019 - Ten Habits for Self-Rewilding
foster a continuing and evolving continuity
I spent hours this past week spitting venomous words on blank sheets of paper that did not deserve the treatment of heavily scratched out phrases, entire sentences, or hastily marked “X’s” of uneven temperament. I wrote on scraps, half sheets, the backside of stories begun, and the back of my grocery list. In one fit of rage I shouted into the Note app on my phone. In the tornado of emotions, I never bothered to pick up my comp book which is where my words are written instead relying on leftovers, discards, leavings. When I think of leavings, I think of Aldo Leopold, “Everybody and everything subsists on leavings [my emphasis].”1 Leopold’s words are now over 70 years old.
Once I tired, I crumbled all the pages and stuffed them into the recycle bin (even those story starts) and I went in search of kindness. Not like-mindedness. Not validation for my feelings or someone to commiserate with but where I could observe selfless action. I refound Rebecca’s HOMEBound Nature News which reminded me that nature writers have a place in his world of words. Jesse McEntee, who writes Next Adventure, sent a generous note. Cindi answered my call for document information to help protect small libraries that are deficient in financial support. Jenny posted a podcast where I listened to audio of her finding success with the navigation tools she has learned, tools we worked on together. Around me, people gave charitably and for community.
As a writer, I wish to share not just the benefits of, but the necessity of, outside, I am worried that the decisions we make do not often consider the larger framed photo. I struggle with wondering how to reach more, to teach more, to motivate more, to guide more. I worry my efforts are insufficient and ineffective. That I deplete myself writing to the people who already get it and the call to action is already being acted upon. But is that terrible, to be the reinforcer, the accountability partner?
When I hit my second wind on the other side of bouncing like a ping pong in a week of just too much of everything, I began to consider more broadly what I might need to do—I need to do the work that needs to be done. How to begin comes from a prompt and again I read poems from J. Drew Lanham’s, Joy is the Justice We Give Ourselves.2 An empty sheet of paper is discouraging. Instead, I rummage through my older journals to find a list from when I wrote a short blog each week for clients, to give them something to think about as they were building an outdoor relationship. With more than a few revision drafts, now seems the right time to remind you, dear reader, of the habits you can practice to Rewild Yourself. A way to look past to look forward. A way to reframe identity and purpose.
1. Embrace self-expression. Use nature’s examples—trees that sway with flexibility or birds that decorate their nests with creative found colors of human trash. Welcome your moods and feelings and validate them with action and voice. Hold space for being angry but do not wallow in the temperament. Instead, leave an opening for a different conversations. Find the buried treasure of breathing that drives its way through you.
2. Conform to the nonconformity. Look at nature and how she defines edges and boundaries. Investigate the details—both grand and micro—and consider her consistency. Seek the truth and follow her lead in existence and foster a continuing and evolving continuity.
3. Dig into the sensual. Delve into what delights you, warms your body, and spurs you into action. Please your physical senses of sight, sound, smell, taste, and touch. Use the sensorial sensations to exist with animation and exploration. Do all of this outside.
4. Move forward or backwards or sideways. The direction does not matter as long as you find the momentum of movement with your feet—a shuffle, an extended stride, whatever suites your ability and moment of self-expression. Pick a tree, a meadow, a space with outdoor elements and whims and go towards what catches your eye. Be deliberate with progression and aware of the shifting sightlines that advancement brings. Search for questions not before asked and answers that feel incomplete. Find the answers, then move again and ask more questions.
5. Shed layers. Notice how nature transforms and cycles. Shrug off the confining socks and shoes that bind and constrict. Pants that limit movement and stride. Shirts intended to hide and shame the beauty of curves and dimples, scars and discoloration. Expose yourself to the truth of honor, service, and generosity. Sluff off the camouflage and embrace the exposure to heal blemishes that no longer serve your intention.
6. Quarry into hope. This is the surface of dirt and soil that points to life. A foundation that supports thousand-year-old sequoias and pink lady slippers that fade in a couple days’ time. To know growth is to lay in her coolness, to poke fingers in her crumbles, to taste her bitter and sweet, to feel wrapped by the web of nourishment that feed the roots of living things. Ground yourself in nature’s base. Look. Really look and in the layers find how to care for you with humility and maturity.
7. Be a place. Investigate outdoor space and notice pockets of similarity and the zones of transition. Notice this within yourself—a place that begets existence, a safe haven, a voice of reason and intellect. Be a source of knowledge and spirit with an interconnected zone of reliance and not scarcity. Act within the principles that continue self-survival.
8. Listen to the voice. The one that yells “run” and the one that murmurs “stay.” Dance with the music of the land. Skip, jump, bounce, reach high, swing low. Gather others to join. Move as a fluid whole or as separate pieces that wait for a conductor to bring order. Only fall into order when the mood strikes, the rest of the time, be a squiggle. Aim for balance where the human might not be central, but a part of the wild.
9. Understand cycles. Of seasons, emergence and decline. Appreciate rest to revive and growth to sustain. Embrace sustenance but avoid over gathering, underutilizing, or not giving enough. Understand death is guaranteed but the path meanders with intention and gratitude. Never forget to gift a dish, something you can share at the table, the stump, the quiet space beneath a tree. Gifts foster fellowship and empathy.
10. Watch everything and anything. Nests and flight patterns. Where fox rest and when she hunts. How layers of ice form and thicken on the water and how it continues to gurgle below the surface. Watch how maples stand taller, fir cease to slouch, and sunflowers lift their colorful faces towards the sun in the spring. Observe to better ready yourself for nature’s rewilding, knowing, she too watches you rewild.
Homework
Pick one of these habits for self-rewilding this week and practice. Practice is a repeated exercise for proficiency.3 Which means, think of each effort as a rehearsal to build habits and routines. Don’t get discouraged with the expectation of perfection. Self-rewilding takes time.
Share in the comments which habit you are first going to effort upon.
Quarry into hope! That will be my mantra for these days
There is nothing quite like the feeling of actually being part of the wild. Thank you for the reminder of how important that is.