I’ve lived with depression for most of my life. I’ve learned to  manage my symptoms in order to function and live a more fulfilling life.  I’ve dedicated this episode to working through some of the areas of  overlap between depression and rewilding. This is a very personal topic  that lives close to my heart. I was originally planning on doing this  one solo, but I realized that it would be more impactful if it were in  conversation with someone who shares similar but different experiences  with depression.

My guest on this episode is Sheila Henson. Sheila received  her BA in History and an MA in Education, spent twelve years as a  behavioral respite worker for children with special needs, working for  many of those years at the Serendipity Center in Portland. Today she is  an ADHD Coach, and is a well known and respected educator on tiktok. The  drive to understand how to be kind, collaborative, and restorative  within our social and ecological communities led her to Rewild Portland,  where she now serves on the board of directors, heading up our  transformative justice committee. Sheila and I also co-teach a Rewilding  Your Health class through Rewild Portland. 

Notes:

List of National Suicide Hotlines
https://support.google.com/websearch/answer/11181469

Sheila’s Website
https://www.sheilahenson.com/

Sheila’s Tiktok
https://www.tiktok.com/@adhdcoachsheila

Sleep & Depression
https://www.sleepfoundation.org/mental-health/depression-and-sleep

Exercise & Depression
The Challenges of Treating Depression with Exercise: From Evidence to Practice
https://sci-hub.hkvisa.net/10.1111/j.1468-2850.2006.00022.x

Meditation & Depression
An update on mindfulness meditation as a self-help treatment for anxiety and depression
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3500142/

Diet & Depression
Diet and Depression—From Confirmation to Implementation
https://www.anp3sm.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/jama_berk_2019_ed_190008.pdf

Music & Depression
Music therapy for depression
https://www.cochranelibrary.com/cdsr/doi/10.1002/14651858.CD004517.pub3/full

Green Spaces and Depression
Green spaces deliver lasting mental health benefits
https://www.exeter.ac.uk/news/featurednews/title_349054_en.html

Gardening & Depression
Gardening is beneficial for health: A meta-analysis
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5153451/

Soil Microbiome & Depression
Dirt has a microbiome, and it may double as an antidepressant
https://qz.com/993258/dirt-has-a-microbiome-and-it-may-double-as-an-antidepressant/

Crafting & Depression
Antidepressive response of inpatients with major depression to adjuvant occupational therapy: a case–control study
https://link.springer.com/article/10.1186/s12991-016-0124-0

Plant & Fungi Medicine
Psychedelic Treatment with Psilocybin Relieves Major Depression, Study Shows
https://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/news/newsroom/news-releases/psychedelic-treatment-with-psilocybin-relieves-major-depression-study-shows

The  Efficacy of Psilocybin Compared to Selective Serotonin Reuptake  Inhibitors in the Treatment of Adults with Major Depressive Disorder
https://scholarworks.arcadia.edu/showcase/2020/pa/60/

Pharmaceuticals & Depression

Antidepressants: Selecting one that’s right for you

Other Sources:

DSM-5 Criteria and Depression Severity: Implications for Clinical Practice
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6176119/

Depression Definition and DSM-5 Diagnostic Criteria
https://www.psycom.net/depression-definition-dsm-5-diagnostic-criteria/

Behavioral Aspects of Animal Domestication
https://sci-hub.st/https://doi.org/10.1086/413673

All About Alexithymia, or Difficulty Recognizing Feelings
https://www.healthline.com/health/autism/alexithymia

Changing The name PDA
https://emilywilding.com/changing-the-name-pda/

What Does It Mean to Be Neurodivergent?
https://www.verywellmind.com/what-is-neurodivergence-and-what-does-it-mean-to-be-neurodivergent-5196627

The roles of peripheral serotonin in metabolic homeostasis
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S001457931500455X#:~:text=Because%20serotonin%20does%20not%20cross,be%20an%20attractive%20therapeutic%20strategy.

I was recently on the Poor Proles Almanac Podcast. I talked too long and so they split it into two parts. 🙂

Poor Proles Almanac Podcast: Finding Place with Peter Michael Bauer (Part 1)

Poor Proles Almanac Podcast: Finding Place with Peter Michael Bauer (Part 2)

Lisa Wells is the author of Believers: Making a Life at the End of the World, The Fix, and winner of the Iowa Poetry Prize. Her essays have been published by The New York Times, Harper’s Magazine, Granta, The Believer, n+1 and others. She lives in Seattle and writes a column for Orion Magazine called Abundant Noise. She’s also one of my oldest and closest friends. In her latest book, Believers, she sought out many different people all seeking to find a way to live sustainably in the world, as we sit on the precipice of a collapsing civilization. In this conversation, we chat about the book, some of the subjects (including myself), the writing process itself, the role of storytellers as culture building, and much more.

Notes:
• Lisa Wells Website
• Instagram Account
• Believers: Making a Life at the End of the World

In this episode I converse with someone who has greatly inspired me, Delia Ann Turner. Delia co-owns and operates The School of the Greenwood: For Creative Rewilding. Delia is an amazing craftsperson and educator. Our topics wandered from making hand crafts, living off the grid, traveling to learn from communities where hand made crafts are barely holding on, integrating what we learn back in our own communities, to her philosophy in carefully crafting adventure and fantasy camps for children, to running a small business and the contradictory aspects of living a wild life but also utilizing tools like social media to increase the reach and impact of her work. It was a wide-ranging conversation and I hope you enjoy it as much as I did.

Delia’s Links:
Delia Ann Turner Instagram
School of the Greenwood Website
School of the Greenwood Instagram

Mentions:
Coyote’s Guide to Connecting with Nature
The Art of Not Being Governed
Mushroom at the End of the World
Nancy Baskets
Eoin Donnelly (Timber Framer)
The Bear and the Nightingale

In this episode, I answer three questions from my patrons on patreon:

1. What is your advice for people just beginning on their rewilding journeys?
2. What is your favorite part of rewilding?
3. What are your favorite books for rewilders to use for help rewilding?

Today I’m chatting with Clementine Morrigan, a prolific writer and podcaster covering a range of topics. In this conversation we talk about “cancel and call out culture” and the challenges of transcending punishment and imprisonment, in order to move toward a more egalitarian, transformative justice process when conflict arises–as it inevitably does–in our communities.

Notes:

Clementine Morrigan’s Work
• Lnk.bio
• Instagram
• Fucking Cancelled Podcast
• Fuck the Police Means We Don’t Act Like Cops to Each Other Zine

Other Mentions:
• So You’ve Been Publicly Shamed
• Conflict is Not Abuse
• The Sociopath Next Door
• Cursed Cancellations Instagram

Eli Loomis is an instructor and Executive Director at Boulder Outdoor Survival School (BOSS) in Utah. At 53 years old, BOSS is the oldest survival school in the country. It is notorious for its long, minimalist desert treks, including a 28-day field course. In this conversation, Eli and I talk about the history of BOSS, the psychology of survival and “The Won’t to Live,” the lack and need for Rites of Passage, context specific training, running non-profit wilderness schools, the transformative experience, and personal and psychological growth that can happen in survival courses, and so much more.

Links

• Boulder Outdoor Survival School
• BOSS Instagram
• Bullet Ant Test
• American Guy Try’s Bullet Ant Test
• John Leach “The Won’t to Live”
• John Leach’s Survival Psychology
• Rabbit Proof Fence
• Martin Prechtel – Long Life, Honey in the Heart
• Khalil Gibran
• Barkley Marathons

This episode is in Memorial of my friend Alex Leavens, my first ancestral skills teacher. 

Patrons of The Rewilding Podcast get access to new podcasts two weeks early. Also, when folks become a patron, for even just $1, you can ask me a question or throw out a topic for me to talk about from a rewilding perspective. In this episode, I will be answering more questions:

• Can a wild world meet the needs of 7.5+ billion human beings?

• Do you know any rules about natural burial—for yourself or relative, esp in oregon?

• What are your thoughts on personal boundaries especially on the rewilding journey?

• What are your thoughts on ableism, and the way we can show up for and support differently abled bodies as we rewild, both before collapse, and after?

• How can rewilding help people with limited physical/mental energy/ability deal with the impending climate crisis, etc?

Become a patron and ask me something.

Today I’m chatting with John Zerzan, long time anarchist author, speaker and host of Anarchy Radio out of Eugene, Oregon.  John’s writing has been instrumental in crafting the rewilding narrative. In this conversation, we jump right into some of the themes and history of primal anarchy, and work our way around various topics. 

Notes

• John’s Website

• When We Are Human

• Oak Journal

• Future Primitive

This episode is the first half of a conversation between myself and Natasha Tucker from Primal Anarchy Podcast. The second half will be released by them and a link posted here will connect you to it. The last time Natasha and I conversed this much was in my living room after the Rewilding Conference in January of 2020. It was great to catch up and chat about the things we are working on and thinking about at the moment.

Take a listen and check out their site:

Listen to Part 2

Primal Anarchy Podcast
Natasha Tucker

I’ve started a patreon to help fund the podcast. Patrons of the podcast get access to new podcasts two weeks early. Also, when folks become a patron, for even just $1, you can ask me a question or throw out a topic for me to talk about from a rewilding perspective. In this episode, I will be answering the first few Patron Prompts.

Here are the Questions for Patron Prompt #1:

From Patron Susan Avery:  “What are your favorite wild edible or medicinal plants?”

From Patron Nicki Youngsma: “What are criticisms of the megafauna overkill hypothesis and/or competing (and/or complementary) theories for megafaunal extinction? What are ways we can use this information to inform present and future living? How can such information and framing support healthier relationship with land and nonhuman kin that affirms human existence, rather than instills shame?”

From Patron Ilse Donker: “Do you know something about prehistoric child birth and death rate?”

From Jermayne Tuckta (not a Patron, but wanted to answer this one): “One method of rewilding includes reintroducing apex predators and other key species back into the area. Presently, wolves have returned back to Oregon and Washington. What other key species can you think of reintroducing? They have already attempted to reintroduce the Sea otter to the Oregon coast, but no success. Is it possible that the environment can no longer sustain the Indigenous species that once inhabited the area?”

In this episode I chat with Lise Silva Gomes, an artist who works  with fiber, knots, paint and more, who has spent a great deal of time  thinking and teaching about community grounded art practice. A huge  aspect of rewilding is the practice of ancestral skills–learning to use  your hands to create the technologies that we need to live, from the  elements of nature that grow and dwell near us. I came to Lise’s work  when searching out ethics, etiquette, and boundaries around communities  of artists and creatives. Lise is an innovator in this field and has  created some amazing resources around this topic that I’m excited to  share with you.

Notes

• Lise’s Instagram

• Lise’s Linktree

• Craft & Practice: Meditations on Creativity & Ethics Zine