This book is a must read, it’s about the return to base nature and a reclamation of one’s self. I enjoyed reading this because it is written by someone who knows what they’re talking about and is focused on re-connecting or awakening the bond you have to the natural world.

This was my first time reading a book about the concept of "rewilding". I really appreciated Micah's way of sharing and his ideas for how to start on a path to reconnecting with the natural world. He has a very gentle, encouraging, practical and inspiring approach. Recommended!

An incredible read by a wise man who has one of the best relationships and understanding of nature i have ever come across. This account of Micah (and now his family) and their environment in a rural state of the US is just beautiful. The man understands what trees and our planet has to offer. I adored it. A must have on every nature lover's shelf.

An interesting concept but I can't get invested in it right now. It just doesn't feel very accessible for me, even though it's well written with a readable style.

The message is wonderful, but the book is very dense and slow going. Maybe it’s the disconnect of reading about rewilding on an ereader?

A really cool book. Teaching us to step outside our own domestication and be more in touch with nature. Mindfulness and appreciation allow us to be more in touch with nature and in turn ourselves. We don’t need to give up our cities and our lives but it’s important to remember where we’ve gone from and get in touch with that part of ourselves again.

I thought this was a nice idea to try & promote more people to make the conscious decision to spend more time in nature.

There is a focus on mindfulness, awareness, evolution & going back to our ancestral hunter gather roots albeit temporarily.

The author is an avid outdoorsman and he invites other to try it too.

From iphelia.com’s Editor’s Bookshelf review: Many books I’ve read contain wisdom; few feel like they come from a deep place of wisdom. Rewilding by Micah Mortali, Director of the Kripalu Schools and the founder of the Kripalu School of Mindful Outdoor Leadership, definitely does. Luckily for me, it also gets at a question that’s been on my mind for months, and rather than telling me what to think, is helping me feel my way toward my own answer.

Back in September, I had the privilege of reading a series of essays by Jungian analyst Pat Berry with a group hosted by the Jung Society of St. Louis. It was some provocative writing focused on dreams, and, of course, it also touched on the nature of being human, as dreamwork tends to do. In October, I met Pat Berry at the Jung in the Heartland Conference, a relatively intimate gathering. I got to ask her about a passage in one of her essays that sparked major questions (and strong feelings) for me:

Human creativity is like nature’s creativity.

Is human creativity really “like” nature’s creativity? Or are we, as animals—like other animals—part of nature, such that our creativity is an incarnation of nature’s creativity? No simile required.

Yes. Pat Berry seemed open to that idea, but the conference, which was about Myth, Meaning, and the Infinite (aka everything, from my point of view), didn’t leave us room to discuss how to be more natural, to connect with the wild world of which we’re a part.

Rewilding does. In fact, that’s what this book, which feels like a lab for Clarissa Pinkola Estes’s Women Who Run With the Wolves, is all about.

The first three chapters tell Mortali’s story of becoming a wilderness leader for troubled youth, a yoga instructor, and a dad who’s raising his kids on the land in the Berkshires (without renouncing modern life and a prestigious administrative position at Kripalu—one of the most famous retreats in the country).

These chapters are a bit creative nonfiction, and a bit slow-moving. There are stories. There’s philosophy. Requiring readers to shift gears to get present to stick with these chapters is probably Mortali’s point. And if your experience is anything like mine, you’ll start having more and more nature encounters (animals, specifically, for me: deer, owl, raccoon, possum, kitties) as you really dig in.

While there are recommendations for nature, or “rewilding,” activities in chapters 1, 2, and 3, it’s in Chapter 4 that Mortali gets into the nitty-gritty of how to build and meditate with fires: the most pertinent rewilding practice introduced in the book. His writing about this process is breathtaking.

He also writes about yoga and mindfulness (on which he’s built his career) with a no-BS approach, noting that just as much as he’s concerned with “these ancient practices” being commodified, he’s concerned that “they are being used as pacifiers to help people put up with the negative effects of modern society.”

In the same way that Iphelia encourages readers to connect with, feel, and actually express their feelings, Rewilding encourages “a desire to connect with life” by engaging, cautiously and reverently but also boldly—as a birthright—what Mortali calls the more-than-human world.

While I’m sensitive to the fact that Rewilding could feel out of touch to readers living in industrial/urban environment, his efforts to make his teachings accessible and actionable are clear.

This book would be a great read for anyone who wants to consider their part in nature and learn to feel it more deeply through nature meditation, responsible hiking and camping, forest bathing, conjuring bow-drill fires, cultivating lasting relationships with wild animals, or even just better knowing and appreciating a nearby park or their backyard.

"Go and sit by a babbling brook and focus on the sound of the water. Listen to the sound of the wind. Gaze out over the ocean and listen to the rhythm of the water. Sit by a crackling fire and smell the aroma of smoke of dry pine branches popping as they release the stored light of the sun. Place your palms on warm concrete and feel the stable earth element beneath it supporting you. Ponder a dandelion growing nobly through a crack of concrete. Society may be telling us that we need more, always more, but stop and listen to what the earth and sky are trying to tell us. Take a deep breath and empty your mind as you exhale. Look around and receive the miracle of this moment. You are enough."

I pick a word of the year each year in an effort to look at life through the lens of that word. My word for 2020 will be "wild" so when I saw this book, I knew it would be a great foray into embracing my word.

And I was not disappointed.

This book is connecting back with nature in a slow, thoughtful, and mindful way. It has meditations, some history of when we used to be connected to the earth so much more, some recommendations on how to be more ready for being in the wild (like building a fire, etc.) and some really small, easy things you can do to reconnect purposefully.

People say that what we’re all seeking a meaning for life. I don’t think that’s what we’re really seeking. I think that what we’re seeking is an experience of being alive, so that our life experiences on the purely physical plane will have resonance with our own innermost being and reality, so that we actually feel the rapture of being alive. Joseph Campbell

More than any one section, what spoke to me is the sentiment of the book and the way it made me feel. As I was reading, I could almost smell, hear and feel the outdoors. I was itching to sink my feet into the earth and feel the breeze on my face. I made several notes of the guidebooks I want to get, survival skills I want to learn, and most importantly to find a way to connect with nature every single day.

I can already feel the invitation of the wild and the calmness it always creates in me. I look forward to reading this book again and again throughout 2020 as I embrace my word and nature.

with gratitude to netgalley and Sounds True for an early copy in exchange for an honest review.

Some good information, although it feels a little light on exercises, more the author telling you all about their life. I agree that being in nature holds the biggest key to wellbeing, so would be helpful to someone new to making that connection.
I received a free digital copy via NetGalley, however the opinions expressed are my own.

In "Rewilding", Micah Mortali brings together yoga, mindfulness, wilderness training, and ancestral skills to create a unique guide for reigniting primal energy and deepening your connection with the living earth. The pages are full of mindfulness practices, rich insights and guided meditations which aim to give the reader a sense of clarity
connection, and confidence. I loved the chapters on ancestral practice, dealing with such topics as foraging, tracking, building fires and finding shelter, as well as the more spiritual side (and am definitely going to be trying forest-bathing next time I'm near some woodland!)

I loved the calm tone of this book, and will definitely read and re-read this, as well as gift it to likeminded friends for birthdays etc. I felt calmer just reading it! A beautiful and well written book.

NOTE: I was provided with a free ARC copy of this book by NetGalley in exchange for an unbiased review.

Rewilding encourages people to reconnect with nature. Author Micah Mortali is interested in the outdoors, spirituality, and mysticism and is a yoga and meditation leader. He uses his experiences and anecdotes that have been shared with him to show how observing nature without fear can give us different views of our own lives and the people in it. He provides plenty of meditations throughout the book to help the reader begin their own rewilding.

I enjoyed this book immensely for the ideas and stories it presented, and the writing is accessible. Although many people will already know that nature and meditation can both be beneficial to overall health, Rewilding presents an immersive look at how to build your own practices. It provides advice for clothing yourself for the outdoors, camping, eating from wild plants, and other notions that used to be common knowledge among our ancestors.

Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for the advanced copy.

A small variety of topics introduced and talked about (ex. ecological boredom, breathing). More integrating yourself into nature and the connection. There is some information and stories/events from own life. Also introduces reader to different skills and practices when going into nature. Nice to look into.

This is an extremely relevant and necessary book that I wish everyone on this earth would read! It is all about getting us back to nature, to mother earth, and to all the beings and creatures and things that live and breathe and give us life. The author Has extensive experience in the realm of nature and mindfulness and bringing the two together. I found the guided meditations and suggested activities throughout the book extremely helpful and have been reminded of many times in my childhood when I was connected to nature much more than I am now. My level of awareness has been raised and I really appreciate that.

Has extensive experience in the realm of nature and mindfulness and bringing the two together. I found the guided meditations and suggested activities throughout the book extremely helpful and have been reminded of many times in my childhood when I was connected to nature much more than I am now. My level of awareness has been raised and I really appreciate that.

Thanks to NetGalley, the author and publisher for an advanced reading copy of this book in exchange for my honest review