena, she was pulled firmly into the now. This shift persisted even after she left the scene. "I would be more relaxed and more present," she says.

Birding also brought blessings for the now 55-year-old Aaric Eisenstein during his own time of turmoil. When COVID hit, says the Austin, Texas resident, who calls himself "The Avian Rebbe" (a rebbe is a community leader in Jewish parlance), "I was struggling…grappling with death on a huge scale."

Eisenstein had always been attracted to the flight, songs and brilliant plumage of birds. Now, seeking an antidote to despair, Eisenstein bought himself a camera, and began walking daily through nearby parks, teaching himself the technical and artistic aspects of bird photography. "When you have that level of focus," he says, "all of the other less valuable, less wonderful thoughts in your mind get pushed out."  

Birdsong was especially restorative for Eisenstein. Two birds – the Northern Cardinal and the wren – are the first to sing in the morning, and their tunes would recall the Jewish prayers sung at sunrise. Hearing birds chirp makes Eisenstein feel "joyful," he says."I feel invited – it's like they're creating a welcoming environment I want to move into."

Birdsong is known to be beneficial. One study found that participants who listened to this natural music were considerably less depressed, anxious and paranoid afterwards. Peterson (who was not involved in the experiment) hypothesizes that the melody is a "pleasant acoustic experience" that "distracts you from stress." Our love of birdsong might also have an evolutionary basis. "Birds are singing," says Peterson, "when there are no predators."

For some, birds can even galvanize a state of awe. This emotion arises when we encounter vast mysteries that we don't understand, and is often accompanied by goosebumps, according to Professor Daniel Keltner of Berkeley University, an expert on awe. The unexpected presence of a nearby bird, or a hummingbird hovering over a flower, can elicit this wonder, says Watts. Birds especially amaze us when they soar overhead. "They symbolize…the capacity to rise above it all," she says.

These moments of awe lift our spirits and diminish our pessimism. During these periods our consciousness expands as the Default Mode Network, the brain area associated with self-reflective processes, gets deactivated. The resulting reduction in ruminations allows us to merge with the bigger world outside our heads, promoting a sense of wholeness that enriches us with new meaning.  

For Eisenstein, awe inspired by birds and nature have kindled a spiritual reawakening. Watching birds streak across the sky feels "incredible," he says. Flight is innately spiritual, says Eisenstein. There's something deep in the human psyche that resonates with birds and recalls the angels with their wings, he says.

Views of natural beauty unclench his muscles and broaden his perspective. "I'm just a little speck on a big rock," he says, "part of a larger system." For the rebbe, this expanded sense has brought him closer to the divine and has deepened his faith.

Eisenstein's new insights have reduced his anxiety and ignited a sense of purpose. "I'm deeper and richer," he says. He's shared his newfound wisdom with his community through social media, videos, a podcast, lectures and two books; the latest is "The Avian Rebbe Stretches His Wings." He's spurred many of his listeners to embark on their own spiritual journeys inspired by birding and natural beauty. "To have a positive impact on people's lives," says Eisenstein, "is very gratifying."

Vivien Fellegi is a former physician whose favorite part of medicine was listening to her patients' stories. She went back to school to study journalism, and today writes about psychology and social issues.
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