How much time do you spend outside?
On average children in the UK are spending just 16 minutes a day outdoors. This is just one of the many depressing statistics regarding the next generation.
According to the office for national statistics, our screen addicted children are not alone in living the life of a hermit. Over 40% of British office workers unable to manage more than 15 minutes per day on average.
A sedentary, indoor-based lifestyle, amongst many things, carries a higher risk of health concerns, including elevated sugar and fat levels in the body.
Many of us choose to spend our lunch breaks indoors. Within this break we could use the opportunity to eat outside, at least for a fraction of our break. This small change could drastically improve our lives.
We are far more sophisticated and advanced socially than our hunter gatherer ancestors but biologically we are unchanged. We still need daylight to exist.
Fortunately more and more people are starting to engage in outdoor activities, enjoying the natural environment than previously recorded. The proportion of adults visiting natural environments and landscapes at least once a week has grown 8% to 62%.
Visiting woodlands, parks and reserves should be a thing of routine, even if we live in cities far away from rural locations. You're never too far away from a tree.
If we can't make time to appreciate nature, then how can we expect our kids to?
