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The 365 Commitment Podcast focuses on helping people make and keep life changing commitments.
Guy Reams (00:01.666)
This is day two hundred forty five, the wilderness. Every year I disappear into the permit free wilderness for a week. I take as many young people with me that are willing to go. I'm of the opinion that spending time alone with nothing but what you can carry in remote areas has a powerful effect on you. I have to spend extra time preparing, pre-writing some of these blog entries, and generally doing a lot of planning. However, it is worth it.
Being in the wilderness for several days is meaningful because it strips life down to what is real. Most of modern life gets gives us layers of insulations, schedules, devices, food, systems, climate control, entertainment, transportation, constant communication, and the quiet assumption that will that help will always be nearby. In the wilderness, much of that is gone, disappears. What remains is simple, immediate, and very honest.
You carry what you need, you feel the weather. You notice that the light changes all the time, you become aware of water, food, warmth, shelter, your own fatigue and direction. You realize how much of daily life is supported by invisible systems. The wilderness restores a sense of dependence and humility. It reminds us that we are not in control of everything. Wind, rain, darkness, terrain, temperature, hunger, and exhaustion do not negotiate.
That can be uncomfortable, but it is also clarifying. It places us back inside creation rather than above it. It creates simplicity. For a few days the questions become very basic. Where will we sleep? Do we have enough water? How far can we go? What do we need to carry? In that simplicity the mind often becomes quieter. Many of the anxieties that dominate normal life become they just feel less urgent.
It awakens presence. Without screens, constant interruption, attention returns. You hear things, you notice patterns, you feel time differently. A meal tastes better. A fire feels sacred. A dry pair of socks becomes a blessing in your life. Small things recover their value. It reveals capacity, carrying what you need, enduring discomfort, navigating uncertainty, and continuing forward when
Guy Reams (02:25.742)
Tired I'll remind you of that you are more capable than you are than your ordinary routine might suggest. The wilderness does not just test strength, it tests you it it it teaches trust in your own resilience. The wilderness removes the excesses and returns to the essentials body, breath, earth, need, gratitude, courage, companionship, and of course God's creation.
Finally, it often produces a kind of spiritual reordering, not necessarily in a dramatic way, but in a quiet one. You return with a changed sense of proportion. The world feels bigger, your problems may feel smaller, gratitude becomes easier, comfort feels less like an entitlement and more like a gift. I think about this as I prepare to leave again.
Planning takes time, the riding ahead takes effort, but when I return I remember why it matters. The wilderness is meaningful because it removes the excess and returns us to the essentials. For a few days life becomes harder, but also clearer. If you've been feeling buried under the noise, consider stepping away, not forever. Just long enough to remember what is real. Pack what you need, walk into the system at walk into the wilderness walk sorry.
Dang it. Walk until the systems around you fade away. Let the simplicity teach you. Then come back and carry that clarity forward into your life.