Taking Back Nature: Why Mindfulness in the Natural World Belongs to All of Us

There was a time when nature belonged to everyone. Not legally, not in the sense of land deeds and property lines, but in the shared rhythm of living. Farmers tilled soil not for sport but for sustenance. Workers walked to factories along dirt paths bordered by wildflowers. Children played in streets that had not yet been paved over, climbing trees, wading in creeks, staining their clothes with grass and dust. Nature was not an escape. It was simply life.

But in the 21st century, the simple act of being outdoors has been stolen and repackaged. Hiking boots that cost more than a week’s wages. Wellness retreats tucked into pristine mountain ranges, advertised with minimalist fonts and price tags reserved for the affluent. National parks commodified into destinations for those who can afford the entrance fees, the gas, the time off work. Nature—what was once our commons—has become the playground of the one percent.

And that is the crisis. Not only ecological collapse, but spiritual exclusion. We are told that “mindfulness” means a $40 yoga class or a three-day stay in a glamping resort. We are told that to connect with the earth we must purchase, subscribe, or retreat. The green silence of forests and the humility of sitting under the stars have been co-opted, branded, and resold to us as a lifestyle. This is not only insulting. It is dangerous. Because when access to nature is restricted by class, it divorces most of humanity from the very ground beneath their feet.

The truth is this: nature does not need our money. It needs our presence. Our attention. Our participation. And that participation cannot be the exclusive right of those who already control so much. Blue-collar workers, office clerks, service staff, teachers, parents—our lives are bound up in systems that profit from our alienation, that keep us tethered to fluorescent lights and glowing screens. And in that alienation, the one percent thrive. If we cannot touch the land, we cannot fight for it. If we cannot see the stars, we cannot imagine more than the ceilings we live under.

To reclaim nature is therefore not just leisure, but resistance. Walking to the park instead of the mall. Planting a garden in a vacant lot. Fishing off the pier with your children, not because it is chic, but because it is life. Eating lunch under a tree on your break instead of scrolling endlessly inside. These small acts remind us that we are not consumers of nature but participants in it. They resist the notion that connection to the earth is something you must buy.

This reclamation is also a matter of justice. Historically, it has always been the working class, the poor, the marginalized who bear the worst costs of environmental devastation. Floods and heat waves do not discriminate, but they destroy most brutally where resources are few. Polluted air does not hover over penthouses; it settles in the lungs of those who cannot afford to leave industrial corridors. Climate catastrophe will not first dismantle the wealthiest enclaves—it will erode the homes of those already balancing survival. And so, it is not merely fair, but necessary, that everyday people re-root themselves in the natural world. The fight to preserve it depends on us.

The romanticism of the one percent—that pristine mountaintop photo op, that wellness brand’s curated forest walk—is hollow without laborers building roads, janitors cleaning facilities, cooks preparing the retreat’s meals. Working people already sustain these “elite” encounters with nature; what we must do now is sustain our own. Without needing permission. Without needing to buy in.

To engage with nature again is to assert that we belong here. That the quiet of a sunrise belongs to the nurse getting off night shift as much as it does to the tech executive at a weekend spa. That a child in a housing project deserves to hear birdsong and feel soil between their fingers as much as any family vacationing in a national park lodge. To breathe fresh air, to see open sky, to feel grass against skin—these are not luxuries. They are rights.

If we leave nature in the hands of the elite, it will remain a commodity. But if we, the many, return to it—if we make it part of our daily rhythms, our rituals, our communities—it becomes what it always was: a common inheritance. Not a retreat from life, but the ground of life itself.

To take back nature is to take back our humanity. And that is not something we can afford to outsource.