Okay, so Gwyneth Paltrow, right? She’s out there telling people her big secret for managing anxiety. And it’s not some fancy Goop supplement that costs your firstborn and a kidney. Nope. It’s shouting. At bushes. You heard me. Shouting. At. Bushes. I swear, sometimes I think these celebrities are just messing with us, seeing what kind of outlandish advice we’ll swallow whole. But then I stop and think, wait a minute, is she actually… onto something?

My Therapist Told Me to Talk to My Feelings, Not My Ficus

Look, I’ve been covering this stuff for a long time – 15 years, give or take a few mental breakdowns of my own – and I’ve seen some wild wellness trends come and go. Remember bee venom facials? Or steaming your lady bits? (Let’s not go there, for real.) But “shouting at bushes”? That’s a new one for the books, even for Gwyneth.

She told People magazine, basically, that when she’s feeling anxious, she goes out into nature, finds a bush, and just lets rip. Yells, screams, vents all that frustration and worry directly at some unsuspecting shrubbery. And get this: she says it helps. Like, a lot. She actually said, “It helps.”

And my immediate, gut reaction? A snort. A full-on, coffee-through-the-nose snort. Because, come on. It sounds like something out of a bad comedy sketch. Imagine showing up at a public park, spotting someone in a designer sweatsuit, yelling obscenities at a rhododendron. You’d probably call 911, or at least quietly back away while trying not to make eye contact. But then, you know, the thought started to niggle at me. The thing is, Gwyneth has always been pretty open about her mental health stuff, her anxiety, the whole journey. And if it works for her…

The Goopification of Primal Scream Therapy?

It’s easy to just dismiss everything Gwyneth Paltrow says or does as peak Goop absurdity, right? And, not gonna lie, a lot of it IS absurd. A $15,000 gold sex toy? A candle that smells like her vagina? Yeah, that’s a hard pass from me. But underneath all the eye-rolling, sometimes there’s a kernel of something actually… human. Actually relatable, even if it’s packaged in a way that only makes sense if you have multiple houses and a private meditation guru on speed dial.

Because let’s be real, anxiety is a beast. It twists your stomach, makes your heart pound, and fills your head with a million worst-case scenarios. And sometimes, you just need to get it OUT. I mean, how many times have you been stuck in traffic, or dealing with a truly infuriating customer service rep, and just wanted to roll down the window and scream at the top of your lungs? We’ve all been there. It’s a primal urge, that need to release. To just let go of all that pent-up energy.

But Wait, Is Yelling at a Bush Just Good Old-Fashioned Venting?

Here’s what I’m thinking. We’re constantly told to “process our feelings,” to “journal,” to “talk it out” with a friend or a therapist. All good, valid strategies, I’m not knocking them. But sometimes, talking isn’t enough. Sometimes you need something more physical, more visceral. Something that just empties the tank, you know?

“It’s about letting go of that energy. Just getting it out of your body.”

I remember one time, I was going through a particularly rough patch, and my therapist actually suggested I find a pillow and just punch it. Hard. Or go into my car and scream. Not at a bush, mind you, but the principle is the same. It’s about letting go of that energy. Just getting it out of your body. Because when you hold it all in, that’s when it really starts to fester, to eat away at you from the inside.

The Privilege of the Primal Scream

Now, here’s where my journalist brain kicks in, because it’s never quite that simple, is it? While the idea of cathartic screaming makes sense, there’s a massive elephant in the room. Or rather, a perfectly manicured lawn surrounding the bush.

Gwyneth Paltrow probably has a sprawling, secluded property where she can scream at her heart’s content without disturbing anyone, let alone being hauled off by concerned neighbors. Most of us? We live in apartments with thin walls. Or houses with neighbors close by. Or, God forbid, we’re trying to do this in a public park, and then we’re the weirdo yelling at the azaleas. It’s a luxury, this kind of uninhibited release.

And that’s the rub with so much of what comes out of the Goop universe, honestly. The solutions are often fantastic, but only if you have the resources – time, space, money – to implement them. Not everyone has a private, anxiety-absorbing shrubbery. And that’s a shame, because the underlying need to cope with anxiety? That’s universal. Totally universal.

What This Actually Means

So, am I going to start yelling at the juniper outside my office window? Probably not. My landlord would have my hide, and honestly, the juniper looks pretty stressed already. But I have to admit, Gwyneth’s bush-shouting revelation isn’t as completely bonkers as it first seemed.

It’s a reminder that sometimes, the most effective coping mechanisms aren’t the ones you find in a perfectly curated wellness guide. They’re the messy, unconventional, even a little bit embarrassing things that just… work. They get the job done. For some people, that might be a rigorous workout. For others, it’s a good cry. And for a select few, perhaps those with a private garden and a healthy disregard for what the gardener thinks, it’s a good, old-fashioned, primal scream directed at some foliage.

The real takeaway here, I think, isn’t to literally go shout at a bush (unless you’re, like, really secluded and feel like it). It’s to remember that mental health isn’t one-size-fits-all. It’s about finding what helps you release that pressure, that tension, that anxious energy. Even if it looks absolutely ridiculous to everyone else. Who cares, right? As long as it brings you some peace… even if that peace comes from a very confused shrub.