The “outdoors” tend to be perceived as an aesthetic extension of our modern society, accentuating our day to day lives with an appealing backdrop to the tedious tasks we perform on a regular basis, but failing to remind us of the unlimited opportunities of self revelation and exploration available to us.  On occasion we deign to delve into the surface layers of our rural surroundings and dignify the excursion as some extraordinary exploit where we’ve pitted ourselves against the wanton wiles of the wilderness, while reclining on comfy cushions and feeding our faces with packaged processed foods.  Such ostentatious “adventures” only serve to further delude our innate identity and debilitate our inherent abilities by encumbering them with unrealistic expectations of our environs.  What we need is to not test our toes within the tapestry we’ve woven about us, but to tear the illustrations aside and immerse ourselves within our very own instincts.  This need be taken no further than 10 feet out the backdoor into the backyard, but what a wondrous experience to allow the city lights to wane in the distance as we wander a bit further from the technology and creature comforts we’ve propped ourselves up with.  Doing no more than wriggling my soft, sensitive toes in this raging river of survivalist supposition, I’ve attempted to do just that.
My first few solitary stays in the woods not far from modern convenience were a lot more enlightening than I had expected.  What threatened to be an incremental accruement of cognitive stagnation a priori proved to be just the opposite as concerns for even the necessity of contemplation and mental stimulation were shed as easily as a worry for water at a pool party.  Slipping away from the incessant trivial demands of the roles and rote of superfluous society seemed to beg the surrender of baggage unwittingly acquired.  ”Time” gave ground to the measure of earth moved beneath each step as simple, directly definable duties were undertaken.  It didn’t matter who “Sally” was dating or how productive the team was performing, all that was relevant was the allotment of activities I’d chosen to accept.  If I wished to be warm as the world pulled its wool blanket over its eyes and exposed its dark dreamscape, then my only objective was to obtain those materials to make that desire manifest- break the wind from my back, elevate my skin from the warmth leeching landscape, suspend insulating materials I could snuggle up in, and collect the twigs and sticks I could combust for a comfortable fire.  If my heart, hands and feet yearned to be set free to realize their potential, there was a veritable playground of unexplored terrain to be tackled.  No longer was I conscribed to a constricted agenda but free to meet only those demands of my anatomy and curiosity.  Time neither sped up nor slowed down but more or less just changed dimensions with a little less resistance.  Like a flow of water I’d once attempted to swim upstream utilizing all the acceptable methods, I’d now merely stood up shedding the superficial posturing to tread against the same current in a more streamline fashion.  I hadn’t gained any great insight or made any profound revelations yet about the world around me, just surrendered for a time to a simpler appreciation of its intricacies.
Such is the “call of the wild”, the beseechment of our inherited impulses and instincts.  It’s not about seeing the world and its inhabitants one way or another, but a subconscious supplication to not suppress our individual inherent identity.  The depth and breadth of desired introspection alone dictates the level of immersion one should imbibe.  A spherical world is an intimidating arena for a person with a preference for square corners, but for those that wish to round out their world view its as simple as stepping outside the boundaries and frolicking along new frontiers.  From there it’s a matter of just how far into the wild you wish to embark that encourages you to acquire more specific skills.