Vitamin N Recommended Dosage: Macrodoses VS Microdoses

Mount Hood, Oregon

You can think of the Holy Grail of outdoor adventure as a "macrodose" of Vitamin Nature. Macrodoses are the epic expeditions that many of us long to embark on: thru-hiking the Appalachian Trail, summiting Mount Everest, pedaling the Tour Divide, climbing El Capitan. 

While perhaps not quite as grand as those bucket list adventures, most multi-day backcountry expeditions count as macrodoses of nature. If you're disconnecting for days at a time and immersing yourself in the wilderness, the impact is immense.

Trying to get a macrodose on the Colorado Trail. Photo: Mike H.

In the middle, we have normal-sized doses of nature: a day hike to climb a 14er, an epic mountain bike ride, whitewater rafting a rugged river, paragliding through the Alps, and so much more.

Getting my normal hit of Vitamin N. Tucson, Arizona. Photo: Marcel Slootheer

On the low end of the scale, we have "microdoses": taking the dog for a walk, taking a break from a long interstate drive to go walk a mile, pedaling to the grocery store.

Microdose in Berlin, Germany

On the surface, the microdoses don't seem all that important. "If only I could have a macrodose—if only I could thru-hike the Appalachian Trail, my life would be complete!" we think. And yet, those macrodoses can be difficult to attain. Shit, some weeks, even a normal dose of nature seems out of reach.

In these moments, the microdoses prove how ultra-important they are. A microdose of nature admittedly doesn't have nearly the same effect as a single macrodose, but if you begin to add those microdoses together, they compound. Collectively, they can prove to be even more transformative over a lifetime than one big macrodose.

Microdoses keep us sane. Microdoses keep us grounded. Microdoses keep us connected to nature on a regular, recurring basis.

Brendan Leonard of Semi-Rad illustrated this (literally) extremely well in a recent blog post.

The Cyclical Nature of Vitamin N Dosing

In my perfect world, I'd administer the exact dose of nature needed, at regular intervals throughout my week, to keep me active and engaged in work. Simultaneously, these doses would give me the time I need to decompress and explore nature, increase my fitness, take care of my mental health, and do all of the other things that I want to do in my life. It seems like every other month, I sketch out what my weekly schedule should look like to optimize for this lifestyle, and then I resolve to follow it.

But that schedule never works out. It never happens. These types of stringent schedules and commitments never seem to materialize in my everyday life.

I'm not sure what to blame for this. It could be my penchant for constant travel and the fact that I blow up any conception of a normal schedule at least once a month upon moving to a new place. This nomadic lifestyle is not conducive to having a schedule of any sort or optimizing for efficiency and productivity... at least, not productivity and efficiency in every area of life. Maybe you can get one or two down, like work, but everything else? Something needs to give. I imagine that's what it feels like to have kids, only worse. 

When the schedule inevitably fails, the size of my nature doses will often experience a negative downturn. Sometimes I'll go several days while only getting a microdose of nature. When these downward cycles hit, I tend to fight them, rage against them, and try to find a way around. That's probably what the Outside 365 challenge is at its core—a refusal to stop going outside, a refusal to bend to the downward cycles of Vitamin N dosing. Maybe this entire project is predicated on the refusal to acquiesce to these normal rhythms of nature.

The most important thing in the middle of a downward trend is to remember that these downward cycles never last, and that they always swing back up. Sometimes the upswing is painful thanks to a lack of fitness, but it's there, and it always comes back.

The swing between microdoses, normal doses, and macrodoses is cyclical and constantly varying, but it's totally natural. But in the meantime, remember that even if the trend is downward, you never have to grind to a complete halt!

Conclusion

One of the most important parts of my Outside 365 project is assigning value to all of the various doses of Vitamin N. As long as that dose of nature includes at least one human-powered mile, each and every dose is counted and valued. It's easy to overlook the microdoses, but in the grand accounting of our lives, the microdoses are dramatically important.

Sure, shoot for the venerable macrodose. But don't count out the microdose just yet.