Forgetting Wildness: How Humans Lost our Earth Connection & our Path to Reconnection

Humans are wild. We are meant to be immersed in a web of life, respectfully giving and receiving wisdom, restoration, and life lessons from the world around us. In our past, we knew how crucial Earth connection was to our spiritual wellness. We only have to look at the rich mythological traditions held throughout the world to see that the relationship between humans, plants, animals and this planet was widespread for most of human development and it was deep. It was also a main source of our spiritual defense and personal autonomy.

Then, we got separated.

As we heal our nature connection, it is natural to ask: how did we get disconnected in the first place? Where did we lose the power that came through our planet connection? The answer is: We were educated, relocated, forced, coerced, and shamed out of it. This left us vulnerable spiritually. The ‘rise of the feminine’ that you hear people speaking about is in part, rediscovering the sacred Earth connection and the power in your earth-based spiritual know-how.

This is an article + video essay about how we forgot our nature connection + why it is so empowering that we are moving through a consciousness shift where people are remembering their wildness AND reconnecting to it. It is a mix of anthropology, ethnographic fieldwork on the spiritual story of humanity (and what we have been doing to heal from the past), and traditional knowledge passed to me through medicine circles.

*Thank you to the friends and ceremony circle colleagues who have shared about their people, their land, and invited me into ceremony over the past decade. What I learned with you showed me the depth and breadth globally of our Earth disconnection and why rewilding is so important to our species.*

Time stamps

• Intro:00-4:00; What we used to be: 412 – 9:00; Programs of social control = taking away our wildness; 10:00 – 13:00 Strange magic war? ;13:28 – 18:50 Nature is for ‘savages’; 19:10 – 23:10 ‘Man’ triumphs through science (supposedly): 23:14 – 27:00; Reclaiming your SOVEREIGNTY through your wildness 27:15

Exploring the Human and Earth relationship: 

Knowing our story is important. It helps us understand where we came from, what created our current conditions. The metaphysical aspect of our current moment is left out in most academic discourses. As I have found, all of the questions I could not answer as an anthropologist with pure academic literature, the metaphysical part of our story fills out. I link cultural anthropology + ethnographic metaphysical research to provide a more nuanced account of what we are transcending.

Earth connection and nature as a teacher is a cross cultural theme that you can trace back to as long as stories and songlines have been remembered and told. So too do we find it in the archaeological record. This is indicated in sacred sites like the animal mounds in Wisconsin, USA and in cave paintings like the Sulawesi pig paintings (read about them here https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/45000-year-old-pig-painting-indonesia-may-be-oldest-known-animal-art-180976748/). We also find this evidence in the totem poles, emergence accounts, and cultural histories that are passed down through generations. 

Very often, people assume that ‘nature beliefs’ are only held by Indigenous, Indian, and First Nations persons. The truth is – nature connection sits at the base of traditions throughout most of the planet. Where we live, what is possible there and our relationship to the provider are KEY themes around which culture is built. In Ireland and England, for example, there is a rich tradition of plant medicine and animal connection. The Vikings and Nordic persons are well known to have related to animals and the other realms. There were people like me – valkyries – who would guide souls. Looking to Japan, another example, we see vast spiritual and mythological traditions that detail the relationship between humans, Earth and nature beings.

In addition to holding animals and Earth as sacred beings, many of our ancestors were aware of the power of telluric energy and its advanced power to heal and spiritually inspire humanity. The pyramids, churches, domes, medicine wheels and sacred sites of the planet aligned to happenings like eclipses and 18.6 year moon cycles (like major lunar standstill) show sophisticated calculations, dedication of financial and human capital to create the structures signifies something. So too does the long-term stewardship between people who care for the Earth and their ancestors, which gets passed down directly to us through Earth (which is how I learned), from valued teachers like me, or from family (if they remember). 

How Humans Became Separate from Earth

This disconnection from nature did not happen overnight. Some people have never truly forgotten. How it played out is widely variable – for the purpose of this discussion I will focus on the European branched expansion, first locally, then through North America and Australia. 

People in the Western world (Europe, North America, and anyone that has been ascribed to the main stream cultural ethos of development we have been following) have been exposed to 3 major sets of shaping:

1 ) the witch-hunts: 

• Prior to the witch-hunts, people were relating to nature for medicine, spiritual support, and for the spiritual wellbeing of a community. This was a source of tremendous folk power and spiritual inspiration. The people who were seeking to maintain a new reign of state + moral control made it ‘immoral’ and illegal to practice the traditional ways. This was like a pre-cursor to what would be adapted as other forms of European colonialism). the ‘guilt’ or belief you cannot believe in Jesus whilst also connecting with Earth is a holdover of this. 

 2) colonialism: this is a major one. Colonial impact did not only shape the peoples who were removed from the land. The propaganda campaign that came up through the scientific revolution and the concerted effort to code the population to accept native or nature as ‘less than’ has affected us in so many more ways than we recognize unless we unpack it.

 3) the scientific revolution that created that false ‘humans over nature’, science versus spirituality dichotomy that places ‘rationality’ and ‘devotion’ at opposite ends of a right and wrong spectrum. Within this mindset, people who believe in ‘Earth medicine’ or traditional ways like Chinese Medicine, spiritual healing or even the concept of a soul are viewed as being intellectually inferior.

• This is still alive and well in academia and all around us.

4) During the covid pandemic: I know this one might trigger people and I am sorry. During the pandemic, we experienced ongoing public messaging that ‘going outside’ was related to danger. Many of us were kept indoors for extended periods of time. (I think myself it was about 6 months all told – for others in places like NS, PEI, NFLD where I come from it was much longer than that.) During this time, we were ‘coded’ to associate indoors with safety. This messaging has remained in tact to some extent for a lot of people who almost now jump back from Earth connection or engaging the world the way they once did. 

I elaborate on these in the video above.

Earth Connection is Once Again Coming to the Forefront as VALID AND IMPORTANT

As we make our way into the next phase of humanity, we are ready to heal the drastic imbalance we have been living in regarding Earth, our spiritual selves, and our resources. Cities, once being built upon a modernized uber urban standard are now incorporating biophillic design. Therapy and counseling programs now engage culturally appropriate Earth based engagement. (I have consulted on these programs being put into school systems.) 

One of the things that I am EXTREMELY excited about is how clearly people are hearing the call of Earth, again. This is showing up in the research disciplines. So too is it in social media and the world around us. Content exploring different layers of nature connection is seeing huge circulation compared to a decade ago. Nature connection is being prescribed by therapists and counsellors (thanks to those of you who have come and studied with me on how to bring this into your practice). It is also being included in hospital environments.

however, we are dealing with an ideological imbalance

One of the things about emerging research and the presentation of the importance of nature is that indigenous and non indigenous medicine people (like myself) are being excluded from those conversations. That is why I have to do things like run my own school and publish information this way. There is also very little conversation about how in some ways, the lack of reference to the elders or the trajectory of knowledge which is being verified is another form of colonialism.

The Elders and medicine peoples of the world have experienced a tremendous amount of persecution for protecting the knowledge that research science is validating today. As a social scientist myself, I think it is EXCITING that we are getting this verification. Part of my work as a person who is a medicine person as well as an anthropologist is to help put this knowledge into respectful context. The medicine people were right and they are still right and now science is saying it. HIGH FIVE. Talking about this like this helps bring the feminine into balance and to honor those who came before me.

Part of my work in helping balance that is to include them into the conversation.

The Earth is ready to heal and teach us: Embrace Your Connection And build (or strengthen) your own unique relationship

The best way to begin learning is to acknowledge your own experience. Get outside and allow yourself to ‘clock’ how you feel after nature time (we spoke about this in an introductory article and video a while back).

A second way is to recognize that Earth can teach us directly so long as we are open to receiving the lessons. Though we are taught to think that nature communication is the privilege of a select few types of persons, the truth is: Nature is the teacher Creator made for each of us to learn from and be healed by. I know this because Earth teaches me this directly and has been for most of my life. Earth WANTS people to know this.

So how do you learn?

This is my specialty. I would be pleased to give you the information and tools to get out there and get connecting (or doing so more or differently). 

GET YOUR COPY HERE

Plug Into the Planet is where we do it. 🌍✨

👉 check out ‘Plug into the Planet’, here
https://indicrowacademy.learnworlds.com/course/spiritual-grounding

Come home to Earth.

Come home to yourself.

As I say in the video: the link between humans and their wildness is strong. So much so, that it is calling people back to the land and back to Earth. This is part of the great awakening.

Thanks for watching and reading,

Katie

Katie is from PEI, Canada and currently lives in Maryland, USA. She is a social anthropologist + psychopomp who has worked on this topic for most of her life. She left the University to work on this full time and to facilitate soul connection + Earth journeys with clients. For more about her: https://crow-medicine.com/learning-at-indicrow-academy/

Elevated Content Series: Elevated content is content that asks you to see the world around you in new or different ways. Sometimes beginning with familiar concepts, others brand new ones: the point of elevated content is to level up our ability to analyze, engage, and thus understand our lives. Knowledge is power. Enjoy this series as a way to build up your knowledge base whilst also sparking different layers of your consciousness.

Stories of our People:

Stories of our People: Healing through Land Connection

The False Divide Between Science and Spirituality: How Modern Science Is Validating Spiritual Wisdom