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Bushcraft as Therapy, But Don't Commoditize Nature

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There is a large body of research that indicates contact with nature is good for your mental health. I have direct experience, witnessing how conservation activities directly impacted patients in several acute psychiatric wards. A patient who had been struggling with acute anxiety disorder, and who was nearly catatonic became animated when digging, and after 20 minutes said that for the 1st time in his life, his anxiety was gone! Now called Eco-therapy, more formalised approaches to leveraging the special qualities of nature, forest bathing, or as it was first coined in Japanese,  shinrin yoku , have started to grow in momentum in the American and British cultural zeitgeist as a passive consumer product . The practice is to surround oneself in nature, mindful of sight, sound, and smell. It is a passive activity requiring zero interaction with the environment. Climate Anxiety Climate anxiety may become one of the major drivers of anxiety disorders and depression, and is full...
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XReadiness Has All The Potential Of Teaching The Skills Of Nature Connection

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A deeper connection with nature can be achieved through learning wilderness survival skills from skilled practitioners. XReadiness  document recommends learning to become adept at making fire. I agree, but I am surprised at the lack of detail, in this short paragraph. In the 1st instance, I don't have a tumble dryer, so there is no dryer lint. In building my survival skillset, I have developed a method for processing plants to see if they meet the standards for being used as tinder for a flint and steel or ferro-rod. If plant material can accept high and low-grade sparks, then it can be lit with a lighter. "FiRE-MAKiNG & ALTERNATiVE HEATiNG METHODS Knowing how to make fire safely and efficiently is critical for heat, cooking, and morale. Learn at least two fire-starting techniques: matches, lighters, flint and steel, ferro rods, or solar magnification. Carry tinder (cotton, birch bark, dryer lint) and kindling in your emergency bag; dry materials are often hard to find dur...
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Core Shamanism Does Not Offer Tools To Connect Us To Nature

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"Sit Under A Tree & Ask It What it Wants From Me" These posts are not about individual beliefs or healers who use offbeat methods to help people. My critique is of people who are selling a cultish belief systems with no foundation in reality that deny climate science and reality.  I am wondering if I am giving these Plastic Shaman too much time? Maybe, or maybe they need to be exposed for their nonsense. Its actally not cultural appropriation to use the term shaman because it has no meaning. It is a term stolen from an indigenous culture whose spiritual identity has been wiped out by extractivism & genocide. It is a term imposed neocolonially by anthropologists and everyone else onto indigenous people. In fact Core Shamanism is a white fascio-anthropological construct  (link to a post explaining the history of  Shamanism). Core Shamanism is now being taught to indigenous cultures who have had their traditions genoncided by the close relatives of those now recoloni...
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Rites of Passage Into Nature

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I often hear things like 'society is breaking down,' 'young people are out of control,' and 'we need national service.' Then I wonder how many of the adults calling for this have gone through national service? If they are Generation X, like me, none of them. But we have all gone through Rites Of Passage, even if we don't realise it. Turning 16, 18, 21? First kiss? First sex? First time Getting Drunk, stoned, or tripping? That Ayahuasca tour you went on? Getting a driver's license? Death of a parent? Surviving Trauma? But these are not real Rites Of Passage. A Rite of Passage is a transformative process. Apart from the last, there is an expectation that every child of industrialised countries will go through these with minimal input from their elders. Yet in indigenous cultures, the Elders are central to the transformative process of a Rite of Passage. If we are to inherit Rites of Passage from our ancestors, let's not sanitise them so we can ...
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The Future Is Not Going To Be Easy, But Optimism Leads to Complacency.

Dungeons and Dragons, or the more up to date version, World of Warcraft have never attracted me. Perhaps its because I have been handling real weapons in the woods and have the skills of the fantasy Ranger, except my skills are real and not based on the roll of a dice. People tell me about forest spirits. Well fed, people, they are not talking about the gnawing hunger between winter and spring. They talk of Fairies, Not Baba Yaga, the death that stalks the land during famine. The See'rs of industrial capitalism spirits are optimistic of a growth future.  The dominant conversation about the future has no foundation in the reality of the science of current climate observations. Observations, not models. " We stand on the precipice of profound shifts across every dimension of our existence, driven by the dual forces of degradation and innovation. The Earth’s deterioration, climate change, and the collapse of systems ill-equipped to navigate us through these exponential shifts und...
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The Collapse of Civilization Is Happening Now, But Connecting With Nature Can Help Us Cope.

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The Ecological Collapse and Overshoot are driving climate chaos and civilization collapse. The collapse of our food production system will be the biggest wake-up call that no one expected to happen as quickly as it is. It starts with the fear of rising food prices like eggs. but the bigger shocks are when grain, corn, rice, and other common staples start to collapse. What is it the we can do to cope with these situations? Foods that traditionally have been associated with famine need to be foods which we focus on for the future. Interestingly many of these foods also have ranges from sub-tropical to the arctic circle and there is evidence that humans have been eating these foods since before the neolithic. Reed Mace, Typha Latifolia Silver Weed,  Potentilla anserina Lesser Celandine,   Ranunculus ficaria Duck Potato,  Sagittaria latifolia We continue to forget that the Amazon was a planted forest.  However, this is too little too late.  There is now enough CO2 a...
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Deep Communication With Nature

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Why do plastic medicine people & neo Shaman make drums as their go-to ceremonial noise-maker tool? Its simple, you can get it all in kit form. Perfectly machined drum hoop, skins ready to go and thong precision cut. They probably "birthed" their drum in a workshop, learning from someone else, who did exactly the same, with exactly the same materials,from simillar suppliers. The cultural traditions of plastic medicine people and neo-shamans is based in the consumption of woodlands, industrial wood machining and mass slaughter. Cherry wood Bullroarer, made by the author The Bullroarer however is far older than the drum, making a distinctive resonant undulating vibrating sound. It has been found among indigenous peoples of Africa, North America & Australia. All of these cultures use them ceremonially. Some cultures believe they are inbued with the spirits of the dead, and that bynplaying them we honour their spirits abd unvite them to be present. Bullroarers ...
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