The Primitive Mind
What the Wilderness Taught Me About Paying Attention
I always think the first few miles of a near hundred-mile backpacking trek are the hardest. No matter how hard you train, you can’t account for the altitude change, the early pack adjustments to get it just right, or convincing your legs they have another couple hundred thousand steps to go.
But the one thing I never expected in those first few miles is what it would do to my mind.
Inevitably, I would bring so much more to carry than what was in my backpack. The heaviest weight was always in my mind. Of course, there is thinking about family and being cut off from all communication. That’s obvious. But what I didn’t expect is how conditioned my mind had become to the pace of the “real world.” While my body was slowing down in the wilderness, my mind continued to race.
What’s the next thing?
Did I get a message?
Where do I need to be?
Did I get it finished?
What did I leave undone?
What am I planning next?
What am I working on?
Without us knowing it, our culture conditions us with expectations, planning, and getting things done. And we don’t notice it because it has become normal. It’s so normal that most people do not realize there is an alternative to the manic mind.
What I began to notice on these trips is that my mind started to rewire. Thoughts of meeting expectations, planning the next thing, or getting things done quickly transformed into watching my feet take steps, controlling my breathing, looking for the next water source, and deciding where to set up a tent. My mind became much more primitive. My thoughts were distilled into basic and essential considerations.
Somewhere along the trail, I noticed that the constant feeling of being behind had disappeared. The wilderness wasn’t asking me to optimize anything. It wasn’t measuring my productivity or keeping score. It only asked me to pay attention.
There wasn’t time or space for mulling or ruminating, brooding or hyper-obsessing. The reality is that the only things that mattered were getting from point A to point B, finding clean water, setting up shelter in a safe place, getting enough calories, and finding a spot to dig a hole to poop.
It’s amazing how a short reprieve from our manically constructed reality can actually save your soul.
And I have to wonder if, for all of our advancement, we have forgotten something essential. We have learned how to do more than ever before, but somewhere along the way we lost the ability to simply be.
Question
When was the last time you experienced a moment that asked nothing of you except your attention?
Peace,
Brandon
