Becoming Nature

Tamarack Song has spent his life studying the world’s aboriginal peoples, apprenticing to elders, and learning traditional hunter-gatherer survival skills. He has spent years alone in the woods as well as living with a pack of Wolves. In 1987 he founded the Teaching Drum Outdoor School in the wilderness of northern Wisconsin. He is the author of several books, including Entering the Mind of the Tracker.

• In Honor of My Teachers To Know Nature Is to Become Nature A Different Approach to Connecting with Nature Relearning the Old Way To Know Nature Is to Know Yourself Transformation through the Animal Mind Step 1 Remember Nature Speak, the First Language The Personality of Nature Speak Why We No Longer Talk with Animals How Nature Speak Works Where We Get Stuck Relearning Nature Speak Nature Speak and Domestic Animals What to Expect from Nature Speak Step 2 Learn the Silent Language of Birds How Birds Teach about Themselves A Bridge to Nature Speak How Birds Teach about Other Animals From Symbolic to Direct Communication How to Learn Their Silent Language Rock Dove Red-winged Blackbird Great Northern Loon The Anatomy of a Birdsong Step 3 Awakening the Animal Mind My Coming Out I, the Animal Our Two-Track Brain We, the Conflicted Species Thinking without Thought Beware of the Rational-Mind Trap Knowing the Experiential Mind Set Letting Go of Goal Orientation How to Live in the Now What It’s Like to Be in Animal Mind Step 4 The Time-Media Trap Leaving Tools, Entering Relationship A Fresh Perspective on Cultivating Relationship Our Brains on Media Media Creates Reality Re-attuning Our Ears to Nature Speak It’s All in the Mind Seeing Is Not Always Believing Audiovisual Material Meets the Animal Mind Time by Dictate Step 5 Be Where the Magic Happens How We Live Can Help Us Find Animals Dawn: The Place to Begin Next, Attune to Our Body’s Rhythms Step 6 Enter the Silence, Listen, and You Will See The Dynamic of Silence Learning to Listen Listening Beyond Words Honing Our Listening Skills with Shadowing Big Ears: A Deep Listening Example Deep Listening and Time Looking Versus Seeing The Problem with Seeing Too Much A Lesson in Listening Step 7 Energize and Attune Your Senses The Awareness Overcoming the Barriers The Stories The Exercises The Answers for Step 7 Step 8 Walk and Paddle Quiet as a Shadow Natural Walking Shadowing Canoeing Step 9 Turn Invisible and Instill No Fear Seeing through Our Biggest Blinders: Prejudice and Fear How to Become Invisible To Stand Out Is to Blend In Be the Landscape Visibility: A Survival Strategy Step 10 The Best Tricks for Seeing Animals What to Do When We See an Animal Step 11 Become the Animal Imagine Step 12 To Touch an Animal Counting Coup: The Concept Learning to Count Coup When Noble Fare Is Far Away To Touch the Soul Acknowledgments Appendix 1 List of Stories Appendix 2 List of Exercises Notes Glossary Bibliography Index About the Author About the Artists

“I love the way Tamarack explains that you must get away from thought to understand animals. He is referring to verbal thought with language and entering the animal’s sensory-based world that has no words. To understand animals, you have to get away from words and enter their realm of visual, auditory, and touch sensation, which are linked to emotions. Becoming Nature will help connect you to the natural world.”