When did it happen for you?

[ozish]

In a recent post over in the intro section, it was mentioned that things like brain tanning just don’t come up often in regular conversations. That struck a note for me. I was first introduced to the idea of brain tanning at about 8 years old. On a trip cross country (OH to WA) with my parents they picked up a book somewhere that discussed the process. That was my turning point.
My parents were always camping while on vacations and rather heavily involved in Boy Scouts, so I picked up a fair bit about life away from flush toilets and electricity since I was old enough to go along. I wasn’t very old when I realized that most folks don’t have a clue how to start a fire without a match or a lighter or where to set up a tent so you don’t get your bedding soaked if it rains in the night. I learned pretty early on to not talk about that kind of stuff around those people so they wouldn’t think I was too weird, but now I realize that just stifled my knowledge by not talking to the right people.
So, out of curiosity, what was your turning point? What was your pivot?

Sorry if this has been brought up before. There’s a million and one places to put a thread and I haven’t really got used to exactly where things should go. I thinking this should go in a general sort of area but didn’t really recognize a single area for just general chitchat. Moderators, board owner type people, feel free to move this where ever you deem fit.

[system]

I was in my teens. I grew up in a very low income family. I saw that money or lack of it was a constant problem for my mom. It didn’t matter that she complied in every way with what society and the church asked of her. She worked her ass off, was a devoted mom to her kids, never collected a penny of assistance but still had to deal with having her phone and power shut off when she couldn’t pay the bills. Having to take me to work with her because she couldn’t afford day care. That kind of stuff that single moms have to deal with.

At a young age I figured out that there would be two ways to deal with that situation.

1. Have so much money that I could always cover anything that I had to pay for.
2. Learn how to not need much money.

For a kid from my neighborhood #2 was probably more achievable, so that’s the way I went. At first that took the form of becoming street wise. Then the hobo life. Then the Rainbow. Primitiveness only entered into it later.

[BlueHeron]

At the risk of sounding holier-than-thou, I have to say it’s been with me since as long as I can remember. I ignored it for a long time, but when I was younger, when I wasn’t ignoring it, I knew two things very clearly: I wanted to live outside the society that was “given” to me, and I wanted to live in union with nature. Want 1 + Want 2 = primitivism.

I remember that nobody understood me. My parents ignored my requests to go “camping.” My friends thought I was weird when I made up worst-case scenarios and how to survive them. I had to sneak into the forest bordering the playground and worry about getting caught for doing something “wrong.” I always acted out my fantasies in secret. I guarded my desires closely, as they were extremely precious.

[Andrew_Jensen]

When I found Urban scout’s site, or Ran Prieur’s. It was kinda at the same time. I’d just spent 3 months unemployed after my first job out of college fired me. Though I’ve always been kinda survival minded, anti-capitalist, and a fan of counter-cultures. This just kinda clicked a lot of it together for me. This provided the thing that I felt was always lacking in critiques of our civilization, which was “so what do I do right now to make things better.” Where many other concepts I’ve looked at had one big answer that I couldn’t begin to attempt, rewilding (or more accurately, the people here) gives me a million little things I can do at my leasure, revolution as a hobby.

[Sandwalker]

I was quite content with the rural life when I was a kid living out in the country. It was nice to just carry around that old shotgun across the prairie every weekend and after school hanging out with friends spending the whole evening out-of-doors. The land always was sort of a buffer for me to deal with the problems I had with school life and the “social situation” of rural Canada ever since I can remember. If I was ever really upset I would just retreat to the groves and fields of grass and run around in thunderstorms and go walking for miles and miles. I never really “fit in” with the mainstream in elementary school and I always was a stubborn person who followed my own inclinations. I would say that “God” was the pivot for me, I just had to start listening and paying attention to the signs more often.

Then later on I moved to the city and after a few years of messing around and not accomplishing much I decided that I wanted to head back to the country and live out my ideals. I had (and still am) always been fascinated with “tribal life”, “tribes” and living close to the land but it wasn’t till I left the country a few years later that I started to think about it seriously and take the necessary steps to find a tribe or live the tribal way of life, as opposed to the commerical way of life. Shortly after that I took a sort of “voluntary homelessness” vow and started travelling around and eventually headed overseas.