The Savage Shaman

What have we gained, and what have we lost in the relentless pursuit of “civilization?” We have lost our silence, we have lost our darkness, and we have lost our peace. Finally, as we are collectively losing our humanity, we are turning back to nature for solace, for healing, and reconciliation.

Shinrin yoku is a Japanese phrase that literally translates as “forest bathing”. While shinrin yoku has currently become a pop-culture health fad, perhaps we are doing something more than lowering our blood pressure and improving our immune system when we go for a hike. Venturing out into the wilderness, we are stepping into the unknown, untamed, unpredictable environment in which our species evolved. As John Dewey expressed in his seminal philosophical treatise, Art As Experience,

“At every moment, the living creature is exposed to dangers from its surroundings, and at every moment, it must draw upon something in its surroundings to satisfy its needs.”

-pg 13, Art As Experience by John Dewey (c) 1934

In other words, every living creature is intimately bound to the conditions of its environment. Our modern world creates ever more intricate methods of insulating the human organism from the consequences of our actions, and the reality of living as an organic creature subject to the inevitabilities of hunger, cold, sickness, old age, and death.

“The career and destiny of a living being are bound up with its interchanges with its environment, not externally but in the most intimate way.”

– ibid

What is this “most intimate way” that Dewey is describing here? How are the “career and destiny of a living being” not actually bound externally to the environment (ie, by nature and our reliance upon it) but bound internally in a more personal, intimate reality?

THESE ARE THE QUESTIONS that I ask myself everyday when I step out of my car, and into the vast, quiet, mountain forests that surround my home at 9,200 feet above sea level in the Colorado Rockies. Just minutes from my house are several interconnected trail systems that offer miles and miles of quiet, peaceful, contemplative hiking in the Rosevelt and Arapaho National Forests.

Join me for a slow, peaceful hike deep in the forest, one snowy December morning.

An Invitation to Wander

My final critique of the shinrin yoku movement as it is currently expressed in popular culture is its emphasis on purpose. It would seem as if the modern day city-dweller demands a reason to do something as radical as going out into the woods – to reduce stress, anxiety, depression, anger, fatigue, and even to prevent COVID-19. (Yes, all these health benefits and more are studied and proven by the National Institute for Health, read the full study here).

However, the true “aesthetic experience” arises when we forget our purpose, when we allow our bodies and minds to wander aimlessly in the woods, when we depart from the well-worn trails to lesser known paths – deer trails, or faerie roads inbetween the trees, bending our bodies under the branches, tiptoeing around the patches of juniper and bearberry. That is real shinrin yoku – to step into the wilderness with humility, curiosity and awe, and the many open questions that do not require answers. I invite you to step out of your routine, comfortable, safe spaces and wander in the wilderness.

If my proposal seems counter-intuitive, or downright impossible, here are some questions to consider:

1. what are we really doing when we step back into wilderness?
2. how (and why) to listen deeply and speak truthfully with the trees?
3. what if the secret to saving humanity was hidden deep in the forest?
4. and what would happen if I joined the de-colonization of humanity and committed to re-wilding my body and soul?

As John Dewey ponders how we are to access an authentic aesthetic experience,

“It should be just a commonplace that esthetic understanding – as distinct from sheer personal enjoyment – must start with the soil, air, and light out of which things esthetically admirable arise. Adn these conditions are the condisitons and factors that make an ordinary experience complete.”

– ibid, pg 12

Dewey’s thesis, actually, is not so far from my own:

“If artistic and esthetic quality is implicit in every normal experience, how shall we explain how and why it so generally fails to become explicit? Why is it that to multitudes art seems to be an importation into experience from a foreign country and the esthetic to be a synonym for something artificial?”

– ibid, pgs 12-13

In other words, if everything is sacred, why and how do we re-connect with the intrinsic sacredness of everything?

THIS perspective overlays with Butoh theory, gestalt, shamanic practices, and even the secret Dzogchen practice of Rushen. These overlays frame the dialog that informs my research and practice. In my next article, Shinrin Yoku III, we will abandon the notion of purpose entirely, and move into the realm of the sages, shamans and artists who wander, listen, wonder, and live in the wilderness.