Re-Wilding, Caveman Diets & Surviving Off The Land | Adam Kavanagh (2020)

Adam Kavanagh join us in Season 1 (2020) of Birdsong.

Adam is an adventurer who seeks out wisdom from nature based cultures around the globe, in particular through the powerful way of living and breathing known as re-wilding, we’re talking living and surviving out in nature, off the land.

Adam worked as a coal miner for 9 years, and as you might expect, there’s going to be some level of physical, mental, emotional exhaustion to be suffered, which became apparent for Adam with a crippling overactive thyroid.

Somewhere along the way he stumbled across and adopted the caveman diet, essentially a Paleo style diet, which paved the path to some deep healing and nourishment and lead to his realisation that a barefoot approach to life was calling out his name.

He eventually quit his job, traveled around the country, and spends time living and surviving off the land; sharing his experiences with community primarily through instagram.

My interest in having a chat with Adam arose after seeing some epic photos on his instagram feed, as well as listening to his appearance on Evolve hosted by Pete Evans.

In this episode Adam touches on some of the ins and outs of his approach to paleo / the caveman method of eating and how it helped him on his health journey, I was interested in his experiences when it came to bowhunting, connecting with the land, tuning into the seasonal changes and the elements, re-wilding in general, and we chat about some of his animal experiences out on the land alongside more of Adams personal journey.

 

EPISODE NOTES:

Rewilding Adam: Adam’s journey from overworked coal miner to bow-hunting caveman

The one meeting that sparked Adam’s “rewilding” journey

Adam’s journey into Paleo Learning to eat for your body vs a “diet”

Having respect for where your food comes from

The “heaviness” of hunting

What’s it like to live and eat in the wild?

Is it true that you use ALL of the animal when you live out in the wild?

How do you hunt boars gone wild?

Getting medical care...when you’re away from civilization

The vegan vs carnivore (and everybody in between) debate

Being spiritual in the wild Working with the cycles of nature to get your food

Being grateful for the simple things in life

Stories from the Dreamtime

The ONE book series Adam won’t leave for the Australian wild without

Remembering to honor the small things in life we often take for granted

 

TIMESTAMPS:

[4:00] Opening the Container: Adam invites us to the sacred space of our conversation with a reminder to be grateful for the simple things like the kookaburra

[10:12] The meeting that changed everything

[13:23] From Modern diet to Paleo

[16:30] Eating for the body, not the book

[22:20 Hunting and self-sufficiency

[28:54] The “heaviness” of hunting

[33:23] Hunting in the wild

[36:16] Do you use all of the animal that you hunt?

[39:00] Boars gone wild

[41:26] Getting medical care with a tusk through your hand

[57:34] Wild spirituality vs modernity

[1:01:07] The cycles of nature

[1:04:18] The simple things

[1:12:00] Dream time stories

[1:14:10] Rites of passage

[1:20:00] Closing the Container: Adam closes the sacred space of our conversation with a reminder to be grateful for the things we often take for granted