A Note on Nature

By: James Slider

I've been reading the Practice of the Wild by Gary Snyder and that book has definitely influenced my thinking in regards to nature and what we hold to be natural or wild. By Snyder's definition:

Natural - Anything that exists on earth
Wilderness - Something allowed to grow to its full potential
Wild - The fundamental essence of our relationship with all other things on earth

These concepts led me to thinking about alot of other things and the way we view ourselves as humans.

The concept that we are seperate and different from nature is a huge part of the mindset of a "civilized human." I also think that this concept is a mistake. We are innately wild, and one of our largest flaws is to think that concrete ground and brick buildings seperate us from every other creature that eats and is in turn eaten. We identify with material objects, our houses, our cars, our clothes because they seperate us from what we view as untamed and unorganized nature. We pave over grass and cut down trees to "organize things," essentially we do it to feel that we are in control.
The flaw in this concept is that raw nature is structured upon an organizational pattern that is complex beyond our comprehension, a system of checks and balances that innately maintains itself until we come in and shatter its equillibrium. In this way, the ignorance of the human race leads it to destroying or "civilizing" the natural landscape and destroying a far more intricate and beautiful system than we could even dream of creating.

To accept the fact that our bodies are wild is almost like learning to walk again. We are wild in instinct, in each moment spent involuntarily frozen in the darkness after hearing a noise, in the way we size each other up unconciously, a spark in our minds that cant be put out. To accept this fact means relating yourself to all that we view as untame, in my view this is far from regression, it is closer to revolution. To be wild is not to be cruel or uncaring, it is to grow to the full of your potential, while accepting your place and relation to everything else on earth. The wild is to eat and be eaten, to take life in order to live your own, and to give life so that others may live, to see yourself in every other creature because you are all interdependant. Quite a thought.

If this thought intrigues you as much as it did me you should check out Snyders book, or talk to me about it sometime, im always happy to talk.