Earlier this week, I was in the San Bernardino mountains at dusk when I looked up and noticed what appeared to be dozens of swallows, congregating and cavorting in the sky.
What kind of birds come out by the dozens to frolic in the dying light?
I watched them in the waning minutes of the magic hour, fluttering amongst one another in Möbius strips.
Upon closer inspection, I discerned these weren’t birds at all. They were bats.
As night fell, I watched, in awe, until they retreated back into darkness, beyond my sight. And then I continued to sit there in the darkness, envious of their wildness, grateful to witness it.
Bats use echolocation, rather than eyes to “see” their surroundings. Through their mouths or noses, they make calls that travel through the air until they bounce off objects and echo back, letting the bat know where prey is, or what’s obstructing their path.
There are many ways to see. And many ways to be wild.
Wild is our nature, the ancestral, instinctual part of us that has kept us alive. Wild is what exists inside of us that hasn’t been civilized, co-opted by the system, or tamed by the institutions that indoctrinated us. It’s how we survived amongst all the species that evolved along with us. It’s an intuitive, agile, seasonal, and ever-evolving life force we can trust.
We evolved to live in the wild, with wild plants and animals as our companions and our nourishment. We are not only part of nature. We are nature.
When we think we don’t need the wildness of bats, or the wildness of the dark, or even the wildness inside of us, what are we giving up?
What is the cost of ignoring our wildness?
What do we gain by our conscription into a capitalist culture of comfort and security? Do we own our time? Do we own our bodies?
When we call out, what do we bounce off of?
If we internalize the instructions and systems of others, how do we know where they end and we begin? Are we living our lives off someone else’s script? And if so, who do you ask for permission to speak off script, to re-define the role of partner, parent, or employee?
Can you trust your instincts?
In a state of awe, we feel humbled. In a state of wonder, we feel possible.
~Sharon Blackie
When you imagine living a more wild life, you might fear losing safety, security, or control. You might fear being different from other people, or fear losing your boundaries, or fear the unknown.
This is natural. Schools have taught us systems that override our bodies and our instincts. Our fear of wildness is similar to our fear of change.
But we are tool-using animals, and when we trust that our instincts are a vital part of our tool kit, we can thrive in the wild. Literally and metaphorically.
My mother taught us to use the first letters of “Survive fear, survive with faith” to remember what to prioritize, should we find ourselves lost in the wild without supplies.
• Shelter - Location, location, location. Decide where you will build your nest. Choose a flat space on high ground (a large rock or a mound of dirt, where you can remove roots and debris), away from well-used animal trails, leaning trees, and snow or rockfall areas. A good shelter in a bad location is a bad shelter.
• Fire - A fire can prevent you from freezing or keep you warm enough to do the other tasks you’ll need to ensure your protection. Cooking can increase the range of food you can consume, keep away bugs and wild animals, and improve your overall sense of security. Consider site selection and site preparation away from your shelter. Without matches, your setup will be crucial. Before you attempt to start your fire, collect ample tinder, kindling, fuel.
• Signaling - Ask yourself: Who knows I am missing? Is anyone looking for me? When is the earliest possible moment a search could begin? Do I want to be found? If you want to be found, signal early and often. If the landscape on which you are stranded is dark, collect light rocks. If it’s light, collect dark rocks. Find a clearing and spell out SOS. Make three small fire pits, designed for maximum smoke. If you hear a plane, you will rush to light them. If there is no clearing, use the brightest color fabric you have (tear it from your clothing, if that’s your only option), and tie three flags to the highest tree you can climb.
• Water - Dehydration will directly affect your ability to make logical decisions. Once you have built your shelter, home in on your water system. Water is the earth’s blood, giving life to all the world’s beings. Honor it. The blood in our veins, the sap in the trees, and the water of rivers and streams are united in shared sisterhood. If there is no running water, use a jacket or anything you may have that resembles plastic to build an evaporation net. Find a sunny spot near vegetation to dig a hole as wide as your plastic. Place a cup or anything you can improvise as a container inside the hole, and then cover your hole with the flat plastic, securing it around the perimeter with rocks. You will also need to place a rock on the center of the plastic, directly over the container. Condensation will collect in your container overnight, yielding up to a quart of water a day.
• Food - If it could take more than a couple of weeks for someone to find you, or if you are running from something and want to remain hidden, you will need to sustain your energy with food. Depending on the sea- son during which you are stranded, this may be simple or it may be difficult.
~Forager: Field Notes for Surviving a Family Cult
How do you recognize the wildness in you?
Do you trust your instincts?
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Thank you for being on this journey with me. I am grateful for the gift of your presence. Walking this path, knowing so many of you are walking it too, gives me hope. May we continue in our recovery, in relationship with one another and with the anima mundi, supporting each other in our growth, like a mycelial network. If you’d like to continue this conversation in person, consider enrolling in my small group writing workshop at the Maloof this October, or engage in the weekly comments section below.
Thank you for the way you live artfully.
This is a beautiful post. I especially loved reading the survival tips, they had me away in a wilderness for the duration, maybe with no more modern comfort than an abandoned old run-down shack. Then, dreaming of the story I might write about this. Or what stories might come to me in such seclusion.
On instincts, I did have a life-altering realisation about them recently, where I finally understood that whether you think a feeling is based on instinct or faulty programming, it should be honoured either way, because it may be true, innate instinct, so you would be betraying yourself to ignore it, and if it is instead a product of trauma, family dysfunction, or something similar, it exists because you have not yet recovered, so to push through and ignore it in this case, too, would be damaging. Your body is telling you that you are not yet ready, there is more work to do. And I believe the greatest work we can do for ourselves is learning to love ourselves properly, and this is not possible when we continually override our feelings instead of honouring them. Life has been dramatically more peaceful for me since coming to this realisation.