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When one is out in the wild, with nothing between Nature and yourself, facts take on a different meaning. When you run into a bear, with no firearms, by yourself, there are not many people who will ask the bear to wait a minute, because they have to look up the answer on the internet, their notes, or try and remember what some expert told them to do, or tell the bear they are exempt because the studied or know so and so. The bear does not care what your religion, philosophy or politics says about him. His reality is the only reality. You will not have time to visualize anything but your own death. Your explanations about how he should act, or what will happen to him, will be nothing more than dust in the wind. What you know intellectually, or have memorized will have little to do with your immediate predicament. What will matter is how you SEE, your reactions, and your training. In other words, what you live, not what you think. The bear will see you for what you are, not what you want to be, what you should be, or what you will be. He will see what is in your heart, how you carry yourself and your feelings toward him. Your communication with him will be direct and your intentions will be known. What is in your gut, will take over almost every other part of you. This is your soul, chi, or mind body relationship. In situations such as these, your eyes can waste up to 80% of your energy, and you will go into a state of shock, if you rely on sight alone. Learn to gaze, as in peripheral vision, rather than stare like a spectator at an accident victim. To SEE with your stomach, to feel with the back of your head. Your demeanor and stance, will not be that of a gorilla pounding his chest showing how strong he thinks he is, it should neither be that of a peacock blowing his own horn, trying to impress you. One would be better off with a casual stance, like a seaman would have; sea-legs. Not so rooted that you look like a brick wall, and not so light on your feet that you appear to be light (less that solid). If you elect to walk, do not turn your head away, or run, otherwise an automatic reaction will take over in the bear, and you will be seen as game fleeing. John Muir, and others have gone many hundreds of miles without firearms, radios or flashlights. They might bring a long staff to keep a bear at his distance . They become one with Nature, not separating themselves from it through the narrow roles of cause and effect. These naturalists are rarely attacked, because they are there for the same reason the bear is, and are considered part of the forest. This is due to the sincere love and respect that they have forged over the years. World renown 'Bear Man of Admirilty Island', Allen Hasselborg nearly lost his life to a grizzly along the Bartlett River (Stowe 1996). Tasked by C. Hart Merriam, then director of the Smithsonian Museum's mammal collections, to collect bear specimens in the region, Hasselborg met up with a Tlingit hunting party. While talking with them, he boasted that he wasn't afraid of bears, bravado deemed reckless and dangerous to the Tlingits. Among the Tlingits was an elderly man by the name of Albert Jackson. Jackson sharply warned Hasselborg that if he kept his boasting up, he would anger a bear that would attack him. Several miles up the Bartlett River, Hasselborg saw a large grizzly bear the next day, fired four shots into it, and then pursued the wounded animal. The bear hid on a ledge, ambushed Hasselborg, and nearly killed him. Severely injured, Hasselborg was barely able to make his way back to the where the hunting party was camped. Upon his arrival, Hasselborg was told by Jackson that he got what he had coming to him (Stowe 1996). Martial arts and many internal disciplines can forge oneself, with regular training. Why is it that a samurai sword is beaten, heated, repeatedly, can't they figure it out the first time, one might ask. This apparently repetitive process is more of spiral, than a circle, watch stage and process building on the other. So training can be also. Most of the best, still practice their favorite basics, in addition to new forms. One can visualize a form after watching it briefly, but this is a copy, a forgery, not a forging. A normal challenge to this might be, how do you know this? I know through first hand experience since a youth, sometimes alone, with bears from 3 feet to 30 feet away. I do not see them as enemies, but as sentient beings and Guardians of the Forest. To the Tlingit and Haida Naitves in Alaska, the grizzly was a Spirit Messenger and a source of power. The grizzly spirit is invoked in ceremonial dances and symbolically worn on clothing. The grizzly could be the spirit helper of men and there were legends of a human spirit inhabiting the body of the bear |