Rewilding

The word "rewilding" has been making its way into our consciousness for a few years now. I imagine it's because we humans are feeling the squeeze of our too-tightly contained lives. Survival needs often call for conformity behaviors - following the rules helps us live another day. The problem with living this way, is that our days can often seem like a bland landscape of beige. In the midst of these overriding societal norms, other, more free attitudes and behaviors get nudged aside. It takes courage to move away from the safety of the pack.

And yet, the necessity of self-expression remains, stubbornly rooted in us. Rewilding, returning to a state of natural expression, an uncultivated and unpredictable state, is a breath of fresh air to our psyches. It's most ironic that the word 'rewilding' is used to refer to our most natural selves, a self that has been driven so deeply underground that a search party needs to be sent. It's a self that's desperately in need of reclamation and we acknowledge this by actively engaging in acts of rewilding.

I imagine a self that's been so shoved out of sight and ignored doesn't flourish with a simple weekend trip to the wilderness, then back to the office on Monday. Reclamation takes time. Rewilding, the same. What then, does devotion to this long-neglected self entail? These are deep questions; what is my 'original' self? What in me, is naturally wild and needs expression? Jung talked about repression of the 'shadow' self, the unloved and neglected, often shameful parts. Refusing to accept all that we are, according to his thinking, results in serious harm, to ourselves and others. I think, the refusal to honor the wild in me, has done just that. Often the wild in ourselves is the free, the creative, and sometimes the selfish, the shadow.

In this reclamation journey, I am conscious of the deep need to notice the wounds inflicted by too much conformity, of the buried instincts that begin to breath in me. I wonder as I wander what comforts needs to be sacrificed for the greater treasure, a wilder psyche.