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The Nature Instinct: Relearning Our Lost Intuition for the Inner Workings of the Natural World - Hardcover | Diverse Reads

The Nature Instinct: Relearning Our Lost Intuition for the Inner Workings of the Natural World

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“A captivating guide to finding one’s way in the wild.”—The Wall Street Journal

The culmination of everything Tristan Gooley, New York Times-bestselling author of How to Read a Tree and The Lost Art of Reading Nature’s Signs, has written so far: How to take what you learn about the outdoors—and make it second nature

Readers of master outdoorsman Tristan Gooley have learned that the world is filled with clues to look for—we can use the Big Dipper to tell time, for example, and a budding flower to find south. But what about the innate survival instincts that told Gooley to move on one night, just as he was about to make camp? Everything looked perfect, but something felt wrong. When Gooley returned to his abandoned campsite to search for clues, there they were: All of the tree trunks were slightly bent. The ground had already shifted once in a storm—and could easily shift again, becoming treacherous in heavy rain.

The Nature Instinct shows us how Gooley and other expert observers—from hunters in the English countryside to the Pygmy people in the Congo—have recovered and rekindled this lost “sixth sense;” a subconscious,deeper understanding of our surroundings. By training ourselves through slow, careful observation, we too can unlock this kind of intuition—for finding the forest’s edge when deep in the woods, or knowing when a wild animal might pose danger—without even having to stop to think about it.

Publisher's note: The Nature Instinct was published in the UK under the title Wild Signs and Star Paths.

ISBN-13: 9781615194797

Media Type: Hardcover

Publisher: The Experiment

Publication Date: 11-20-2018

Pages: 400

Product Dimensions: 6.00(w) x 8.30(h) x 1.40(d)

Series: Natural Navigation Series

Through his teaching and writing, Tristan Gooley has pioneered a renaissance in the rare art of natural navigation. He has led expeditions on five continents, climbed mountains in three, and studied the methods of tribal peoples in some of the remotest regions on Earth. He is the only living person to have both flown and sailed solo across the Atlantic.

Table of Contents

Introduction xi

Part I Ancient and New

Wild Signs and Star Paths I 3

The Sun Anvil 17

Wild Signs and Star Paths II 25

The Wind Anchor 38

Wild Signs and Star Paths III 46

Part II Above and Below: Sky and Land

The Shear 60

The Ramp 62

The Pink Compass 66

The Sky Map 68

The Invisible Handrail 73

The Light and Dark Woods 78

The Edge and Musit 83

The Fire 87

The Browse, Bite, and Haven 89

The Celebration and Shadow 94

The Friend, Guest, and Rebel 98

The Reaper 101

Part III Creatures of Meaning: The Animals

The Perch and Sentinel 109

The Return 112

The Face and Tail 114

The Point 118

The Peek 122

The Freeze, Crouch, and Feign 127

The Flight 134

The Refuge 144

The Cacophony 148

The Track 159

The Circling 163

The Slotting 168

The Guide 171

The Squall Squawk 174

Part IV Signs of Wisdom: Advanced Keys

Flock, Bubble, and Burst 179

The Retreat and Rebound 188

The Jink 191

The Shimmy 197

The Ignore and Mistake 201

The Eddy 204

The Crook 206

Nature's Coat 208

Two Frosts 212

The Clepsydra 215

Part V A World of Signs: Digging Deeper

Labels That Come to Life 237

Three Luminaries 244

A Noble Pursuit 251

Tomorrow's Hunter 261

More Than Machines 264

Umwelt 271

Treachery 284

A Storied Creature 286

The Ikus 293

Part VI Epilogue

The Room 305

Notes and Further Reading 311

Bibliography 331

Acknowledgments 335

Index 337

About the Author 366