The Art of Manliness - Befriending Winter

00:00:00.000 brett mckay here and welcome to another edition of the art of manliness podcast

00:00:10.420 some people dread winter with its cold weather long dark nights and the downcast mood these

00:00:16.200 elements often induce but my guess would say it's possible to befriend winter and truly enjoy the

00:00:21.260 rhythms and opportunities that are unique to this season mike mortally is the founder of the

00:00:26.060 kripalu school of mindful outdoor leadership and an instructor and retreat leader who uses the

00:00:30.960 teaching of ancestral skills to help people develop greater mindfulness and connection with

00:00:35.080 nature today on the show micah explains why we should consider winter the night of the year

00:00:39.820 and how befriending the season involves aligning yourself with its call toward rest and reflection

00:00:44.420 we first discuss exploring the outdoor world during winter and how learning survival skills like

00:00:49.060 shelter building and animal tracking can help you spend more time in nature restore your sense of

00:00:53.440 well-being and simply feel more alive in the second half of our conversation we talk about

00:00:58.320 how to improve your interior life during winter both in the literal sense of making your house more

00:01:02.560 cozy and in the metaphorical sense of turning inward mike explains why you should spend one night a week

00:01:07.800 pretending you live off the grid embrace the power of firelight and may want to wait until march to

00:01:12.840 make your new year's resolutions we enter conversation with why you might want to read the road this

00:01:18.240 winter after the show's over check out our show notes at awim.is winter

00:01:22.160 all right mike mortally welcome back to the show thanks for having me brett it's great to be here

00:01:42.900 so we had you on a few years ago to talk about your book rewilding

00:01:45.580 meditations practices and skills for awakening in nature and in this book you take readers through

00:01:52.280 meditative practices that you do at the krupalas school of mindful outdoor leadership and what you

00:01:59.520 do is you get people out in nature take them through meditative practices that uses ancestral skills

00:02:05.240 like fire building and shelter building and building bows and arrows and tracking animals

00:02:12.060 and you got an online course that you offer called befriending winter i thought it'd be appropriate

00:02:17.440 to bring you on to talk about this because winter is coming but let's talk about like what happens like

00:02:22.100 why do most people dread winter like what happens to us physically mentally spiritually during those

00:02:28.780 winter months we're just like oh jesus this is this is not fun yeah oh it's a great question there's so

00:02:34.600 much to it so i always like to think about the history of winter for our species and that always

00:02:41.280 brings me back to thinking about all of the ice ages that happened on our planet and there's been

00:02:47.620 a lot of them and human beings we've been around for about 200 000 years and so our ancestors lived

00:02:54.340 through like you know winters like game of thrones like winters that lasted like thousands of years

00:03:01.040 years so there's a deep ancestral i think memory associated with winter and you know winter if you

00:03:10.100 live in the northern hemisphere or like you know in the southern hemisphere away from the equator you

00:03:15.560 know winter is that time of year when there's less light and that extra darkness and the coldness that

00:03:23.420 comes with it you know that's a time when things die you know that's when plants no longer are

00:03:31.700 photosynthesizing you know winters were a time where if you didn't have enough food or stores put aside

00:03:38.340 then you were going to have a really long hard winter so people struggle with it because you know vitamin

00:03:45.520 d levels drop and you know that's associated with depression it's cold and also there's not as

00:03:53.400 much going on i think socially and so it can be a time when also you have to draw into your home

00:03:59.040 and so for a lot of different reasons i think there's a sense of foreboding there's a sense of

00:04:05.040 a fear associated you know with the darkness and with the cold which is which is very understandable

00:04:11.880 i can remember i saw a few years ago a tommy lee jones movie where he's out on you know the frontier

00:04:18.620 in the 1800s and you know there's a bunch of little cabins and uh on the frontier and he goes

00:04:24.240 around you know after the the winter to all the little cabins and you know people just they lost

00:04:30.080 their minds out there you know winter was you know you maybe you had a bible and a lamp and some oats

00:04:36.760 you know and now we've got netflix and and and central heating and all these things but even still

00:04:43.360 you know i think winter can be a time that is understandably a little harrowing for folks so

00:04:49.580 you advocate different ways to befriend winter but is there an overarching theme and philosophy behind

00:04:54.920 coming to see winter in a new way yeah i mean i think the overarching vision or philosophy has to do

00:05:02.940 with understanding the way that all life has to follow the waxing and waning of our sun's light

00:05:12.820 so there are there are natural cycles that take place and i often think of a quote i heard from

00:05:21.480 joseph campbell where he said the purpose of life is to make your heartbeat match the heartbeat of the

00:05:26.800 universe and i think because of many of the wonderful inventions of modern life like electricity

00:05:35.000 and really great houses that are warm we have many of us most of us probably have allowed ourselves to

00:05:44.020 disconnect from these waxing and waning cycles because we have we have the ability to kind of

00:05:50.260 not go into the darkness you know winter is a time when bears go down into their dens and

00:05:57.600 groundhogs hibernate and nature draws inward during winter it's a time when fields go fallow

00:06:05.900 and animals sleep and rest and there was a time when hunter-gatherer or more agricultural human societies

00:06:12.960 would slow down in the winter time you wouldn't do as much you'd sleep more you'd read more you'd do

00:06:20.240 crafts you would learn how to take care of yourself through that time when there's less light and

00:06:28.720 you would rest more and so part of my approach in helping people befriend winter is acknowledging that

00:06:36.060 this actually is a very important time of rest just like in a daily cycle you wouldn't want to stay up

00:06:42.660 all night right you'd want to go to bed and winter is like the night of the year and so it's important

00:06:49.300 that people embrace that it's actually a time when you can you can rest you can dream you can recover

00:06:55.360 i like that idea winter's the night of the year it's time to just to recoup yeah yeah it is it really

00:07:02.200 is and and we need that and i think you know we people got a taste of a slowing down during the pandemic

00:07:08.800 you know but it's not it's not really it's not natural for us to be going full steam 12 months a year

00:07:16.660 right it's just it's it's not in sync with the earth and so a lot of my work is helping people to

00:07:23.460 you know through mindfulness through just being curious and being present just begin to remember

00:07:30.000 you know in your own organic ways the cycles and the rhythms of the natural world i really feel that

00:07:37.180 through that practice of kind of mindful rewilding we can heal our relationship with the earth and and

00:07:43.720 and i think probably heal a lot of other things along the way yeah i know for me that idea of cycles

00:07:48.620 resonates because i love that feeling of when you're getting out of winter and it's like you're

00:07:54.280 getting that first day of spring where it's not like super warm but it's kind of it's warm-ish but

00:07:59.460 still a little chilly like you you appreciate that a little bit more after you've been through

00:08:03.720 just ground covered with ice and snow it's been dark you appreciate the spring and summer days more

00:08:11.280 because of winter oh yeah absolutely i think that's that's it and you know for folks like

00:08:16.140 you know growing up in new england or anybody who's grown up in a place where you have four seasons you

00:08:20.340 know that's like that really gets in your bones you know i don't think i could live in florida

00:08:24.960 it's like i kind of need that you know okay so uh you recommend different ways to to befriend winter

00:08:31.920 and one of the things you do is recommend learning about winter survival and preparedness

00:08:37.840 uh so how do these how do we learn in these type of skills like survival skills people i don't know

00:08:42.420 most people wouldn't think oh if i want to like get comfortable with winter i need to learn how to

00:08:46.180 start a fire in the snow that's going to help me how does learning these ancestral skills help us

00:08:51.400 befriend the season yeah well you know part of what i advocate a lot is uh you know through rewilding is

00:08:57.920 getting outside and allowing our bodies you know our mammalian bodies to come into intimate

00:09:05.200 contact with the earth in every season um and because again like we evolved having those

00:09:12.140 experiences you know we evolved feeling the cold we evolved you know getting wet we evolved being hot

00:09:19.000 and being in the humidity so i think that that is a part of being a fully alive human and uh you know

00:09:26.500 one of the terms that i i wrote about in rewilding is something i call life force deficit it's you know

00:09:32.640 when we're inside in these temperature controlled environments all the time we're living in a very

00:09:38.940 narrow sensory experience right like we're just kind of existing between 72 degrees and 78 degrees

00:09:46.180 and you know winter is is like a bracing awakening you know when it's kind of like in the morning if you

00:09:52.420 splash your face with cold water it's like you come you you wake up and and winter also has that

00:09:58.680 offering that you know if we can get outside there's that crisp cold refreshing awakening experience

00:10:06.220 that we can have that's so important because part of being i think having a fulfilled life and having

00:10:13.260 a meaningful life is that experience of feeling alive so winter has so much to help awaken our senses

00:10:20.540 experiences so the survival skills or the ancestral skills for me are just points of connection you know

00:10:31.060 if you know how to build a shelter if you know how to make a fire if you know about animal track and you

00:10:36.480 know how to boil water you know all of these things number one can help you to feel more confident and

00:10:43.340 more comfortable in the winter season so i think if you diminish the fear through increasing preparedness

00:10:49.680 and confidence then you know you're gonna feel less fearful and more optimistic maybe and excited

00:10:57.320 about winter so i think that's important and you know getting out there and making a fire in the snow

00:11:04.620 or following animal tracks through the forest uh you know these are fun things to do you know i mean

00:11:12.600 who doesn't you know have fond memories of sitting around a fire while you're camping you know it's

00:11:17.680 these are things we evolved doing and it's important that i think that we remember these

00:11:22.600 skills and then also you know just from a you know a being an adult living in the world kind of a

00:11:28.620 perspective um knowing what to keep in your car and knowing how to provide for your basic needs in

00:11:33.800 the winter time is something that i think everybody should know all right so one of the things you

00:11:37.560 recommend people do to befriend winter is build a winter shelter in the outdoors so can you walk us

00:11:44.040 through like how to build a relatively accessible winter shelter yeah like what do you recommend

00:11:48.640 sure so it really depends on the situation on the terrain and you know whether there's snow or not

00:11:57.200 so you know first thing is we really want to stay dry this is so incredibly important you know staying dry

00:12:05.960 if you're stuck out overnight in cold conditions is going to be key so this is where the shelter comes in

00:12:12.240 because we want to get into something or under something that's going to keep us dry keep us

00:12:16.420 drying out of the wind so you know one method if there's no snow is you can build what's called a

00:12:23.920 debris shelter so if you're out in the winter time you're in a wooded area and there's whether it's

00:12:28.660 pine needles or leaves what you can do is make a little you want to make like a little lean to so

00:12:35.480 you're going to have two poles you're going to grab two sticks and you're going to tie them

00:12:40.320 together so they create a little a-frame just about three feet high all right so just a little

00:12:45.780 a-frame tied at the top and then you're going to get a lodge pole like a longer pole that's a little

00:12:52.000 bit longer than your body and you're just going to rest it in that a-frame so that it's going down

00:12:57.640 at an angle and then you're just going to line that with sticks so that you've created like a little

00:13:03.520 tunnel that you can crawl inside of all right and you don't want to be able to sit up in it you want

00:13:08.560 it just to be for lying down in and then you're going to cover that structure that skeleton structure

00:13:15.000 with as much debris from the forest as you can possibly gather you want to have three four five

00:13:21.520 feet of debris piled up on top of that little structure and that's going to be insulation

00:13:27.780 and then once you do that you want to fill the little structure that you're going to lie down and

00:13:32.860 you're going to want to put down on the ground as much pine bough as you can gather so you know

00:13:38.920 whether it's a hemlock or balsam or pine needles to create a little insulating layer between your

00:13:45.160 body and the ground and then you're going to stuff leaves inside of it and you're going to crawl in and

00:13:49.580 crawl out until you compress all those leaves down and you've made yourself a little cocoon this is

00:13:55.140 called the debris shelter and i've built dozens of these and they shed water incredibly so i've built

00:14:02.620 debris shelters that have been up for two years and they've been through two winters and summer

00:14:07.140 downpours and they're bone dry inside so knowing how to build a debris shelter is a really important

00:14:14.020 skill and if you want to really see it be done just go on youtube there's lots of great videos on

00:14:18.900 there you can watch how to actually build yourself a debris shelter so that's one the other would be a

00:14:24.520 quincy and a quincy is a snow shelter and essentially what you want to do is either find a really deep

00:14:32.360 drift pile of snow or you want to make yourself a really large pile of snow and if you're going to

00:14:39.300 make a large pile of snow then you want to let it settle for about 45 minutes to an hour and it should

00:14:45.720 be about as tall as you and about that big around so a pretty large mound then what you want to do is you

00:14:52.360 want to take sticks and you want to push sticks into the whole external area of the shelter about

00:14:58.460 a foot deep okay so it's going to look like a porcupine with maybe like 25 sticks sticking out

00:15:04.760 of it and that's so once you start to hollow out the hole once you hit those sticks from the inside

00:15:10.480 that tells you to stop so that your walls will all be about a foot thick so that they won't collapse

00:15:16.360 on you you know you're going to make the entrance to your quincy facing east so that that first light

00:15:22.640 of the sun shines in because you're going to want that sun you're going to hollow it out inside and

00:15:28.380 you're going to create a place in there where you can lie down and you can sleep quinzies are amazing

00:15:35.500 they'll keep you out of the wind they're not warm inside they're pretty cold it's like sleeping in a

00:15:41.760 refrigerator in there for sure but it will keep you dry and it'll keep you sheltered and i do

00:15:47.880 recommend to folks to try sleeping in a quincy they are silent as a tomb inside there is something

00:15:57.140 absolutely gorgeous about the light that comes out of a quincy in the wintertime when you have a little

00:16:04.680 candle in there i mean it glows i've had some of the most unforgettable i would say spiritual

00:16:12.020 experiences sleeping in a quincy i'll usually put a thermo rest in there like a camping mattress and

00:16:18.760 i'll bring my sleeping bag in and a beeswax candle and usually around the winter solstice or early january

00:16:24.580 i'll do a night or two in a quincy and there's just something very very special and unique about

00:16:31.120 sleeping in a snow shelter like that so if you've never done it before highly recommend it so another

00:16:36.420 practice you recommend is winter foraging we typically don't think of being able to forge much

00:16:42.160 during the winter you know like squirrels they try to forge before winter comes right so what can

00:16:46.680 people find during the winter season well there's a few things that you know i like to gather in the

00:16:51.700 winter time you know just just simple things like uh you know winter berry leaves you can gather

00:16:57.080 winter berry leaves and make a delicious tea you know if you've ever had winter green gum you know

00:17:01.880 that winter green oil when you drop it into when you drop the leaves into hot water it releases those

00:17:06.880 oils and it's a delicious tea you can do the same thing with white pine needles or hemlock needles

00:17:12.900 so those are some things that i like to forge in the winter time and when i go on a hike with my kids

00:17:17.960 i bring my little stove and you know we'll make a tea like that or you know sometimes i'll also gather

00:17:23.340 birch and make a little birch tea just with uh birch twigs that i drop into the water and release

00:17:30.700 that sweet birch oil you know there's one thing that i grow in my backyard that i harvest in the

00:17:36.280 winter time which is a jerusalem artichoke which are these like seven eight foot tall beautiful yellow

00:17:41.980 flowers that grow and bloom in september but then in the winter time under the ground are hundreds and

00:17:49.660 hundreds of these delicious big fat tubers and so in the winter time i'll dig those up and chop them

00:17:57.000 up and cook them so that's not so much of a forage but it's something that i harvest in the winter time

00:18:02.440 you know the fall and the late winter is also a time that human beings have always hunted

00:18:07.040 you know so along with the foraging you know is the is the hunting practice and so you know that is

00:18:13.720 an ancestral skill that many people you know to this day practice and uh you know those traditions

00:18:20.460 of going out and walking in the forest and you know endeavoring to harvest food for the winter is

00:18:26.520 is something that i think can be done very reverently and with great respect and great care

00:18:32.100 and and can can be a very powerful way to connect with the season as well well yeah so another related

00:18:37.520 to the hunting aspect is you recommend people do winter tracking like what's a good way to get started

00:18:42.500 with that so tracking you know if we think about it you know all of us our ancestors were amazing

00:18:49.400 trackers and tracking is much harder to do in the spring summer and fall when the snow is on the

00:18:56.700 ground the tracks are so much easier to see and so i recommend that folks you know go outside into their

00:19:04.300 yards or wherever you know whatever's close where there's snow and just go out and mindfully pay

00:19:11.860 attention to what tracks are there there's a lot of different resources on tracking that you can

00:19:18.460 get i really enjoy paul resende's writings on tracking also tom brown has great books on tracking

00:19:25.280 and uh there's so many there's so many different ways to approach that practice but

00:19:29.960 you know i sometimes think that you know tracks in the snow were almost like the first alphabet

00:19:35.500 you know they were like the first written language was really the impressions of feet and paws on the

00:19:42.100 earth and tracking is more than anything a practice of awareness and the more aware that we are of our

00:19:52.080 surroundings the more connected we feel most of the animals that we live near you know they're nocturnal

00:19:58.380 so aside from the squirrels and the crows and animals like that that we see during the day

00:20:04.920 you know the bobcats and the coyotes and the bears and the deer many of these animals you know they move

00:20:11.080 at night so we can learn about them and we can connect with these animals by studying their tracks and

00:20:18.940 i've just found it to be you know one of the most fun and meaningful skills that i've developed in my

00:20:26.080 adult life is uh learning about tracks and feeling connected to the animals that i share my land with

00:20:31.720 and so what like you said earlier what all these practices do is just they're contact points to

00:20:36.980 nature that can be a doorway into a meditative practice like you want to do these things

00:20:41.600 mindfully while you're doing them correct yeah absolutely you know what you know brett the thing

00:20:46.920 i've come to over the years is i've spent more and more time really thinking about mindfulness and

00:20:52.020 thinking about the natural world i really i i kind of believe that mindfulness is more of our default

00:20:59.760 state than it is a practice i i believe that if we're in our natural habitat like if we think about

00:21:05.740 ourselves as as mammals that evolved on earth when we think about our natural habitat it really is the

00:21:12.140 outdoors and one thing we know from research now is that you know when people are gazing out at nature

00:21:19.220 they're healthier their immune system functions better they're more optimistic they're happier

00:21:25.900 they're more relaxed i think that we are mindful beings but since we've been disconnected from our

00:21:34.440 natural habitat we've become anxious and stressed and worrisome and unhealthy so i think when we just

00:21:40.940 get out into our natural habitat and we allow ourselves to just sit and observe and we have that

00:21:47.520 intention to connect that mindfulness just sort of flows in well a practice you talked about in the

00:21:55.040 last conversation we had was the the sit spot for those who may have not heard that episode can you

00:22:00.820 remind us what a sit spot is and then how does that practice change during the winter sure so sit spot is

00:22:07.820 a nature connection practice that's really like universally embraced by so many different lineages and

00:22:13.880 schools at this point and essentially what it is is is you find a place on the earth near where you live

00:22:21.560 that you can get to very easily and very regularly and the idea is you go out to this place and you sit

00:22:28.600 and you become very still and you keep your awareness very open and you're simply noticing everything

00:22:37.200 that's happening around you and what happens is day after day month after month year after year

00:22:44.160 you become bonded to this place because when we're still and we kind of melt into the landscape

00:22:54.500 whatever disturbances we create when we're tromping through nature as human beings well when we become

00:23:01.120 still and we're paying attention those disturbances begin to dissipate and then the creatures that

00:23:07.580 are there you know they're not disturbed and so then they'll begin to show themselves so when you sit

00:23:13.020 in nature in a sit spot you get a window into the world that most human beings never see and it's a

00:23:20.200 powerful way to connect with place so in the winter time you do have to adjust it a little bit if it's

00:23:27.840 bitter cold where you live so in the winter i recommend that folks adjust their sit spot so

00:23:33.780 that they can be if possible in a sunny place so if you can adjust so that you're getting that southern

00:23:38.740 exposure middle of the day that can make a big difference or if it's simply too bitter cold for

00:23:44.480 you i recommend doing a sit spot by a window and perhaps a window that has a view of a bird feeder

00:23:51.460 you might if you're in an urban area you might even put a little bird feeder right on your window on

00:23:56.420 your fire escape and that can be a really beautiful way to get to know all those individual birds that

00:24:02.980 are going to regularly come to your bird feeder so those are some ways i recommend folks adjust

00:24:09.200 sit spot for winter time we're going to take a quick break for a word from our sponsors

00:24:13.180 and now back to the show okay so we've talked about ways you can explore the outdoor landscape during

00:24:25.820 winter and befriend winter that way but you also talk about exploring and enhancing one's interior

00:24:32.100 landscape in winter and you talk about that in two different ways like you can do it in your in the

00:24:37.360 sense of your inner life right winter can be a great time for reflection meditation for writing for just

00:24:44.200 thinking about things and then also in your like literal indoor landscape right the physical surroundings

00:24:51.220 of your house so why is winter a good time to lean into inwardness and what are some good ways people

00:24:57.920 can do that well we just have to look to nature to see that that's what the earth is doing in the wintertime

00:25:03.020 is it's drawing inward so again if we look at trees and they drop their leaves and they pull their sap into

00:25:08.560 their roots and we the groundhogs go down and everything draws inward in wintertime you know the earth

00:25:14.320 sort of does draw inward and so that's the energy of the wintertime things become still you know the water

00:25:22.320 freezes and becomes like iron solid and there's this kind of stillness there's a everything the life

00:25:29.640 force kind of locks up and things sort of shut down of course there's still a lot going on but there's

00:25:34.580 less going on you know and so i think if we allow ourselves time to observe that energy and that change

00:25:42.920 and allow ourselves to be influenced by that we can align with that energy just like everything else is

00:25:50.940 and so some some ways to do that that i recommend to folks are you know number one you know in the in

00:25:57.580 nordic countries they have this tradition called hygge right and hygge is this practice it's like

00:26:03.300 the root of hug it's this feeling of being cozy in the wintertime so part of the winter practice is to

00:26:11.720 is to go allow yourself to enjoy being indoors and to try to make the space that you're living in for

00:26:17.720 the winter like a like a cozy nest so you want to like think about you know your favorite chair your

00:26:24.120 couch your reading area wherever you go at the end of the day and you might want to say i'm going to

00:26:29.700 make this space really cozy for myself like what are my favorite blankets uh you know do i have a little

00:26:36.960 fire how can i create like a winter nest that i can look forward to coming back to and getting cozy in

00:26:44.280 this is so important and so with that i encourage folks to one night a week just one night a week

00:26:53.120 pretend that you live off the grid okay so what i mean by this is when you get home from work or

00:27:01.740 you're logging off from online work rather than turning all the lights on in your house as the sun

00:27:06.840 goes down keep all the lights dim or down and maybe you've got like a one nice beeswax candle or a little

00:27:16.660 lamp and just light that one candle or that lamp make your dinner early and then get into your cozy

00:27:25.460 nest with a good book or a journal and read by candlelight okay read by candlelight until you start

00:27:34.940 yawning this is key most of the time you're going to start yawning around 6 30 or 7 this is your body's

00:27:44.560 signal that it's time to go to sleep rather than keeping serotonin levels unnaturally high with

00:27:52.820 electric light let that melatonin onset come in and go to bed at 7 30 or 8 o'clock just do that one night

00:28:02.600 a week and notice the effects this is such a simple but powerful way to explore allowing your own

00:28:10.820 physiology and your own mind and body to align with the natural light dark cycles that are present in

00:28:21.000 the wintertime so what time do you wake up when you go to bed at 7 30 or 8 at night yeah well you know

00:28:28.000 there used to be this thing called uh the second sleep i don't know if you've heard about i think

00:28:31.860 you've probably heard about this you've heard about this yeah so it used to be back in the day before

00:28:35.580 electric light you know folks would stoke the fire it would get dark they'd start yawning 6 30 or 7

00:28:42.020 maybe read read a little bit from the good book and and and call it a day and you know you'd sleep for

00:28:49.140 six hours and wake up at like midnight or one i mean i think this happens to me every time i go camping

00:28:54.480 right it's like you wake up at one in the morning and folks would have gotten up and they stoke

00:29:00.160 the fire and then maybe they would you know go have a midnight snack and then they'd go back to bed

00:29:05.280 and then they'd wake up around five in the morning again i think anybody who's ever gone camping in the

00:29:11.620 fall or the spring can relate to this it's kind of what we all naturally do right away as we go to bed

00:29:16.960 really early wake up once in the middle of the night and then wake up around sunrise and there's

00:29:21.600 actually been a really cool study the colorado sleep study where they they found that when folks go

00:29:29.380 camping that melatonin onset happens right around sunset and it peaks two hours before sunrise

00:29:37.960 okay and then folks wake up right at sunrise because melatonin has been dropping off for about two

00:29:43.680 hours before the sun comes up contrast that with folks who are using screens and plugged into normal

00:29:51.180 life melatonin onset doesn't happen until two hours after sunset and it doesn't peak until two hours

00:29:59.280 after sunrise so when we're looking at our screens and we're keeping our serotonin levels unnaturally

00:30:06.400 high after the sun goes down well when the sun comes up in the morning your melatonin still not

00:30:13.500 even yet peaked so around you know maybe eight o'clock your melatonin stops starts to drop off that's why

00:30:19.840 you know you need those three or four cups of coffee to kind of feel like you're getting yourself going and

00:30:23.920 you know i've certainly probably like you kind of experienced the way that camping just resets that

00:30:30.800 and gets us more on the natural light cycle so we can we can work with that even when we're in our

00:30:35.680 houses just by experimenting with low light levels one night a week yeah we experienced i experienced that

00:30:41.260 we went backpacking with our kids in colorado a few weeks ago yeah i mean it was like seven o'clock

00:30:48.580 seven thirty we'd eaten and i was like well nothing else to do go to bed eight and then yeah i woke up

00:30:55.760 at one o'clock that's the time i woke up and i remember waking i was like oh my gosh i've got

00:30:59.960 five more hours until but you know i got up you know went outside went to the went to the bathroom

00:31:06.880 came back and i kind of just slept not great it was sort of like restless but i didn't feel terrible

00:31:13.520 the next day i was fine yeah that's pretty common and uh and i think part of it too i know for me i

00:31:19.420 did the same thing i took my daughter on a two-night backpacking trip on the at and you know i think it

00:31:24.700 definitely takes some time for me to get used to sleeping outside as well i kind of you know always

00:31:30.060 you can kind of sleep with one ear open so you know you hear something you wake up and then you go

00:31:33.820 back to sleep you know all right so uh get cozy with your interior with hygge so blankets candles

00:31:40.540 are things you can do books puzzles are other things you can do that they kind of make things

00:31:46.240 cozy in there you just want to build a nest inside besides that you also advocate for a concept

00:31:51.180 called the practice of council which is building a winter community what does that look like and why

00:31:56.960 is that important so council is a practice that i work with and have been working with for the last

00:32:01.680 17 years with every retreat i lead every training i lead i always use council practice

00:32:08.380 so you know council is something that you can lean into a little bit more in the winter time since

00:32:14.460 you're inside more and you're gathered more basically what council is is you've got a talking

00:32:20.440 piece and it could be anything i often use a stone or a stick when i'm home with my my wife and my kids

00:32:27.480 i'll use like whatever's lying around sometimes it's just the television remote you know whatever's handy

00:32:33.700 or a lighter and one person speaks at a time in council so you pass the talking piece around

00:32:39.440 and the invitation is to um to be a really great listener to listen from the heart

00:32:45.140 so we're not in council we're not trying to offer advice we don't offer advice we don't try to fix each

00:32:51.980 other's problems we just try to listen deeply and understand the other person's perspective

00:32:58.080 so we listen from the heart we speak from the heart we practice being spontaneous and we practice

00:33:04.580 being of lean expression and you know council like you know it's a practice that we don't have to do

00:33:12.180 just in winter time but winter can be an important time to gather community together if people have more

00:33:20.700 time there's less going on you know you might find perhaps you want to start a men's group

00:33:26.920 maybe you want to you know i just led a men's retreat at kripalu um last week and you know so many men

00:33:35.780 are so isolated and you know one of the themes that came out of it was that

00:33:41.120 we you know so many of us carry so much shame you know for our imperfections or the ways that we had

00:33:47.860 the things we're working on with ourselves or the things that we're struggling with and many men feel

00:33:53.120 like they're doing this all by themselves alone that no one else has these same problems so you know

00:33:59.660 winter could be a good time maybe to gather together in person or on zoom and the council practice can be

00:34:06.960 a very good um structure to lean into because oftentimes when we try to connect and share we get

00:34:15.120 into advice giving or oh the same thing happened to me and that can kind of take away from the power

00:34:20.800 of the share experience so i recommend folks learn about council practice council it's an amazing way

00:34:29.340 to create a safe container for deeper connection yeah and again because there's not much like you

00:34:35.580 said i like the idea because there's not much going on people will probably just take you up on the

00:34:39.820 offer if you say hey let's come over to my place it doesn't have to be even like formal council it could be

00:34:45.140 but just get together and just hang out and talk maybe work on a puzzle play some games people love

00:34:51.600 that stuff during the winter time absolutely or just sit by the fire you know it's uh i always say

00:34:57.220 like fire is the ultimate convener like like no other thing in nature is as good at gathering humans

00:35:03.380 into a circle than fire right anytime you build a fire you're building community well let's talk about

00:35:09.240 fire fire building you know people are always drawn to fire but in the winter it holds a particularly

00:35:14.020 magnetic attraction what are some ways we can work with fire in the winter and use it as a doorway to

00:35:19.940 to meditation yeah well you know one is i really recommend folks um you know consider exploring like

00:35:28.180 marking the winter solstice you know uh part of my work with nature connection is not just helping

00:35:33.940 people connect with place but helping people connect with the cycles of time and so part of embracing

00:35:40.040 winter is embracing this cycle of waxing and waning darkness the winter solstice december 21st

00:35:48.200 is a very important moment in our journey on this earth each year it's a day that has been marked by

00:35:56.840 human cultures around the world forever right like the stonehenge marks the winter solstice so many of

00:36:05.160 these ancient monolithic monuments mark the winter the summer solstice so having a big fire or just a

00:36:12.920 nice small fire can be a really simple way to honor the longest night of the year so that's one day in

00:36:22.040 particular where you can create a little bit of ritual around that and one thing i would encourage is for

00:36:28.920 folks to look at their own ancestry you know look at your where do your ancestors come from where do

00:36:35.640 where were they living at that point where they were indigenous to that place right and what were those

00:36:43.400 practices so for me you know knowing some of my ancestors were celts you know i kind of look back at

00:36:49.240 the celtic wheel of the year and fire was such an important part as it was also in the nordic countries

00:36:55.400 you know during yule which marks the winter solstice and there was the burning of the yule log on the

00:37:01.160 winter solstice but of course you have hanukkah you have the christmas lights you have kwanzaa like

00:37:08.200 so many different traditions are traditions of light at this time of year because this was the time when

00:37:14.680 people would really pray and sing that the sun would return that this wasn't the end you know let's

00:37:20.680 hope that the days start to get longer again so that could be a campfire in your backyard it might

00:37:27.160 be like i said i'm a big proponent of a nice beeswax candle but if you can't get any of those things

00:37:33.560 your last resort and it's not a bad option is netflix fireplace for your home which we use at our

00:37:40.680 house sometimes and actually does really create that ambience of a fire and uh you know i don't think

00:37:47.320 that's cheating like i think that is a good trick and sometimes works well something we've done in

00:37:52.440 our family at new year's is we had a created a fire in the fireplace and then we threw in regrets

00:37:59.800 from the previous year which was another way to sort of ritualize a fire and make it mean more

00:38:08.040 that's a beautiful tradition right wow yeah yeah that's powerful so you can uh you can that's that's

00:38:13.800 really i'm gonna think about that one sometimes people will put into the fire you know their

00:38:18.280 intentions or their wishes for the new year as well and that kind of brings me to one other point which

00:38:23.800 i wanted to make which is that you know even we do mark the new year on january 1st but in in some

00:38:31.000 earth-based traditions like the new year didn't actually begin until march 22nd when the light was

00:38:37.160 actually starting to get longer than the dark and so one thing i one invitation that i'll offer to

00:38:43.880 everybody is to you know if you don't feel like you know what your intentions are for the new year on

00:38:50.600 january 1st it might be because everything in nature is in deep hibernation at that moment and so open to

00:38:58.600 the possibility that january and february can be a time for dreaming and remaining open to what your

00:39:07.640 your soul wants to unfold in the new year more of a reflective time and maybe you get clear on what

00:39:15.560 you want to create and birth closer to the spring equinox so just something for folks to think on i like

00:39:23.080 that idea because i think sometimes there's that pressure to have some new year's resolutions on

00:39:27.880 january 1st but i found like i'm usually not ready like i i don't i'm not ready in that that time

00:39:34.440 yet yeah and so i think just embrace that fallow season and just be like you know what i don't have

00:39:38.280 to have any intentions right now right i'm just gonna be and then while you're resting while your

00:39:44.440 brain's resting there's actually stuff going on like your brain's actually hard at work maybe at

00:39:48.920 the subconscious or unconscious level helping you come with those intentions that you can start

00:39:53.000 making uh concrete in closer towards the spring absolutely i mean winter's a really great time

00:39:59.960 to keep a dream journal you kind of on that point you know since we're sleeping more we're sleeping

00:40:04.120 deeper you know writing jotting down those dreams and being curious about what's there can be can be a

00:40:09.480 nice winter practice too and then as you mentioned if you don't have a fireplace or a place outdoor to

00:40:15.640 do a fire you can use a candle to get your fire fix and i've done that before when we live in an

00:40:21.160 apartment that's something i do regularly just light a candle stare at it and uh there's just

00:40:26.760 something about the flame just dancing around that instantly focuses you and just like relaxes your

00:40:32.280 mind and uh you know i had some really good meditation sessions just just staring at a candle flame

00:40:38.520 absolutely and you know one little trick that i've been sharing with people that i discovered in

00:40:42.680 the last couple years was uh you know if you want to make a little lamp you can make an oil lamp

00:40:48.760 and it's so incredibly cheap you know beeswax candles can get pricey these days so here's a

00:40:54.200 little trick for folks out there if you have like a like a little shell from the beach or the ocean

00:40:59.960 you can fill a little shell with just olive oil or ghee that you buy you know for cooking you get a

00:41:06.840 little piece of cotton string like an inch or two long and just rest the string in the oil and let a

00:41:12.920 little bit of the string hang off the edge of your lamp of the the seashell and just light the tip of

00:41:18.040 that string and you have yourself a gorgeous natural low-cost oil lamp that you can sit with

00:41:26.040 in the morning or at night and meditate with and it costs just about nothing yeah okay oil lamps we've

00:41:31.720 got a few old-school glass oil lamps just for that purpose just we don't need them but they just they look

00:41:37.320 pretty and you want to enjoy it pretty yeah and it's like that's what people you know that's what

00:41:41.560 people used for light like for thousands of years it's really cool they're so simple and uh i'm gonna

00:41:47.400 recommend a candle if you're looking for a little bit of a extra effect on the candle check out the

00:41:52.760 wood wick candles you've heard of these things no it uses instead of like a traditional like you know

00:41:57.800 like a wax string wick it uses a piece of wood so it actually makes a crackling noise no when you light

00:42:04.440 it so it gives it's it's like a little fireplace fire candle i'm definitely going to check that out

00:42:10.040 and you know it's it's such a you know this whole this idea of carrying the fire you know that we've

00:42:14.920 talked about from the road you know in the winter time you know i really feel that like how important

00:42:20.600 it is to keep our fires burning and carry that light like of hope and that things we're going to get

00:42:26.120 through the winter you know it's a beautiful theme and and the fire can really symbolize so much when

00:42:32.280 things get dark well that's actually that's one thing i do during the winter is that's when i read

00:42:36.840 or reread the road and it's it's bizarre because it's the saddest book in the world and you're

00:42:41.320 already feeling sad because it's cold and dark but it's at the when i'm done with it i feel awful but

00:42:45.960 at the same time i feel like i feel hopeful i feel great it's weird yeah yeah i just i just re-listened

00:42:52.360 to it last week and every time i read it or i listen to it i get so many different things out of it

00:42:58.680 and i and i so i i resonate with that it's it's powerful it's powerful all right so there's another

00:43:03.720 recommendation read the road this winter next to an oil lamp or even in your quincy you made for

00:43:10.040 yourself if you've done that absolutely well micah this has been a great conversation where can people

00:43:15.480 go to learn more about your work yeah so you can go to www.micamortali.com that's my website um you can

00:43:22.840 also follow me at micah rewilding on instagram and you can also check me out on the kripalu website

00:43:28.920 so that's uh kripalu.org and just type my name in and i've got a faculty page there with all of the

00:43:35.000 trainings and the retreats and the programs that i lead at kripalu center in the berkshires in western

00:43:40.200 massachusetts well mike mortali thanks for his time it's been a pleasure brett thanks for having me on i

00:43:45.560 always love talking to you my guest today was mike mortali he's the author of the book rewilding

00:43:50.920 meditations practices and skills for awakening in nature it's available on amazon.com you can

00:43:55.320 find more information about his work at his website mikeamortali.com also check out our

00:43:59.160 show notes at aom.is winter you can find links to resources we delve deeper into this topic

00:44:11.240 well that wraps up another edition of the aom podcast make sure to check out our website at

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00:44:47.240 we'll put what you've heard into action

The Art of Manliness - July 31, 2025

Befriending Winter

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