Having just spent a slow-paced week in the woods learning the basics of the art of bushcraft, the return to civilisation has been somewhat disorientating. Many things bothered my mind on my return, from the urban noises to the claustrophobia of the buildings and the density of people. But the main underlying cause of this unease was the jump from very simple living on what nature provides compared to the massively complex way of life currently gripping humanity.
From dawn to dusk in each of our western lives, we use objects and energy derived from far-off places via many hands to bring it here. The very houses we live in, the manner in which we transport ourselves, the food we eat and how we cook it, it’s all provided for us with us having very little control of it. The raw materials for even the most simplest tool is shipped from abroad to be manufactured and distributed to us via a huge network. Very few things can be said to have come from our own hands or from the local environment.
Compared to bushcraft, the level of complexity is huge. Although still using some basic tools from civilization, the abundance of nature was clear to see in its ability to provide for fairly comfortable human existence. Food, medicine, tools, shelter – all could be found and made usable by oneself. The realisation of how difficult it was to provide these very basic needs in the middle of a huge selection of resources brought home how disempowered we are in this way of life, unable to provide for our needs without the massive life-support machine of civilisation.
How could we survive without the life-support system though? Using bushcraft in the woods is no doubt very useful, but it is impossible for the current population to survive off the relatively few tracts of unabused land for long without destroying them too. This is where Permaculture comes in, in its ability to take the abused land and rewild it with humans and biodiversity in mind. By designing the recovery of the land, we can live off the land with very little impact. Although the earth will regenerate in time after humans, if we wish to survive too we need to give all the assistance we can in accelerating this process before any more damage is done.
This is all necessary to reduce the complexity of our lives and thus reduce its destructive impacts on the earth and ourselves. It is hard to suddenly ‘drop-out’ of civilisation though, and this must be done gradually for the majority of us. In the meantime we must take responsibility of the complexity. If you drive a car, do you really currently need it? If not, remove it from your life, if you do then keep it, but only if you accept the consequences of that and commit to eventually being able to finally change. The same can be applied to everything in our lives, to every object and activity that depends upon the life-support system of civilisation. We must slowly become independent of it, accepting what we currently need from it with the full commitment to as soon as possible to destroy these links too.
