Over the past few years, I’ve spent a lot of time in Vermont, where I often take a favorite hike with my dog, Alfie. We walk up a steep meadow, then through a sugar bush with its web of sap lines connecting some 800 maple trees. We climb past a small birch grove and finally reach a series of interconnecting trails known as “five corners.” Then we walk down the other side of this small mountain. If it’s the rainy part of summer, I stop to inspect the profusion of mushrooms. In winter, I catch glimpses of far-away houses in the distant hills. Meanwhile, Alfie trots around to investigate the various scents that I can only imagine.
I find this hike utterly transporting. My to-do lists and small grievances fade away. If I’m in the right mood, I can slip out of my “little self” and enter into a world that feels so much bigger and more alive. I imagine the trees sensing my presence and the bears watching me. But it wasn’t until I read Andrea Wulf’s book ”Magnificent Rebels" that this experience made more sense to me. It’s not just that I’m immersed in the natural world; the membrane between myself and my surroundings grows porous - and every so often, almost disappears.
Wulf tells the story of a group of brilliant and tempestuous German writers and philosophers who launched the Romantic Movement in the late 18th century. She claims that this is the historical moment when our modern concept of the “self”was invented. But it’s a particular version of personal experience that resonates with me. One of those philosophers, Friedrich Schelling, believed that the self and nature were identical, which might be the founding idea of modern ecological thinking. And for me, those walks in the woods shimmer a bit more brightly. You can listen to my interview with Andrea Wulf in this week’s show, Cult of the Self.
– Steve