In a mountain town like Park City, where vigorous recreation is a common way of life, slowing down can feel counterintuitive, but not every benefit of the outdoors comes from chasing a personal record.
Local practitioners are blending science and slow practice to help people regulate stress, reset attention and reconnect with a sense of belonging in nature. According to therapist Allison Page, during the pandemic, when indoor spaces closed, many residents rediscovered the outdoors as a primary place to heal and connect. That shift helped popularize nature‑based care that had already been taking root here.
Two distinct paths have emerged in town rooted in reconnecting with nature. Forest and nature therapy guide Anne Marie Vivienne invites people to slow down and rekindle childlike wonder. And Page, a psychiatric nurse practitioner and therapist, brings clinical depth to the trail through walk‑and‑talk sessions she’s honed for more than a decade. Both start from the same premise: Nature changes how we feel and how we pay attention — but the experiences they offer feel very different.
Anne Marie Vivienne, the founder of a local nature therapy practice, said that, for many, wellness is measured in elevation gain, burned calories or gear upgrades. But for her, healing can look a lot more like doing nothing.
“A lot of people think they’re already getting their ‘nature therapy’ while mountain biking or hiking,” she said. “But that’s not what I do. I’m not burning calories. I’m sitting. I’m listening. I’m letting the trees hold me.”
Vivienne leads immersive, three-hour experiences that encourage participants to unplug and reconnect with the natural world at a pace that can be unexpectedly slow. She jokes that those who join her may move only 30 feet during the entire session. But that, she says, is the point.
“We’ve been taught to associate being outside with performance. My goal is to shift that. Nature therapy is about resting in presence and rediscovering a sense of wonder. It’s a homecoming.”
A typical session includes sensory “invitations” that guide participants into deeper awareness, inviting them to notice motion, texture, or even taste while sitting still. The group then regroups to share reflections, and each session closes with tea brewed from local foraged herbs. It’s not a hike, and it’s definitely not a workout, she said.
The roots of nature therapy — or Shinrin-yoku, Japanese for “forest bathing” — go back to Japan in the 1980s, when doctors began prescribing time in nature to combat stress and illness. Vivienne incorporates this context, but she also deliberately downplays the scientific data in favor of something more personal.
“Will it lower your cortisol levels? Absolutely. Does it help people with inflammatory issues? Absolutely. But for me, I like to center on the joy of it and the ease of it,” she said. “We rarely let ourselves do something easy in our culture. And I think a lot of us are stressed out because we feel like we have to be constantly progressing or improving.”
Vivienne said that not everyone arrives ready to embrace the practice. Some participants come with skepticism or resistance to getting their hands dirty. But in her experience, even the most reluctant eventually dive into the experience.
“By the third invitation, they’re off the bench and in the grass,” she laughed.
Vivienne’s path to nature therapy is deeply personal. After years of working in the outdoor industry and navigating the pressures of a fast-paced, image-driven lifestyle, she was burnt out. An autoimmune diagnosis forced her to slow down and ultimately led her to embrace a more intuitive, healing relationship with the natural world, she said.
“I think the trees miss us,” she said. “When I go out, I’m reciting poetry to the trees, like, here’s my gift to you or I’m singing, or I’m humming.”
She added that many people hold environmental grief whether we realize it or not, and connecting with nature helps ease that burden.
For Vivienne, nature therapy isn’t about fixing people or producing outcomes. It’s about remembering how to belong.
“We don’t visit nature; we are nature,” she said. “This rhythm is our rhythm.”
Allison Page, founder of Trailtalk, has taken therapy outdoors locally for more than a decade. A nurse since 1980 with her first master’s in pediatrics, she later earned a psychiatric nursing degree.
“It was during grad school that I realized that I was more stressed out than I’ve ever been, and I thought, ‘Here I am trying to promote and encourage self care with my clients, and I have no self care,” said Page.
While walking her dog, she realized the cathartic power of being outdoors felt more therapeutic than any hour inside. The idea struck her with clarity, this was her therapy, and she went home inspired. After learning about a therapist pioneering the concept in New York, she decided to bring it west, she said. In 2009, she trademarked Trailtalk and began meeting clients outside, helping pioneer walk-and-talk therapy in mainstream private practice.
“We’re really trying to approach you from a place of wellness, not illness, so I really work to switch the paradigm to say we all fall in and out of mental wellness,” said Page.
She reassures clients that mental health ebbs and flows; they’re the seasons of life, she said, and like catching a bad virus, crises can feel dire, but they’re usually temporary and treatable.
Her sessions might unfold on the Rail Trail, near a stream in East Canyon or at a picnic table in Willow Creek. She chooses locations for their accessibility as much as scenery. Side‑by‑side walking allows intermittent eye contact and tends to feel less clinical, especially for those new to therapy, she said.
For clients who prefer not to walk, she’ll sit outdoors. She also offers telehealth and remote walk‑and‑talk by phone or FaceTime so both therapist and client can move in their own green spaces.
Page blends her training in eye movement desensitization and reprocessing (EMDR), cognitive-behavioral therapy and mindfulness with lifestyle coaching, and she prescribes medication conservatively as part of a collaborative plan. She talks with clients about sleep, nutrition and daily habits, brings in metaphors that fit their lives and even uses music and movement — from positive‑mood playlists to hula hoops and balance boards — to challenge negative self‑talk and broaden the ways people find joy.
“Nature is my therapeutic ally. It’s my office,” she said.
Walking itself, she said, can be part of the medicine. The bilateral movement of putting one foot in front of the other helps drop the emotional intensity of a problem and makes room for clarity. Fresh air, open space and the chemistry of being outside do the rest.
Many of her clients are navigating grief, illness, family‑systems friction or the hidden pressures of high‑performance lives; she positions herself as a “salesperson for hope” and refers people to higher levels of care when that’s what’s needed.
Choosing an approach to connecting with nature and choosing a therapeutic option comes down to personality, goals and personal needs. Some people crave a restorative pause that re‑enchants their relationship with place. Others want a therapeutic plan that can include trauma‑focused work and, when appropriate, medication management. In Park City, both options are close by and led outdoors.
For more information Park City Nature Therapy led by Anne Marie Vivienne, see parkcitynaturetherapy.com. For more information on TrailTalk walking with nature led by Allison Page, see trailtalk.com.