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Wild About Utah: Questions

Stacy Spensley, https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/

Buttercup, bluebell, dandelion, fern.

Mountain, river, and cascading falls.

 

Kingfisher, lark, cygnet, heron.

 

Adder, otter, and newt.

 

What? Why? How?: my favorite wild words of all.

Each step down the trail is a question. What is beyond that ridge? 

 

Each pause to look, a reflection. Why is this here, and how?

 

There’s a cognitive reflex we humans have developed over the millennia called ‘instinctive elaboration.’ Basically, when our brains are exposed to a question—whether we’ve asked it ourselves or someone else is asking—every mental resource at our disposable is devoted to formulating an answer, or at least attempting to answer, elaborating on prior knowledge and the evidence in front of us.

 

Our brains are bathed in serotonin in the process, and the mind’s natural instinct is to relax into diligent calculation. An example: “Why do California Condors have bald heads?” Your brain has probably just been hijacked by mental images of one of Utah’s rarest and most unpleasantly beautiful species, and I’m guessing you feel great about it. 

 

Asking questions while exploring the natural world doubles down on this process of cerebral euphoria. Our brains are already hyper-aware of our surroundings when engaged with nature. Asking questions about those things with which we are engaged magnifies that awareness—focuses it. 

 

In a dry desert wash, I bent down to pick up what I had just kicked out of the sand. I turned the small chunk of petrified wood over in my hand a couple of times, admiring the streaks of color, wondering what elements were there, what organic compounds they had replaced.

 

After several seconds, I dropped it back into the sand and looked up to realize I was in fact several minutes behind my party. They hadn’t realized I’d stopped. I hadn’t realized they’d gone. My mind had been hijacked by questions about colors in the stone. 

 

I carry a small, thin journal with me into the wilds. I write questions in it. Sometimes, I even try to write answers. Mostly, I just get lost in thought.