A Lions Look

Broken. Lost. A shattered perception of reality. Just before I turned 20 my world flipped upside down. Before, an outgoing lover of life. After, depressed, confused, suicidal, and carrying symptoms of schizophrenia, which I didn't even understand until eight or nine years later. This story is only the beginning.

I gained an opportunity to travel to South Africa with my mom and dad at 20 years old. My mom was the Director of Recreation Research at the University of Montana and had the opportunity to participate in a conference in South Africa. All I had to do was earn enough money for the plane ticket over the summer of 2020 to join the journey.

During that summer I read a few books that changed my perspective of our society and existence itself. Ishmael by Daniel Quinn took me away from the idea that we were progressing as a society and the idea this is just how it was supposed to be. The way society is I mean. This is just how it is supposed to be. Black Elk Speaks was another. It spoke of a deeper connection to the world than I was ever shown. Something more than just a material existence. Rather a weaving of energies creating all of life.

The journey began and we saw all the wildlife. Lions, hyenas, giraffe, impala, rhino, hippo, etc. The list goes on. I grew up roaming the Rocky Mountains of Montana, going to Yellowstone yearly to watch the wolves, and hiking in Glacier National Park. My love of nature went deep. I just didn't understand how much we were neglecting our world as a young human. Now, I was delving deep in to environmental studies and climate change. I read the book Deep Economy by Bill Mckibben on the trip and began to understand how oil was deeply intertwined in just about everything within our man made world. It was mind bending, depressing, and overwhelming.

As I read just outside of our cabin for the night a vision or dream came to me. I was transported to Montana where I found myself in the Rattlesnake Recreation Area. I grew up just a mile away from the main trailhead and was quite familiar with where I found myself in this cloudy yet clear dream vision. I saw my friend hunting. Then, I saw him kill a deer. I came to back in Africa and went straight to my mom. "Mom, I think John shot a deer" I spoke to my mom with a fervant awareness that something beyond my current understanding occurred. She replied "John shot a deer before we left". We had no internet connection or cell service in the middle of Krugar National Park in South Africa. "No I think he shot it just now" I said without hint of doubt in my mind. She replied with doubt like I had gone mad. I didn't care, I knew what I had seen in my dream vision.

A few days later we had a choice to make. We could go the way of the lion or the way of the cheetah. My dad and I had already seen a cheetah when my mom was working, so we let my mom decide. I began to believe I could speak to earth and the spirits of the world after reading Black Elk Speaks. I then sent one of my first prayers I ever sent in my life. I said "you know better than I which direction we will go. Whichever way we go, please send us something for our last day". This was our last night. We had only a half day before we needed to return to the realm of city scapes and airplanes back to societies grip of existence.

The next morning we headed out at six. We continued to send the prayer or thoughts and desires to see something special. Mom had chosen the way of the lion. An hour passed and no lions. We stopped for breakfast at an overlook where crocodiles lay calm in the slow waters below. We kept moving. Ten minutes later we saw them. Two lions. Walking in the opposite direction of our car not far from the road. A young male and young female. Thank you. That was a good send off.

Not five minutes later we came to a couple stopped cars. What are they looking at? We wondered as we slowly approached. As in Yellowstone, when something worth seeing is spotted, cars stack up. Sometimes, too many for the ones in the back to see. Luckily, there were only a couple cars in front of us and a couple coming from the other direction. Lions. Six of them in fact. They were just laying around. All males. All fully maned.

We started to snap some pictures. The one above, I took out of the window before my mom asked me to not. I could get my arm eaten as she explained it. She was right. I just wanted a clear photo. Then the lion with tired eyes in the photo above came to the lion gazing towards the horizon. I made up a story in my mind that they were communicating about me. "We can go" the lion now standing said to the other. "No, not yet" the other one said. The standing lion took a big stretch and slowly meandered back to a place to lay. I was fixed on the lion in the center now. This is the lions of lions. The king of the lions, I thought to myself. Our eyes connected and a thought wave came through my mind. Get your shit together Bryan.

A lion just told me to get my shit together. I got a long way to go.