India, Sept. 19 -- We tend to picture healing as something that happens indoors: a quiet room, a chair, a trained listener, a diagnosis, a plan. Psychotherapy has earned its place in modern mental healthcare, and nothing here argues against it. But a growing body of research suggests well-being is bigger than any consulting room can hold. There is a second, under-used pathway to healing, and it runs through reconnection.

Reconnection with the earth. Reconnection with the body. Reconnection with other people. Reconnection with creativity. Reconnection, ultimately, with life itself.

For most of human history, daily existence was inseparable from sunlight, soil, movement, community and the rhythm of the seasons. Urban, digital life has loo...