"If you don’t have a relationship with your wild, it is easier to destroy."
~ Craig Foster
Hi
Liz and I spent an evening with the guy behind 'My Octopus Teacher' as part of us leaning into more sustainability work at THC. It was a fascinating evening and I left feeling really inspired by having spent time in the company of someone living a completely different life to myself.
Foster's core belief is that we have a wild psyche that wants to express itself. However, since the agricultural revolution, most of us have been in the 'tame world'. He believes that we mirror the relationships we have in our lives and, unfortunately for most at the moment, this is the world of the internet and digital communications, rather than nature. He believes that this disconnects us from how important biodiversity is for our survival. It thus makes it easier to harm the biosphere.
"If you don’t have a relationship with your wild, it is easier to destroy."
He believes we can course correct through the power of story. At the moment the story we tell ourselves is one of infinitie capitalism. We could change that story by knowing that wild part of ourselves.
For him, the quest for his wild led towards scary experiences. He told stories of interacting with a jaguar, sharks and crocodiles. However what was fascinating was how, in his quest to find the wild, he had a more powerful experience when he realised the wildness was there at home. For him this was the kelp forests of South Africa... He claims that you don't need a childhood in nature to do this (although I imagine it helps), and that he had even been 'finding the wild' whilst in London on the book tour.
He is talking about more than spending time in the wild. For him, it is about learning how the wild communicates ('the oldest language on earth') and involves slowing down with persistence and curiosity. He believes everyone had this skill until a few hundred years ago. For humans today, 'when you slip inside of the wild, it is transformative'.
Foster went to extreme lengths to do this, as anyone that has seen My Octopus Teacher will attest to. He went wild swimming in the same place every day for ten years which is where the interaction with the octopus began. Whilst most of us aren't likely to make this sort of commitment, here are a few starters on connecting with your wild:
- Ensure you connect with nature - remembering it's a key way to cure many types of depression. Go to the same places in different weathers and different seasons and just pay attention to what is happening. How can you connect with what is happening around you rather than seeing yourself as separate? We are all ultimately part of a greater eco-system.
- He had been cold water swimming whilst on the book tour to maintain his mental well-being. He says that cold water swimming gives you a long hit of dopamine (compared to the short hit we get from social media etc).
- Children expect to live a wild life and we can nurture this from a very young age. His answer for saving the planet is very much to get everyone engaged in nature (thereby making it harder to destroy).
A fascinating evening and a critical reminder that we have been designed to live in reciprocity with the wild.
Until next time,
Rox x