That space there.

Hi, it's Florence Williams here.

Welcome to Radio Headspace and to Friday of National Parks Week.

Thanks so much for having me as your guest host this week.

It's been great to share all the ways that nature can improve our lives.

Now if you've been thinking all this is great, but you live in a city, nature isn't really

that accessible, then this episode is for you.

And the millions of people who have struggled to find a green space, myself included.

Today I'll talk about how I personally adjusted to city life, why green space is so important

to urban planning, and how nature isn't as far away as you may think.

So I was fortunate enough to live in the Rocky Mountains for a couple of decades.

I lived in Colorado, I lived in Montana, and I had this kind of daily, even almost hourly

connection to the natural world because I could see the mountains from my windows and I was

often in them.

And then when my family moved to Washington, D.C., it was a pretty dramatic change.

I felt like I was surrounded by gray.

I was surrounded by concrete.

So much noise.

I definitely felt really out of sorts.

I felt more anxious, I had more trouble sleeping.

These effects that I was feeling are well documented in urban populations.

Urban populations do suffer from more anxiety.

...