We live in the natural world, even if we are city dwellers. If we are to be healthy, we must be close to our appropriate environment. A shark cannot thrive in a desert, and an orchid cannot live in Siberia. We humans are of the earth, and we must have frequent, intimate contact with the earth if we wish to be well. Health is not merely the absence of disease.
Health is existence that is vigorous, happy, and free of physical or psychological disorder.
Ironically, some of us think that our home is somewhere other than nature. As participants in a complex, excessively stimulating, human-made society, we imagine cities, industries, ideas, and products to be our reality. We imagine that reality is job, mall, house, television, fashion, and the people around us who share these same unnatural yet compelling beliefs. We are out of touch with reality. People who live in simple societies, in Stone Age cultures such as barely remain in New Guinea, Australia, and South America, are never out of touch with their natural environment nor with their appropriate role in relation to that environment.