Step
Four

Develop
Your Skills

Being outdoors in Nature is something that comes naturally. Or can we count on that?

Narrative frameworks are reinforced by personal experience. You have untapped skills for experiencing Nature, but they need to be directed. This step instructs you on honing your skills and applying them to each realm.

Adapted for Nature

Human evolution shaped us to thrive outdoors. We’ve repurposed a lot of the old skills for modern living, but with training they can still handle the natural world. They’ll help you step into the big and little natural dramas, sense, know, and understand what’s going on, and feel the elation of belonging.

Are your skills this developed?

How To
Do It

Find the
Mani Stones

Collect micro-lessons on sharpening your skills and applying them to Earth’s realms. Traditionally, carved mani stones have been placed along paths to share wisdom and prayer. Expand on that custom to develop your senses, curiosity, reverence, and love for being in Nature.

Your mission is to practice their 52 lessons over time until they become a habit.

Doubts and epiphanies


Perhaps you’re questioning if this applies to you. If you don’t take this step seriously, you won’t develop existing capabilities that would heighten your experience of the outdoors.


Heads up for the realization that you were born to be in Nature. You’ve got all the faculties to be comfortable and good at it; it’s in your DNA. As your skills improve, you’ll notice feeling happier and more relaxed in the natural world.

The
Market

Help With
The Task


Awaken your abilities with one of these items that shows you the stones, but doesn’t weigh you down with them. Each item presents the same 52 stones and their messages, but delivers them differently. Select one that’s convenient for you to take outside.

Directions


When you get your collection of stones, look them over to find those with messages that help you develop your skills. Read through them to learn which capabilities you’ll be developing, and how to sharpen and expand them. The rest of the stones are dedicated to applying these capabilities to Earth’s nine realms. It’s best to practice with them outdoors.

Take It
Outside

Use What
You Learn


When you’ve looked through all the stones, go out in Nature with just a few at a time. Do what they say and discover how much more you’re noticing and engaging with the natural world around you.

Make progress

Go for a walk with your stones. Pick one, read it, reflect, and do what it says. Walk a distance, select another, and repeat. Do this often when you’re outdoors until the lessons become so familiar you do it automatically.

These practices allow you to perceive more, dig deeper, and involve different parts of your body and brain in the experience of Nature. Once you start, you’ll find it’s a self-reinforcing process that engages and integrates you more with the natural world. Keep it up while you move on to the last step.

Step five

Photo Art on this website includes adaptations from “A Long Dead Star” from ESA, Hubble, and NASA, by Y Chu; “The Blue Marble from NASA; “Twin Blue Marbles” from NASA; and Earth photo by Reid Wiseman from the International Space Station, Expedition 40.