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Soulcraft: Crossing into the Mysteries of Nature and Psyche

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Bill Plotkin's Soulcraft, grounded in the author's formal training as a clinical psychologist, and in his decades of experience as a wilderness guide who guides his clients through both inner and outer wilderness, provides readers with an experience-based, intellectually stimulating, and potentially life-altering antidote to mainstream Western civilization.

Based on the premise that virtually all of us live lives that attempt to satisfy the ego's needs while ignoring the soul's deeper yearnings, Plotkin guides us to a severance from our ego-based lives, through an encounter with soul, and finally into a return, with new knowledge of the gifts we carry to our people--family, friends, co-workers and community.

As he encourages us to grow from our necessary and valuable uninitiated adolescent need to be accepted by society, into our initiated adult need to live authentically these gifts we carry, he treats us to his own story and the stories of others who are doing the work of authenticity.

More than 30 practices validate the presence of the word "craft" in the book's main title. Whether the reader is drawn to meditation, drumming, dream work, deep imagery, befriending the dark, wandering in nature, working with shadow or any one of more than a score more approaches to living a soul-based life, Bill Plotkin challenges us to live our true callings, and provides us the means with which to do so.

Soulcraft engaged me both experientially and philosophically, calling me to both act and think. It's no accident that Thomas Berry wrote the foreword, or that Brian Swimme, Angeles Arrien, Robert Johnson, and Derrick Jensen, among others, praised the book before publication.

Bill Plotkin, in the words of David Whyte, whose poetry graces many of these pages, carries "what is hidden as a gift to others." For this we should all be grateful.

I am currently translating this book into the German language. It is the most exciting translation I have done in the last years. Even though I am only copying it down it has already changed my life in a profound way. I am very thankful for the destiny that put this book on my desk - and I know that there was no coincidence involved.
The book provides several practices and approaches that help to address the problem a lot of people encounter in the middle of their lifes - or sometimes even earlier: The moment when you notice that things that have always made sense all in a sudden don't carry any meaning for you any more. It is the first book I ever read that does not only promise to, but actually really helps you finding out what you are here for and how you can act according to this insight. It brings you on your path - the soulpath. Work your way through the practices, exercises, and ceremonies in this book and your life will never be the same again. Seriously, I see a lot of books on new age and nature spirituality going over my desk, but this one definitely outdoes all I have been reading and working on during the last ten years.

Every now and then a book is birthed into the world that is destined to irrevocably alter the spiritual face of modern culture. Bill Plotkin's Soulcraft is just such a book. Charting a course through the underworld pathways with the heart of a shaman, mapping the powers of myth and psyche with all the soul and interpretive skill of Jung or Campbell, Plotkin's guide to the journey of initiation is to nature-based soulwork what Huxley's Doors of Perception was to consciousness studies. This book is an immense treasure that will provide wisdomseekers, psychologists, shamanic practitioners, and seasoned wilderness guides alike with a fresh heart-opening soul language, a new mythos for fathoming the depths of change, as well as time-tested practical methods for navigating the landscape of authentic transformation. In essence, Soulcraft is Plotkin's "soul gift," a user's manual for the journey of the human soul, as well as a guide to the futurescape of why we are all really here. It is the book I wish I could have had at my fingertips when I began to feel the ancient call for rites of passage in my early youth. It is required reading for anyone guiding other people in soulwork, or delving deep into their own. As philosopher Parker Palmer has said, "The way to God is down." Plotkin shows the way.
- Frank MacEowen, author of The Mist-Filled Path: Celtic Wisdom for Exiles, Wanderers, and Seekers

What do you get when you cross a Jungian-oriented depth psychologist, an ecotherapist, and a wilderness guide of the highest caliber? And then what do you do? The answer to the first question is Bill Plotkin, director of Animas Valley Institute (www.animas.org). The answer to the second: spend 20+ years creating a way to approach soul in a culture that over the years has lost its ways of soul connection that once were as natural as walking upright. Half guidebook, half storybook, and half pure poetry, Soulcraft: Crossing into the Mysteries of Nature and Psyche by Bill Plotkin describes his lifelong work in discovering and developing nature and the outer wilderness as mirrors for our inner nature and inner wilderness. In Soulcraft, Bill tries to compile and present approaches to the mystery of our souls and what Mary Oliver calls "our place in the family of things." Of the many fruits one can take away from the stories and practices Bill describes in Soulcraft, I think four of the juiciest are: (1) his distinction between "spirit" and "soul", (2) his approach to dreamwork, (3) his belief that soul work, while not promising any easy answers to the harsh realities of life, certainly makes life more interesting, and (4) the practices that lead to cultivating a soulful relationship to life.

Bill explains, "By soul I mean the vital, mysterious, and wild core of our individual selves, an essence unique to each person, qualities found in layers of the self much deeper than our personalities. By spirit I mean the single, great, and eternal mystery that permeates and animates everything in the universe and yet transcends all. Ultimately, each soul exists as an agent for spirit. ... Soul is what is most wild and natural within us." It is coming to know of this wild and natural within-ness that he seeks- through wilderness (outer and inner) exploration into the "sweet darkness" of the underworld journey of Shadow, Mystery, Love, and Death. He does not ignore or discount spirit in Soulcraft, but he recognizes that the path to the large openness of spirit necessarily goes through the darker singularity of the underworld journey of the West on the Medicine Wheel. Each person's individual journey, the hero's journey, serves all of life.

Bill's method of dreamwork, characterized as "soulcentric dreamwork," diverges from other approaches in its premise that every dream "is an opportunity to develop our relationship to soul ... Each dream provides ... a chance for the ego to be further initiated into that underworld story and those underworld desires." Bill coaches us to approach each dream reverently and very slowly, "permitting yourself the sometimes disquieting luxury of hanging out among the rich symbols and events ... twisting slowly in the breeze of its seductions and abductions." In other words, allowing the dream to dream us into being- allowing the dream to be the agent that helps to align us with our soul's deeper wisdom. "The dream can and does transform the ego, especially when we cooperate (surrender) during dreamwork." He goes on to suggest that when we dream, we are "dipping into a stream, a Great Underdream, that is always flowing even when we are not having what we normally call a `dream.' ... The Underdream is what the soul wants the ego to embody in the dayworld," trying to help us see the important points about the deeper life waiting and longing to be lived.

This deeper, sometimes "disquieting" soulful relationship to life is not an easy or a fun task. In an insightful analogy, Bill likens deep soul work and the call to the journey into the West to the advertisement that Ernest Shackleton placed in the London papers for his expedition to the South Pole in 1914: "Men wanted for hazardous journey. Small wages, bitter cold, long months of complete darkness, constant danger, safe return doubtful. Honour and recognition in case of success." Jungian analyst and author James Hollis's comment that "therapy will not heal you, make your problems go away, or make your life work out. It will, quite simply, make your life more interesting" makes a compelling coda to what Bill is presenting in his book. The work being offered, the ad our deeper selves are longing to read and answer, is simply to respond to what we know we are here for, without regard to outcome, the only reward being the knowledge that we did not, in Mary Oliver's words, "end up having simply visited this world."

Throughout the book, a practical gift that Bill gives us is a description of approaches he has discovered over the years that enable and enhance a direct experience with soul. These are broadly categorized into "Practices for Leaving Home," "Pathways to Soul Encounter," and "Cultivating a Soulful Relationship to Life." This is a rich compost pile of approaches and skills and attitudes that helps nurture growth of the relationship to soul, whether it be an early sprouting, a sending out of new shoots, or a sinking of deeper roots. Among my favorites are "Welcoming Home the Loyal Soldier," "Healing Work with Sacred Wounds," "Making Peace with the Past," "Soulcentric Dreamwork," Self-Designed Ceremony," "Symbolic Artwork," "Soul Poetry," "The Vision Quest," "The Art of Being Lost," "Befriending the Dark," "Confronting Your Own Death," "The Art of Shadow Work," and The Art of Soulful Romance." Rich stuff, all of it, and those are just a baker's dozen of more than forty that Bill offers up in the thirteen chapters of his book.

A good friend of mine turned 50 just last month. Knowing where he was in his life and where he wanted to try and end up, the book was an easy choice for a gift. As he thanked me for it, he laughingly hoped that this book would answer all of his important questions. No, this book won't answer all our questions, but it goes a long way to creating a soulful approach to reconnecting with Nature and Psyche and helping the reader discover just what the important questions in life might really be.

I have long held a deep interest in and have studied ecopsychology, and I currently work with EarthLinks, a Denver-based non-profit organization that provides experiential earth education, specifically creating a healing context for at-risk homeless adults and others on society's margins -- thus I was naturally drawn to a new book by Bill Plotkin titled Soulcraft. In it, Plotkin, a depth psychologist, ecotherapist and wilderness guide, takes the reader on a wilderness journey of their own soul -- as the subtitle states: "Crossing into the Mysteries of Nature and Psyche."

The current environmental devastation and sustainability challenge we face is due in large part to the dominant post-industrial consumer-culture's way of creating a 'disconnect' of ourselves from our own soul and from the natural world. As Bill Plotkin says: "When we become alienated from soul -- our inner nature -- we lose respect for outer nature, resulting in pollution and degradation of the environment." Soulcraft offers us an experiential guide to help re-awaken our contact with the soul and helps us rekindle a closer relationship with the natural world, where such wounds, both inner and outer, can be tended and healed. Deep learning can come from close contact with the inherent wisdom of nature -- and a deeper understanding of that wisdom is just what earth literacy is about, reading the 'book of nature.' Soulcraft is a engaging guide to discovering the wilderness of Earth as mentor to and mirror of our own inner wilderness.

I recommend Soulcraft as essential reading for anyone wishing to delve deeper into their own inner journey and into the larger journey we all strive for as we transform our culture toward a sustainable future, and a mutually enhancing human /earth relationship.
-- Mary Romano
Editor, Earth Literacy Companion

My intention for reading Bill Plotkin's book was for research - to learn more about dreamwork, deep imagery, trance dance, and other methods of inner discovery. I got that and much more!

Bill Kauth, co-founder of The ManKind Project, once said "As a culture, we are drowning in spirit and starving for soul." Soulcraft showed me how and why this is true and how to open up to hear my soul's calling through connection with nature.

The stories of transformation are spellbinding. The poetry is profound. Bill's mastery of the language of transformation makes the book an easy read as well.

I highly recommend this book to anyone who has a longing to know their true calling and is ready to embark on the journey.

Bill Plotkin's Soulcraft is a beautifully crafted, accessible guide to the ancient practice of vision quest (or "Time of Lamenting" as a vision fast may be more accurately called). This book manages to combine sound psychological expertise, stirring personal narrative, practical advice and glimpses into the mysteries of Nature as a sacred mirror for Soul. If you yearn for deeper connection with Nature and your own soul, no matter your spiritual orientation, this book will prove an invaluable resource. Plotkin, founding director of Colorado's Animas Valley Institute, brings a wealth of experience as both a counseling psychologist and wilderness rites guide to the book. He weaves his own personal stories and those entrusted to him by guides and vision quest participants over the years together with concrete explanations of the practices of Soulcraft. The result is that the book speaks directly to the part of the soul where the longing for Quest resides.

Many books that speak to soul connection or spiritual practice neglect talking about the shadows or the "dark side." Plotkin has an unerring knack for exposing and using our ancient fear of the dark (including the darkness that lies within ourselves) to forge new paths for self insight and true connection with our world (inner and outer). In this and many other ways, the Soulcraft practices offer guidance toward soulful adulthood. Plotkin also defines soul and spirit in a way that makes more sense than any other model I have yet seen.

Speaking as a person who was guided by Plotkin on an 11-day vision quest, this book was written by a man who not only walks his talk, but dances it skillfully, brilliantly and whole-heartedly. I recommend that anyone who feels the heat from the fire that lies at the heart of this book immediately get in touch with Animas Valley Institute, because the guidance and wisdom provided by Plotkin and his fellow guides is shatteringly generous in ways that are too numerous and deep to describe.

Soulcraft is a must read for any individual seeking meaning to their life through soul-connection. The book is unpretentious, easy to read, yet profound. Bill takes us on a journey of his and various other individuals' lives. At the same time, he offers us practical tools to engage in our own soul journey. Soulcraft will make many of us want to go on a Vision Quest to encounter our deepest fears with the intention of reconnecting to our Soul and living our Divine purpose.

This is an excellent book for moving forward in your life and finding your true self. I have felt stuck and confused for many years about the direction my life should take and this book has helped me to change that. The activities the author recommends open your everyday mind to your subconscious or soul as the author calls it. This has been a life changing book for me and is helping me to finally understand what it really means to grow up. If you feel stuck and as though your story has gotten too small for you then it is time to read this book.

Over the past few days I have been slowly reading each page of Bill Plotkin's pivotal work Soulcraft. I had read it a few months before I completed a vision quest with the non-profit he founded in 1980, www.animas.org, but it was a completely different book then. Now, having experienced the profundity of his Western based soul initiation process in the form of a Animas Valley Vision Quest, I have revisited his life's work and boy is it GOOD! No, GREAT! No, OUTSTANDING!

The bottom line is that it is life changing. I am so inspired to work on my creativity, drumming, dancing, music making, writing and speaking, meditating and listening that I can honestly call this book one of the most important I have ever read. Plus, each chapter has excellent references and the reading list that is offered in the back is a lifetime of study, exploration and enjoyment.

In fact, I hope someone has created a list on Amazon so I can start ordering the bibliography from Soulcraft and leap into bringing forth the unique gift of my soul.