As we face solitude and times of retreat, bears remind us that this can actually can add power to our lives. In our digital world we can forget that we’re animals, but when we need to be personally strong our animal nature is actually our greatest source of strength. When the humans all around us seem disconnected from this, it’s a good thing we still have guides in the broader animal kingdom. We’re often so busy grinding away within the lanes of domesticated existence that when we can come up for air, we hardly know what to do with ourselves. Especially in times when we perceive potential survival threats or existential threats to certain elements of our contrived status quo, it’s easy to get pulled into the media’s addicting but fairly unconstructive stream of fear and divisiveness or to endless statements from the various people that claim to “lead” us about their own competence and the incompetence of the other “leaders”. Alternatively, we can turn to our friends the bears for some guidance on how to use times like these to be stronger animals! One of the bear’s main lessons for us comes from its practice of hibernation. This is one of the bears’ key evolutionary strategies that make them one of the largest and most adaptable apex predators on our planet. As bears hibernate during the winter in their extremely heat efficient dens, their heart rates, rates of breathing, and metabolisms slow down substantially, and they stop eating and excreting waste. During this time, their bodies are fueled entirely by stored body fat and they remarkably manage to preserve almost all of their muscle mass and strength. This allows them to conserve energy during times of cold weather and food scarcity so that they can focus their energy and live more powerfully in times of greater abundance.
Another of the bear’s main lessons for us comes from its primarily solitary life. Bears are not reclusive, however; they actually have highly nuanced social lives. They fight and posture to establish dominance, they have friendships and alliances, and the commitment and protection a mother bear gives to her cubs is emotionally moving. Sometimes they can be territorial and at other times they are not. They can be extremely ferocious, and when they are they are probably the most powerful terrestrial force in the entire animal kingdom. However, for the most part, they tend to shy away from encounters to retreat into the woods alone to eat. They certainly don’t run around in a constant state of aggression like wolverines and honey badgers. These aspects of the lives of bears offer us powerful lessons. Sometimes we humans seem to forget that we can choose how to focus our energy in life. We can shift our energy from dysfunctional practices and draining voids to areas that develop us and give us strength. Just like hibernating bears, when we practice and build this mental discipline we can unleash ourselves more effectively in situations of opportunity and times of abundance. The relative solitude of bears seems critical to their mastery of themselves and their energy - they don’t waste most of their energy on pack dynamics and instead act from a deep source of independently developed self confidence. Although they yield to a stronger bear, bears demonstrate a sophisticated sense of boundaries and they do not serve any self-important and resource-hogging bears that lie or manipulate to deprive all the other bears of power. The more we study bears, the more we realize how extremely nuanced they actually are and how we can never fit them into any binary categories. Overwhelmingly, the life of bears displays an incredible level of self-mastery and with it an outlier ability to focus energy. This mastery appears to be rooted largely in solitude and highly strategic engagement. The bear’s unrivaled terrestrial strength and dominance in nature also demonstrates that rest and retreat is not a sign of weakness and not without substantial benefits. Collectively as a society we have decided to face today’s health threats with a period of retreat and solitude. Given the amount of work that could probably help us become more effective personally and collectively, this time of retreat seems like a powerful gift. In the past, I’ve always struggled to make any changes in my life in a business-as-usual setting and I’ve needed to use “gap year” adventures for major realignments. I recognize that approach isn’t feasible for most of us so I think a time of disruption like this might be a viable alternative. As we take a break from our commutes, our routines, and our outside distractions, it can serve us to think about what we stand for in life, what beliefs and practices no longer serve us well, and what actions or changes we can make to strengthen our lives. Additionally, as a history major in college, one thing I learned is that challenge is a critical element for the evolution of society. Although it is difficult and sometimes very draining to witness all of the “problems” in the world, exposing the cracks in our systems and institutions is a really good and necessary step for any progress to occur. Biographies of inspiring figures show us that truly meaningful transformations in this world often arise as outer manifestations of personal transformations and individual decisions to accept personal responsibility. Hence, as we witness “crisis” we may want to reflect on who we want to be and what we want to contribute. It’s probably also a good time to take another cue from the bears and work on our own boundaries in order to protect us from strength-draining temptations like pity, despair, and negative energy. But don’t take my word for any of this; I’m just a little human who was raised in a world of fear. We can just watch the bears. They don’t whine about social distance, they don’t blame each other, they don’t sit around and freak out about their changing world or any artificial concepts, and they don’t cling to the past. They just go into their dens when it starts snowing, they emerge in the spring hungry and reborn, they adapt to whatever their environments offer, and they generally crush life. From my extensive study of bear documentaries, I can assure you that their lives are epic masterpieces. I suggest we channel some bear energy during our little hibernations. Our brothers and sisters in the bear family remind us that we’re not only little tools that can be manipulated. The way I see it, this world is our canvas and when we gather our strength we can paint the hell out of it.
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