The protagonist obviously struggles with the world wich is the reason he lives in the forest. But you could say he left the city for the wrong reasons, not that the causes itself were no reason to leave but he left out of despise and the will to be alone, used to being powerless in the masses.
Convinced that people are nothing more than an annoyance he leaves the city to hide unaware that nothing is absolute. And he will soon learn that there are dimensions to everything during his halicunation when he dries out in the real world due to being lost in the deeper woods. In this reality however it is the rain that saves him.

In the deeper woods when his halicunation begins he meets a talking tree dropping nuts, this stands for falling free from the mass.
The rabbit hole stands for his negativity, dressed up as curiosity.. its made of his thoughts and the urge to fight against the mass, but he cannot and ends up making himself vulnerable to his own anger.
Wich is where the mist comes in, the struggle of his own senses, confused about his choice, seeing the faces of the mass.. differentiating himself from it conciously.. they are his demons.
Its funny how the water droplet sylphid betrays the human by drying up the whole forest, but this is a for the fact that the droplet wants to be alone, away from the mass, naturally the droplet is a facet of the protagonists halicunation so he ends up on the edge of reason, almost suicidal.
But then he starts to think.. this is not who he wants to be. He wants to be a kind man, he did not want to be part of the mass because he wanted to be free of influence, to be naturally inspired and live without judgement.
He loses the will to harm the mass and thus himself, instead he wonders about what the good things he remained.
In 'here supposed to be a sea' he decides that he himself will work to restore the forest, that instead of hiding from the mass, he will though alone rebuild his life.. no longer struggling with meaning no longer running away, he will simply settle and call this its home.
It is then that he wakes up rescued by the rain.

Strangled refers both to being deprived of oxygen, the city is polluted and a forest is a lung. Yet also refers to being dried up as a person, thinking youve lost when you arent a part of something. Because you're always a part of something if you start something.