#86. What I Took Home from the Arts & Health Conference: Some Healthcare Questions Are Actually Life Questions

Last Friday, I travelled to Rotterdam to attend the Arts & Health Conference at Erasmus University. For the first time in a long while, I didn't have to explain what I do. I stepped into a room full of artists, researchers, healthcare professionals, and creators who all shared a similar belief: that art can play a meaningful role in health, wellbeing, and recovery.

One of the things that stayed with me most was a simple sentence that seemed to return throughout the day:

"Some healthcare questions are actually life questions."

The more I listened, the more I realised how true that is.

When nature, art and mental health meet

We live in a society that is constantly switched on. More and more people are struggling with stress, burnout, grief, loneliness, and major life transitions. Yet not every form of suffering can be solved with a diagnosis, a treatment plan, or another item on a to-do list.

Sometimes what people need most is something much simpler: space, attention, meaning, and the freedom to feel what is already there.

One example from the conference touched me deeply. I heard about artists working one-on-one with people living with dementia in their own homes. Not as healthcare professionals arriving with a treatment plan, but as fellow human beings creating something together. Through art, memories, emotions, identity, and connection can become accessible again in ways that words sometimes cannot reach.

It reminded me that art is not simply decoration. It can become a bridge back to ourselves.

The Difference Between Curing and Healing

A key insight from the conference was the distinction between curing and healing. Curing focuses on solving a problem. Healing is something different. It is about restoring meaning, connection, dignity, and a sense of wholeness, even when a situation cannot be fixed. That distinction resonates deeply with my own experience.

When I lost my parents, nature did not take away my grief. It did not provide answers or make the pain disappear. What it offered was something quieter but equally valuable: space. During long walks with my camera, my attention slowly shifted away from the constant noise in my head toward the details around me. The light falling on a flower. Patterns in ice. A landscape standing completely still in the early morning mist. In those moments, I wasn't solving anything. I was simply breathing again.

The EARTH Method and Healing Nature Photography

Much of what I heard during the conference reflected what I have been developing over the past few years through the EARTH Method.

A way of looking where nature photography is not only about creating beautiful images, but about slowing down enough to become present again. To me, nature is not just the subject of a photograph. It is a mirror for what is happening within us.

That is why I am currently working on a book and a card deck centered around healing nature photography. Not because nature offers quick fixes, but because it can help us reconnect with ourselves during times when life feels overwhelming, uncertain, or broken.

If you are navigating grief, burnout, stress, or another major life transition, you may not need another productivity system or self-help strategy. Sometimes the first step is simply slowing down long enough to notice what is already present. For me, nature photography became that doorway. Perhaps that is ultimately what art and nature can offer us. Not solutions, but a place where everything we carry is allowed to exist.

And sometimes, that is exactly where healing begins.