Embodied Animism And Rewilding The Human Spirit
There’s a language older than words that opens the doors of perception to experience the world holistically as an intimate part of nature rather than as detached observers.
This felt language of experience is called Animism and it derives from an ancient kinship worldview that sees everything as kin with a sense of mutual respect and dialogue among species.
This kinship worldview is shared by nearly every indigenous culture on Mother Earth, with each animistic way of seeing and being in the world unique to the ecosystem of its people. It views all aspects of the natural world including animals, plants, rocks, rivers, and weather systems as alive, each possessing its own spirit or essence.
This worldview is less a belief system and more a way of relating to the world. It is a way of perception grounded in relationship, connection, and reverence for something much greater than ourselves.
The Suppression Of Animism
In the modern world, animism has been suppressed because animistic culture have never willing joined the colonial system.
Benjamin Franklin observed that Native Americans often prioritized their tribal identity and traditions over the allure of the colonial system, even when offered the prospect of integration.
He noted that even when Native Americans were raised in colonial settings and learned colonial ways, they often returned to their own cultures and traditions, finding them more appealing.
Settles from Europe noticed that rarely did Native Americans ever defect to join colonial society, but many white people happily defect to join the tribes.
When asked why they didn’t want to join the colonial society, indigenous people would criticize how it was a monotonous way of life, ruthlessly competitive and led to tribe-less societies built for the benefit of elite classes of colonialism, monotheism and empire.
The Embodied Experience of Animism
While Animism is endlessly debated on the Internet, in museums and in Universities, most modern people treat it like a relic of a bygone era.
As a result, the Western world has created a disembodied form of education that often teaches little about developing the senses, wisdom or connection to nature.
Animism can heal this disembodied way of being, where many people often feel like detached observers who don’t belong.
Animism can be experienced and understood only as an embodied way of seeing, listening and feeling kinship with the natural world.
While the dominant materialist worldview treats the Earth as inert and therefore something to be controlled or extracted from, Animism challenges the philosophical foundations of this worldview that has led to the wholesale destruction of both Planet Earth and people’s connection to the sacred.
Today, I believe the growing epidemic of degenerative physical and mental illnesses is the result of the domestication, meaninglessness and addiction of living in the virtual screen world of late-stage capitalism, watching the apocalypse unfold in slow motion while scrolling on our smartphones.
The modern culture may have largely suppressed and forgotten that we are not separate from the rest of life but there is a return of animism happening where people are seeing ourselves as part of a vast, interconnected web of life and spirit again.
As we spend more time unplugged in nature mindfully exploring senses and “reading” the book of nature not with our pre-conceived ideas and thinking but with the “felt presence” of our immediate experience, something magical and even mystical happens.
The veil between self and world grows thin, and the boundaries between “us” and the trees, rocks and animals begin to dissolve. It’s not something we imagine, it feels like a remembering, a deep knowing and a return to a more original way of being.
Exploring Animism On Nature Retreats
I have found the best place to experience the embodied magic and mysticism of Animism is through unplugged nature retreats.
I believe nature reteats and can be the foundation of a new way of embodied education and experiential learning that can rewild the human spirit.
Because wild animals that don’t destroy their habitat, only domesticated humans who have lost their way and become trapped in the endless pursuit of money, status and materialism.
Only embodied people tuned into the wild wisdom of nature will make the big changes, build the communities and change the worldview to reverse the apocalypse before it’s too late.
I have been running mindful hiking retreats for the last 7 years that integrate mindful awareness, experiential learning and community building practices.
I love exploring new places, flying my drone and sharing my adventures on my Instagram.
- 10 Sustainable Brazil Ecolodges And Nature Retreats - July 4, 2025
- 10 Sustainable Ecolodges And Retreats In British Columbia - July 3, 2025
- 10 Sustainable Ecolodges And Nature Retreats In Alberta - July 3, 2025
