When was the last time you intentionally went out into the rain? Not because you had to, but because you wanted to experience the pulse of it on your skin? Because you wanted to sense how it transforms not only the landscapes we live in but the very light we see? 

If you had asked me that same question a couple of years ago, I think I would have answered very firmly in the negative. Quite unconsciously, while I considered the sun to be “good weather” – to be glorious and beautiful everything else was pretty written off as “bad”. Rubbish day at work? Rain had become not a living, fundamental thing, but a metaphor for mood and misery. It was damp and dour. Soaking and sombre. The rain on our parade. 

But then, almost exactly two years ago, came a summer of almost unbearable heat. It was not “nice” weather, it wasn’t “beach” weather, it was a rail-buckling, road-melting, spit-sizzling assault. And as the ponds dried up, the rivers retreated and the fields were left scorched and cracked I started to dream of rain. It was then that I resolved to not just brave ‘inclement’ weather but actively  seek it out and enjoy it: to explore and understand where weather comes from and how it shows us something important about where we live, and something important about being human.    

During the writing of my book In All Weathers, I found through walking, running and swimming in rain – whether it was a heatwave breaking summer storm, a sudden shower or a Cumbrian downpour – that contrary to cultural tropes, there is little sadness to be found in rain. In fact, it is the very opposite. When the clouds burst I found a lightness, a joy that I think was born of just experiencing something truly wild. 

It is a feeling that is backed up by science. In short, when it rains there is not just water in the air. Negative ions are atmospheric molecules charged with electricity. They are most abundant by rivers, beaches and mountains, where air molecules are broken up by moving water and they are there too when it rains. 

These negative ions, which are breathed in, transferred to blood and brain, have been linked with biochemical changes that impact positively on mental health. A 2013 review of scientific literature published between 1957 and 2012, found that negative ions could have therapeutic effects on depression. So, while we might associate rain with gloom and noir and misery, being out in the rain can actually boost our mood. It can make a ‘bad’ day good. 

But for me, the act of seeking out weather, was about something even more important – something that is at the heart of the 30 Days Wild challenge. Taking time to notice helps us to re-engage with the natural world and become more connected to the rhythms of life we are all part of. It helps us change our habits, to view the world through a wilder (and hopefully weather-soaked) lens.