DDR 071 - Karie Lee Knoke

In this engaging conversation, Karie Lee Knoke shares her journey from childhood environmentalism to becoming a survival skills instructor and energy medicine practitioner. She discusses her experiences on Season 9 of the reality show 'Alone', her passion for teaching women survival skills, and the importance of connecting with nature and local plants.

Karie emphasizes the spiritual aspects of nature, the significance of community support, and the need for cultural appreciation in learning about plants and survival. The conversation culminates in a discussion about the upcoming Survival Sisterhood Retreat, aimed at empowering women through shared learning experiences.

You can find Karie Lee on Instagram @karie_lee_knoke. 

For more information about the Survival Sisterhood and Karie's Wilderness School, head over to www.karieleeknoke.com

Please rate and review this podcast wherever fine podcasts are downloaded. 

The Don't Die Rusty Podcast is recorded with Riverside.fm. Riverside is leading the charge in technology and convenience in terms of remote podcasting. You can help support the Don't Die Rusty Podcast by Clicking Here to sign up.

Takeaways

• Karie Lee's childhood experiences shaped her passion for survival skills.
• The importance of community and support in learning survival skills.
• Energy medicine and plant spirits play a crucial role in healing.
• Cultural appreciation is essential in learning from indigenous practices.
• Local plants are vital for health and survival.
• The spiritual connection with nature enhances survival experiences.
• Women learn differently and need supportive environments to thrive.
• Survival skills are not just about survival but about thriving in nature.
• The good life is about joy, laughter, and connection to nature.
• Empowerment comes from learning and sharing knowledge with others.

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Episode Transcript

(00:02):
Let me get this.
right.
Hello, Don't Die Rusty Nation.
Um, this is going to be one heck of a conversation tonight.
We're missing Ricky Bruhle, but you know, he has to be working the, so that's the way itis.
And we are lucky enough to have Carrie Lee Kenoki.
She was the runner up in episode nine, uh, TV show alone.

(00:28):
And she has so many other stories to tell here.
I mean, I, in watching alone and then researching, you are an inspiration.
Aw, thank you.
m
I look at it, you know, I've, you as a, I laugh, I don't really laugh.

(00:53):
just wonder where people like you were when I was growing up, because we're roughly thesame age and all the girls seem to want it to be doing girly stuff and you're saving the
world, you know, learning how to live in the wild.
Yeah, well, I wish I'd known people like you when I was a kid.

(01:14):
uh As a child, yeah, I was not a girly girl and I was not a tomboy, so was kind of in thisniche where, I don't know, I had a couple of girlfriends that liked to do the things I
liked to do, like with horses and, you know, being a mini environmentalist and picking upgarbage as we walk home from school.

(01:36):
We'd walk home.
We'd walk in the ditches and pick up all the garbage on the way home from school.
I don't know too many other girls that would do that except...
But yeah, just different.
it's interesting because like sometimes when I'm up in the here in the Black Hills, causeI'm in Spiritfarer, South Dakota, you know, you aren't told to go do this, but sometimes,

(01:59):
you know, we'll just walk, get out and just walk a mile or two down the road and pick upall the trash and walk all the way back.
And it feels like a great day.
It does feel good.
And
And you know, how did you really turn into, I mean, what kept you going in learning how tosurvive in the woods and survive all this as you grew older?

(02:32):
That's a great question.
Many people have heard that, you know, at eight years old, I wanted to go out with nothingbut my knife and survive after being inspired by the book, My Side of the Mountain.
And that really stuck with me.
And I didn't have a lot of mentoring as a child.
We would go backpacking.

(02:54):
And so I had a lot of exposure and we'd go canoeing.
I had a lot of exposure to the outdoors.
But not really a lot of mentoring as far as the skills go, but any little nip it I wouldget, I would just like glom onto it and remember that.
And I really didn't get into the skills until I discovered the Primitive Skills Gatheringsin 2007.

(03:20):
I went to my first gathering at Winter Count and then to Rabbit Stick.
And from then on, I was like, this is my tribe, this is my people.
Like, where have you been all my life?
Some people like Patrick Farnamon, who's also roughly our age and he's been doing it sincea kid.
Like, man, I wish I had, but I didn't.

(03:46):
And I agree with you there because I haven't been to any of those gatherings and someday Ihope I am because I grew up, I grew up if we had a TV in the house but mom and dad watched
what they wanted to watch.
In which I went and read and I read a lot of mountain man stuff.

(04:10):
I'm a big John Coulter is my
Favorite mountain man.
I mean, I just see what he did in, you know, I mean, it's funny that you go with Lewis andClark, you just about get back to St.
Louis and then you head back up in the wilderness and you do your stuff that he did.

(04:30):
what I'm saying is then he came down, became a farmer in Missouri and died.
And where I'm going with that is like learning how to live in the wild and like
You, I'm gonna pick your brain now.
First of all, well, before I pick your brain about, because I really wanna get into energyplants and your energy medicine, but tell us about like what you're doing now.

(04:58):
You have Sacred Cedar Survival School.
And what is all that about?
Well, I've always wanted to have my own school.
And before I went out on a loan, I had purchased 13 acres of property.
And in hopes of starting up the school, that was the whole plan was to do the schoolthere.

(05:21):
I've been teaching classes not only at the primitive schools gatherings, but also where Ilived on another person's property.
However, I didn't have my own property, so I couldn't.
just let go and really do like a full on retreat or a full on school.
And then right after, I swear two weeks after I closed on the property, I got the callfrom Quinn from the show saying, oh she asked me if I would reapply for the show and I had

(05:51):
actually applied for season six and almost got on the show, but not quite.
So she asked me to reapply and I was kind of stumped because I'm like, now?
I just bought this property and had this huge mortgage payment.
m But I had to go.
I just had to go.
Right?

(06:12):
Yep.
And, and that helped you get the school going then.
That gave me a place to do it at.
And so at that point, was about, you know, at that point I went out on the show.
So it was kind of a delay to whole year until I could actually start formulating whatcourses I'm going to put together.

(06:35):
And I come from a primitive skills living background.
So I don't like to say I teach survival skills.
I will teach you how to live in the woods, but I'm not that person that's going to tellyou.
Jessie Krebs is this who is also on my show.
She's the one that's gonna teach you how to get your ass home in 24 hours I'm gonna teachyou how to how to hang out and stay there and live so that's just a different background

(07:00):
and they're both very viable Resources and just different perspectives on what survival isTo me I'd never really Claimed I'm teaching survival skills.
It's more about how we thrive in the woods
And that comes along with health.
I mean, without your health, you're not going to survive very long.

(07:23):
that's what I consider a very important part of survival is you have to be healthy.
You do have to be healthy and well, can, it's, it's, it's interesting too.
I've, I don't know if you know Laura's era.
Have you, have you ever heard of, she's on naked and afraid and I met her once.

(07:47):
She did a, happened to be a place that she was doing some survival skills stuff.
And it's interesting to me that she, she would be like the
get let's get us off the mountain in 24 hours kind of person too.
And it's interesting where I'm going with that is most of the time when I went and watchedher give her do her stuff, was at a Winter Strong in, uh Soren X's had a Winter Strong and

(08:17):
she was talking and she taught us how to build a fire and do other things.
But I tell people like she would,
I would trust her to get me off the mountain, but you would teach me how to live there.
And that's what's cool.
And that's very interesting.
To me, that's interesting because what got, so we might as well talk about what I'mreally, really truly interested in is because people know that I've been on this health

(08:46):
and uh this health journey and you're into, you actually.
Is it energy medicine and energy plants that you work with, correct?
Yes, so I do energy medicine, so it's working with your body's energy systems.
And I also do herbal medicine, whether it's flower essences.

(09:11):
So I'm here in my office right now.
Behind me here's my flower essences.
And then over here, you can't see, but I have a whole shelf of my herbal remedies.
And then there's a plant spirit medicine, which
helps on a different level.
like herbal teas and remedies and tinctures, they help with the physical parts of yourbody.

(09:38):
Plants, plants are very complex and they are, they're beings, you know, we're humanbeings, they're plant beings.
And in the native way of looking at things, they, they also have a spirit.
So plants on a physical level with the tinctures and T's, when we take them in that way,they're helping us on a physical, our bodies in a physical way.

(10:06):
Flower essences, which is the essence of a plant.
So each plant has a purpose in life, just like we have a purpose in life, whatever thatis.
That plant, each flower has its own energetic
pattern and when you encapsulate that pattern into a bowl of water, so if you take aflower, let's say rose, rose is an easy one for people interested, put rose in the water.

(10:41):
Now everybody knows roses are all about love, right?
You give your wife or girlfriend or whoever a dozen roses for Valentine's Day, it's allabout love.
to, so maybe a rose tincture might help you physically with your heart.

(11:04):
However, if you put a rose petal on water and set it in the sun, the sun will reflect thatenergetic pattern into the water, which is a liquid crystal.
And then you put a little bit of clear brandy in there, Christian Brothers clear brandy,and that'll preserve it.
But it's an energetic pattern.

(11:26):
So you want to take that, just a couple of drops a day, maybe put it in your water bottle.
And we also have these patterns in our bodies.
They're called habits.
And they may be bad habits.
We need to correct those.
However, we do not want to let go of those bad habits because they've been serving us forwhatever reason for a long time.

(11:48):
So habits are hard to break.
So a flower essence is going to help us over time to help correct that pattern.
For example, with flower essences,
Maybe we're dealing with heartbreak or we really just need to heal our heart at anemotional level.

(12:09):
That's what flower essences are going to do.
So you might use bleeding heart flower essence and maybe rose flower essences and a coupleother ones and take that and over time it's going to help you heal your heart on an
emotional level.
The third level is what we call plant spirit medicine and that has to do with

(12:33):
Each plant has a plant spirit.
Elliot Cohen writes about it in his Plant Spirit Medicine book.
But the spirit of a plant is going to help us spiritually.
Yeah.
and

(12:53):
trying to use the example of the rose.
So maybe the plant spirit of the rose may help us spiritually just to be in love with theworld or in love with ourselves and help us on that very higher spiritual path that we
might be on.
Well, because I, well, and I think there is a lot to plants because I believe that we, inwhere we have gone in the last, I'm going to say 50 years, has changed because we want

(13:31):
things right now.
We want the, everything has been synthesized, we'll just say.
And,
And I got shut off my phone now.
But everything has been synthesized and we are, we seem to have forgot the plants.

(13:53):
We seem to have forgot natural, the natural world.
And I think we're starting to come back to it in a sense.
Since I'm just going to say for me personally, I think it's been mostly COVID.
We've started to get out back into the
nature, and we've realized how ah plants, animals, the whole spiritual essence has become,I think it's starting to come back myself.

(14:25):
I don't know if it is, but I'm hoping.
Maybe it's internal hope, but I think people are starting to realize the good use ofplants, in different ways.
It's just not eaten.
It's not just eating broccoli and cauliflower or carrots.
It's, it's, there's other plants out there that have medicinal purposes as well as energy.

(14:47):
Uh, you know, I mean, and then you can get into the woods and you can enjoy the whole lifepart of life, know.
Yeah.
Yeah, my, uh, well, my, uh, my herbal teacher, she's always saying that plants are here toheal the world as long as we don't destroy them all first.

(15:12):
And that's kind of what I'm really right now wanting to step into is bringing awarenessaround specific plants.
I've been really diving in deep with a blue camas lately.
death chemists and perichemists because one's going to kill you and one's going to feedyou.

(15:33):
Yeah.
and just how watching these fields and fields of different plants disappear because ofurban sprawl and now there's spraying herbicides on our forests and or logging.
There's a plant called lady slipper and it's very good sedative type of a plant and it wasbeing over harvested because it was in such demand and I had some on the land.

(16:04):
They used to live on it.
I marked them with the flag so that I could check on them every year.
I lived there 15 years and I kind of like caretook these little plants.
And I moved off and they logged, selectively logged the property and those plants are nowgone.
And it's not anyone's fault.
It's just out of people don't know.

(16:27):
So I'm really wanting to step into that place of I want to let, bring awareness to whatplants are.
that we really need to take over and I'm trying to right now, I just transplanted a wholebunch of blue camas and I'm trying to propagate these wild plants to see if I can and I

(16:48):
want them to continue to grow so I'm putting them in a safe place where I know thatthey're not going to be squished out by um human ignorance, so to speak.
I hear you there.
Where have you?
um
I've got lots of projects, but that's just one of my little projects I've just started.

(17:09):
So, but what are you, where are you learning?
Like, are you learning from American Indians or are you learning from uh like the Orient?
Are you learning from African uh tribes or is it all combined or do you have any specificplace of using?

(17:35):
that you are using.
That's a great question.
I am focused on what's around me, so local plants.
I like to refer to the native plant societies when I'm really trying to identify plants.
And I encourage that in my foraging courses to stay away from these apps and books.

(18:01):
I mean, they're helpful, but all the apps, there's misinformation, contradictions, even
not just the apps but also in books.
So they're great resources but I typically focus on plants that I can use in my backyard,in my own mountains, in my own region.

(18:21):
Where I've learned that I have a few teachers I've learned from.
Michael Moore, he's now gone, I've learned I've taken a course from Rosemary Gladstar andthen Barbara St.
Dennis who is
my local teacher here.
And I also learned from native elders.

(18:42):
And I'm not native myself, so...
However, this is how I've learned to...
It's...
By being a native ceremony, I have learned from native elders how to be on the land andhow to interact with the land and the plants.
And that's where I've learned this from.

(19:05):
All the way from the Maracame in Mexico to grandmothers in Costa Rica.
And so I've picked up all this information and it's a fine line.
It's a fine line when I'm trying to share this of what I've learned.
It's a fine line between cultural appropriation, because I'm not really making money outof it.

(19:33):
But I like to say a cultural appreciation.
And I'm wanting to work with the tribes to help save these native plants that are theirheritage.
And also mine.
I'm sixth generation Pacific Northwest Territorian.
My ancestors, my great, great, great grandfather was a scout on the Oregon Trail.

(19:53):
I can't help what my lineage is, but I have a very strong, strong uh connection and desireto learn the native ways.
And truly, that's how I...
There you go.

(20:17):
I was going to let you stop talking and then I was going to get...
Yeah.
uh
But I owe it to these native elders who have taught me how to live on the land with theland.
That's the key thing is with the land.
And when I went out on a show, when I went out on the loan on the show, that's what I did.

(20:37):
I made my offering.
I made my prayer.
I treated my whole time on the show as a ceremony.
I went to a sweat lodge.
went in uh before I left for the show, did a sweat lodge.
I the journey as a ceremony when I came home, I sweated out.
Not as a vision quest, because I already had the vision.

(21:02):
I'd had the vision for many years.
But I wanted to do kind of a spiritual experiment.
It's like, okay, let's put all of this to the test and see how deeply I can connect withthe land.
The ancestors there, I...
My first prayer second day I made a prayer to the land and said, hey, I'm Carrie LeeKenoki.

(21:25):
I'm a foreigner to this land.
I'm from the other side of the continent.
I'm here to do this show, but not really to do this show.
But first I have to apologize for what's going to happen here.
The helicopters, the boats, people cutting down live trees, doing this and that.
I can't, I don't know what they're going to do and I am sorry.
I apologized and I just got shivers when I said that.

(21:47):
Yeah.
Yeah.
my body still.
I apologize for whatever's gonna happen here.
But why I am here is I wanna see how spiritually deep I can connect to this land.
And I felt so held and supported and guided.

(22:07):
Like I knew when to go fishing and when not to go fishing.
And I, the ancestors,
I've said this before many times, the ancestors told me how to build my shelter.
And I've been building shelters since five years old, you know?
I'm really good at it, but I was perplexed and I was having a hard time figuring outexactly where to build a shelter because I was in a wildfire burn, so very exposed, which

(22:37):
is not good.
The trees were really dark, wet, not good.
And spooky.
I can't see any predators.
I was like, I don't want to be in the trees.
Burr is cool.
But one night as I was going to bed, I just looked out on the landscape and it literallyjust hit me like that.

(22:58):
And so the message I got was, so this is day 14, the night of day 14, Two weeks stillliving underneath this little shelter.
Harp, like I gotta do, I gotta start moving.
Yeah.
And what I heard was, lift my skin.

(23:22):
lift up my skin.
Well first of all I looked out on the landscape and it hit me that my god this wholehillside is clay.
I had seen the clay.
It helped me with my bug bites which they didn't show.
But I rubbed clay all over my neck and I got rid of those bug bites.

(23:43):
I just realized it was all clay and so then I heard this voice, lift up my skin, dig downin the clay, push it aside, build up your walls, put your roof on, put my skin back on top
of you and I will keep you warm.
And then I just like, oh, okay.
And I went to bed, my, you know, brain was just turning and the next morning I juststarted digging and I took the top soil was the skin they're talking about.

(24:13):
Yep.
way.
So I took the three to four inches of topsoil and made them into, I called them bricks.
and set them aside.
had 41 by 1 foot or so of these pieces of topsoil, set them aside, dug the whole shelterand put that back on top of the tarp.

(24:35):
And I was very warm, especially when it snowed, it turned into an igloo.
And I just had to trust at that point.
That's what I'm here to do is to live with the land, right?
So I just had to go for it and trust.
However, this is what happened.
was that I built it on a ridge that went down to the river, but on the right hand side ofme was a taller ridge.

(25:02):
I'm going to stand up for a second.
So here's the little ridge.
This side was a taller ridge going down.
This side was also a taller ridge that went down to the river.
I could see everything in front of me.
There was all this alder in front, so no predators were going to come through there.
And if you look at my arms, I was being held.

(25:25):
And when the wind blew, because I was down here, even though I was fully exposed, had allsunlight all day long.
When the wind blew, it would go right over, I could see the trees blowing, it would goright over the one end ridge and over to the next, and it wouldn't touch me at all.
And if it did touch me, I knew it was really blowing.

(25:47):
But I could see predators from all directions.
I felt really safe and I was feeling really held.
like I said, I just had to trust what I was hearing because that's what I asked for.
And then this will freak you out.
It freaked me out.
At the end of the show, so I came in and I'm in the aftercare and the refeeding program.

(26:12):
The second day was in there, this
gal she was from the local tribe, she lived nearby, the Innu tribe, and she came into myroom, she was the housekeeper for the lodge, and she came into my room with a vacuum
cleaner, she's all kind of like this, and I was just like, she was just standing therelike, yes, and she was like, can I give you a hug?

(26:38):
Sure, she goes over and over, she gives me big hug, and she started crying, and she gaveme this big hug, and she's like,
Oh my God, I'm so glad you're okay and that you're safe and that you're here.
And I've been praying for you.
I've been praying for you out there and hoping that you had everything you needed.
And I asked the ancestors of my land to take care of you and protect you and make sureyou're safe and have everything you needed.

(27:02):
And I started crying.
was like, Oh my God, girl, we got to talk.
And so that ceremony that I had started was still going.
and the amount of spiritual support I was receiving, not just from her, I mean, who knows?

(27:23):
She opened that world to me.
She asked her ancestors, I asked for permission and I feel like she opened the doors tothat, that realm that nobody really likes to talk about or maybe not even know how to talk
about it.
But I think a lot of people experience that and just really...

(27:44):
don't want to be viewed as this woo-woo person or they don't know how to talk about it.
But I think a lot of people experience this kind of phenomenon all the time.
yeah, I came home and I found it even more stuff like that of the grandmothers in CostaRica praying for me in Mexico and they don't even get the show.

(28:10):
They just knew I was out there and they wanted me to do good.
Well, I do believe that.
believe you're right too on the, we have as a society, either you're, if you talk topeople about feelings, those kinds of things that you have, you're labeled and I never

(28:33):
ever, ever want to be labeled anything because I think that just limits you.
But I do believe that there's
There's a spiritual part of the wild that in the people that have lived there before andother things that are out there that we do not truly understand.

(28:56):
And we have to show appreciation to what we are or where we are, should say more.
And this is funny.
like, I talked to, uh I talked to my friend.
And we, I said, when I ever take anybody out in the woods with me, like first time, youknow, like we're out looking at things.

(29:22):
The ones that really I think are getting it are the ones that see the little things thatsee that little flower or that little bird or this and that.
Did I know that they're attentive?
And when you become attentive, then you get to that place where you have that view.
And then you know that this is more than, you know, there is something out there that issurrounding us and making us, helping us see maybe within ourselves and maybe also the

(29:55):
world.
And people need to see that.
you said, you know, your, your, your camp and alone was, you were surrounded.
felt like you had, you were hugged, you know, and for
And you were in the aspect of, know, that lady comes in and wants to give you a hug andtells you she's been praying for you.

(30:20):
And I think that helps out more than anything.
And when you're in the wild and know that you're not alone, you know, that is somethingthat is special.
Because I don't ever, I really don't, I...
I feel more alone in a city than I do in the wild.

(30:43):
Right?
I never felt alone out there.
I had all kinds of friends.
The trees, the chickadees.
Yeah, I never did feel alone.
I surrounded and held and supported the whole time.
And plus I have the safety net too of the crew.

(31:06):
Yeah.
And you take, you know, like we were talking earlier, I graduated with a history andIndian study, American Indian studies major at Black Hill State.
And I got submersed and like you just got done saying earlier, you're like, you're not,that you've been in some traditions of the.

(31:35):
tribes and stuff that, but I'm not taken away, but I do hunt for my own food too.
And, um, but I do leave a little tobacco at the, where I've just to say thank you.
And people might think that I'm funny by doing that, but I just do it because I think thatwe need to say whoever or in think the animal and utilize it too.

(32:03):
And I think, uh, people don't.
I just think that some people have become harsh and cold.
And I think that if we can change that part of the world and say thank you to what is outthere and not destroy everything that is around us, we'll, we can do something.
Yeah, yeah, I tried to carry tobacco around and make my offerings because that was the wayI was taught.

(32:32):
And what I teach in my forging classes before you harvest is to make an offering, ask forpermission, stop and listen.
Don't just say, can I pick you and then start picking?
Stop and actually listen.
Because sometimes a plant, even though you know it's edible,
might be growing in toxic place, or maybe it got sprayed, or maybe it's growing right nextto a poisonous plant.

(33:00):
All these things you don't know why and you have to stop and listen.
And if you get that cold feeling, don't touch it.
If it's kind of a warm feeling, go for it.
But also, state what your intention is and ask them, ask the plant.
This is
This is what I want to use for the plant, let me know when I have enough.

(33:23):
And if you don't have tobacco, offer a piece of your hair, because as part of you, that'syour DNA.
And, if you're bald, sing a song.
You can offer a song because the song is coming from your heart and the song, the plantsdon't care what the words are, they care about the vibration.

(33:50):
They feel the vibration of what's coming from your heart.
And that's why I was singing all the time out there as I just sang songs.
I didn't have tobacco.
And this forest is my medicine.
was singing that as an offering song, which was my friend's song that I sang out there.
Well I love that you sang your mama a birthday song too.

(34:13):
Yeah.
Yeah.
You know, that's special really, you know, to, here's my question and I don't remember,but you don't have a calendar, right?
No, but we have the data's imprinted on the camera.
Oh, cause I was thinking that's, that's pretty cool.

(34:37):
If you could remember that like, you know, day one, day two, day three, day four, dayfive, you know what I mean?
That you could remember it was her birthday.
Yeah, I remembered her birthday.
knew Halloween.
I didn't know when Thanksgiving was because it's on a Thursday and I had no idea what dayof the week it was.

(35:00):
I was going to say something, set my mind.
Oh, it her birthday.
One thing they didn't show, I just have to say, because I was hunting squirrels that day,I actually got a squirrel for her.

(35:21):
I actually had two squirrels and I was trying to get, I hunted one and then I trapped theother and I was trying to get a third one.
And what I had said, they cut me off.
I said, I got a squirrel, one for you and one for me.
Sorry, dad.
Hehehehehe
off and said something like, don't remember when I was trying to say I got my lastsquirrel.

(35:46):
But they kind of re-edited the words.
But if you took the picture, you'll see the second squirrel on my other hand.
I was like, I had two squirrels.
And I don't know why that would have been so cool for them to show that, just a littleediting, you know, the things they do when they edit.
But that was a great day.
I said, one for each of us.
I'm going to eat them both, but.

(36:07):
Yeah, no, that's it.
But uh here's the question for you too is like the best concerts that I have are alone inmy car, but with the plants, they might not like my singing.

(36:28):
Well, it's what comes from the heart.
You can just hum along and it really doesn't matter, it's just, you know, that positivevibration.
They want to feel the love.
That's all.
Excuse me.
how do you think that, how do you think it spiritually, I mean, besides the show thatbeing in the woods affects you then?

(36:59):
To me it's a calming, like I said, I would rather wake up in the middle of nowhere thanany city on earth.
Mm-hmm.
feel more safe in the woods than I do in a city.
I, it's funny that we talk that there's culture in cities, but there's peace in the, I saythere's, you can say that, but I think there's peace in the wild.

(37:21):
Yeah, I totally agree on the same way.
And I find it, I want to say odd, but maybe more sad that people think the woods is such ascary place.
And it's scary because we aren't the apex predator in the wild.
But neither are we in a city either.

(37:43):
You know, we're not the...
And I think once you have, when you have exposure or have an appreciation, but when youhave that connection and you start to learn, it becomes your normal.
When you spend enough time in nature, it's your normal.

(38:04):
And it's not so scary.
And I remember, you know, the first time, like going to Alaska, my first time in Alaska,25 years ago, we did a, me and my partner did a three month.
kayak trip in southeast Alaska.
We were terrified of the birds, I mean the bears, not the birds, terrified of the bearsbecause these are brown bears.

(38:27):
They're the big grizzlies, they're not Idaho bears.
Yep.
And our first week, like, we had a rifle for protection and I was shooting it, but it mademe cry.
was the only gun that made me cry, only because I knew that if I was shooting it wasbecause I was killing something, which I didn't want to do.

(38:51):
So it was an emotional cry.
Plus it hurt my finger.
Good excuse.
We were under a lot of stress and we weren't able to relax.
We went to some hot springs and I felt like I'm just in a bowl of stew here, you know?
Because we'd seen pictures of grizzly bears at that same location from some friends.

(39:17):
And then after a while we went to a bear observatory called Anan in southeast Alaska.
And we went there and we saw a number of bears and we saw that they weren't reallyinterested in us.
They were interested in food.
And as we went on we just got more and more confident that they're not out to eat us.
Especially the bears, they're not out to eat us.

(39:38):
They just don't want anything to do with us unless they're threatened and they're going tohold their, you know, hold their place.
It takes exposure to kind of get over that and they own it.
I won't say it's the only way, but the way I got over it is just that exposure of like,oh, there's a bear.

(40:00):
Okay, just go on my way and avoid it.
And yeah, it's scary.
And you get out of it and you're fine.
And the bears aren't so scary anymore.
I guess with the school I really would like to help people with that exposure, not thatI'm going to say, oh, here's a bear, go try that out.

(40:22):
But how to prepare yourself, how to know what to do, carry your bear spray or your gun orwhatever that is you're going to use to protect you.
If you have a dog, train your dog to not charge a bear because they're just going to turnaround and rung and bring the bear back to you.
I trained my dog by sign language.

(40:42):
not knowing why.
But again, in Alaska, me and my dog, hiking down a trail, ran into a bear.
And I was not carrying a pistol.
Actually, I was, but I didn't want to use it.
I'd go hiking all the time with my dog, and we ran into a bear, and I used my signlanguage, like, sit, stay.
I ventured forward, and then come.

(41:05):
And he was totally in tune with me, and this bear came across the trail.
We went out further, went up the hill, I went this way and then it went this way.
We kind of did this.
He led us down the trail.
He was just wanting to fish.
He was in the stream trying to fish.
And so if you're out in the woods, I would at least carry one of those three things, a dogpistol or your bear spray.

(41:34):
Otherwise you need, and just be a bear aware and know what to do, know how to react.
Yeah, or maybe have a slower person with you.
No, I'm just kidding.
uh Yeah.

(41:55):
So, but you have coming up in two weeks, isn't it?
You have your survival sister who would retreat.
What's that about?
Yeah, I'm really excited about it.
It's coming up quick.
I'm just in the final getting everything together for that.
Survival Sisterhood, it's all about, it's actually going, it's not just a retreat, it's afull on year round community of women.

(42:23):
And it's all about women learning skills from other women and I'm bringing in top notchinstructors, but creating a container that's a safe.
non-competitive, non-judgmental, supportive, heart-centered environment for women to learnin.

(42:45):
And that's what women need.
They need to learn from other women.
We love our guys.
It's not a man-hater club.
We need our men to support us and give us that time to be together.
that the women can learn skills and then go home and say, go camping with their husbandand say, hey honey, I'll start the fire.

(43:13):
Or no, or be able to go do archery or go play together instead of being under thatpressure of having to learn something in a man's way.
Because men and women learn differently.
We process differently.
Our bodies are used differently.
And it's, yeah, it's.

(43:36):
We want to be able to go have fun together.
Mm-hmm.
So the retreat is really, I'm bringing in Jessie Krebs from the show.
She's bringing her military background.
I have Lindsay Prosecco.
She was on Alone the Beast and she won.
And she's bringing in some self-defense and predator preparedness type skills, shelterbuilding.

(44:00):
And then I have uh my local friend, Laura Clemens from Tendril Apothecary.
She's doing women's natural health and herbal medicine.
because like I said, we need to have our health as part of surviving.
So this is a holistic viewpoint or approach to survival, all these different perspectivesof what we need to do.

(44:22):
And then I also have another local gal named Monique Thorpe that's doing gun safety andrifle safety.
and then myself, primitive living skills.
And just getting together, have a good time and learn skills from each other, creatingthis network of women.
And we're not just to support each other, and we're also raising funds for cancerservices, because women who are in that place of breast cancer, cervical cancer, they

(44:57):
really are in a survival situation.
You know, it's really...
popular to do wilderness survival, and that's what survival is.
We're to go out in the woods and survive.
Let's be real.
These women are in a survival situation.
So how can we as women support one another?
And maybe it's just so-and-so wants to go for a walk or wants somebody to watch a moviewith.

(45:19):
It can be really simple things.
It doesn't have to be complicated.
But how can we support each other in our times of need?
So we are raising funds.
for cancer services.
The other piece, that's the five day retreat.
Throughout the rest of the year.

(45:40):
Yeah, throughout the rest of the year.
say, I was going to say, where is, I mean, I mean, are you going to do this every year orhow do people get into it?
Yeah, this is our first annual and I found this amazing piece of property right out ofsight of Priest River, Idaho.
So this is in North Idaho.
It's 160 acres surrounded by state land and we can pretty much do whatever we want outthere.

(46:06):
So we can just go have a fun time and do what we want to learn out there.
It's coming up July, so we start the evening of July 8th.
the 13th so that's in just two weeks.
oh And the other piece of that is we also have a community that we meet year-round andthat commute in that community as a membership type community and I do online every month

(46:35):
we do an online course we have a circle call where we just get together and chat get toknow each other I give weekly tips on different survival techniques
and some homework.
So we'll talk about that and I just kind of keep things going throughout the year so wecan become a real network.

(46:56):
And I'm always looking for ways to increase that network, but bringing in otherinstructors as a guest instructor.
And it's not about me.
I'm not at the top of the pyramid.
I'm just a person in that circle.
I'm just holding the space and the vision for it.
But this is an open circle for women or...
there are folks who identify as women that feel that they want to be there.

(47:21):
Well, I mean, it's just one of those things that I think my wife might be interested in.
And I was just trying to figure out how you, how do you get a hold of you or how we'll putsome in.
You'll have to send me stuff and we'll put that in the show notes too.
But I'm one of those people that, uh, my wife, like I want her, like she went on a fishand she goes on a fishing trip without me.

(47:48):
You know, I, I appreciate that.
because I know she's independent and strong and she's learning how to, mean, it was a flyfishing trip and I don't know how to fly fish and I was doing other things, but I
appreciate the interest of her getting into the woods and learning things.
And it's not so much, like you said, it's not so much that she wants to be hardcore, but Iwould like her to learn and I hope she, and she wants to learn things, but it's uh

(48:20):
I think that would be an interesting.
an interesting thing for my wife to be in.
So I'm going to talk to her tonight actually after that and for a little while, like Isaid.
anyway.
I would love to have her, yeah.
This is the type of retreat that's...

(48:41):
This isn't like push your limits and challenge yourself, although I'll recommend it if youwant to challenge yourself.
We'll help you with that.
It's not meant to be hard and struggling.
My 81 year old mother is coming.
uh So she'll be participating.

(49:03):
And know, there's certain things she would...
Yeah, yeah, she's herself, she has a pistol for safety and she's never shot it.
And a lot of women are like that, they'll buy something but they're afraid to shoot it.
So it's like, well, let's learn how to use it so it's not a danger to you, that's a toolfor you.

(49:23):
So it's really not like you have to be in really good shape to come.
You you're not too old, we're not too uh out of shape.
It's like come because it's you.
It's you and learn what you need to do to protect yourself or how you're going to surviveor whatever comes to you.

(49:45):
it's more about empowering, building self-confidence, self-reliant and self-resilience.
That's the health part.
Yep.
But how to just be strong and confident in what your capabilities are and knowing what youneed to do to help you overcome any kind of a situation that you might run into.

(50:08):
Not just in the woods, but could be at the shopping mall.
Well, I hear you and that's why, yeah, she's taken her gun safety.
She's taken gun, how to use her pistol in proper ways.
And, you know, and those are the things that as her husband, I can't go out and teach her.

(50:28):
Cause you, and I shouldn't because they, you just need somebody that is a teacher and notlike your husband, you know,
A husband and wife shouldn't teach each other anything at times because you just get anattitude with them where if you're learning from somebody else, that's the better way.

(50:51):
I would enjoy that.
Like I said, I would chat with her about this thing because I think she would enjoy that.
It would be a good deal.
Yeah, and our bodies are different.
We use our bodies differently.
We have different strengths.

(51:13):
Well, you do, we, we do have different strengths and we have to realize that and we haveto be self-aware of ourselves.
And, and I try to be self-aware of myself, but, in it would be interesting.
um, so how has your life changed since the show and have you been, have you been, I mean,you have a book maybe coming out here soon or sometime.

(51:46):
I am busier than ever.
Yeah, part of me wants that life back where I was doing a lot of crafting and my garden.
I don't have a garden yet on my new property because I don't have any water.
Hopefully trying to put a well in soon.

(52:07):
My life has changed.
He could say, I've always known what my personal purpose in life was or is.
And I feel like I've always had the stuff I want to share.
And that's part of that purpose and not just about the environment and oh, just, I justhave a lot to share.

(52:34):
And I've been trying to live by example.
So I went off grid 25 years ago.
I live in a yurt and collect my rainwater and just living off the land in that as simpleas possible but still be a part of the modern world.
So I know a lot of people go out and they're just total off-grid but they don't want to doanything with the modern world.

(52:58):
And I have one foot in each place.
But I've been trying to live by example, but there's who's going to listen to me except myclose friends.
And so I feel like now I have this, I'm in a place where I can share that and more readyto share my voice.

(53:20):
said that on the day I tapped out was that I was ready to step into being an elder,elderhood where I've been like, I'm not that old, you know.
ready to make that transition into elderhood, but to share and use my voice.
And so I appreciate being on this podcast because I use my voice and exercise, learn howto use my voice and share with some of the things I want to share.

(53:55):
And people want to listen now.
Well, yeah.
Well, you know, I mean, that's where we come.
Cause I w that's why I thought I had something to say and I wanted to get people outbecause I'm, I didn't, I always questioned myself about, uh, should you do this?
Like who's going to listen in and do you really have a voice?

(54:17):
And, and we found out that we do, but it's like,
It's about chasing your dream.
This is, don't die rusty is about chasing your dreams and becoming the best you and livein your best life.
And the motto is we want to wear out, not rust out.
You know, we want to keep not just our bodies, but our brains also.

(54:41):
And we want to, you know, when, when this body is done for its life, it better be woreout.
And it's all about we.
We don't take the material things in life with us.
We take our memories and we take the life we lived and hopefully we have left just alittle bit, if not more for the people around us to say, they influenced me.

(55:10):
they all will have a piece of you, you know, and because physically and usually peoplewouldn't realize, but you know, a generation or two down the road, people forget about
you, but.
Who knows if that one little thing that you've taught somebody doesn't just keep on goingdown the lineage and you will never know that.

(55:30):
So that's what Don't Die Rusty is about.
And you're doing good because you're telling us you're, you're helping out people andyou're, and that's what this whole thing is about is keeping things going one step at a
time forward every day.
And I like to, I like to think about like,
I always tell people to get into the woods.

(55:51):
I always tell people this and that, but I want to, you know, I want to learn from otherpeople.
Like, so I feel privileged and lucky to learn from you.
And if I can take just even a bit, every, you know, everybody has something that they canshare with everybody else that clicks and you've clicked a few things with me here, you

(56:13):
know, and just get me curious.
where I want to study more about like the plants and I want to study about things and thatmaybe someday we can have another episode and we can really get down deep into some other
stuff.
And I think that's interesting.

(56:35):
Thank you.
And I, so I can help you out with that.
I have a few things coming out.
And any day in the next week or two, I have a wild foraging master class that's coming outwith 360 Sportsman.

(57:00):
We covered 50 plants in that master course and we'll be adding to it.
So it's the volume one and a volume two kind of thing.
I'll be adding to it throughout the year as the plants reveal themselves.
Yep.
And to go along with that, I'm also putting together a pocket guidebook of wild edible andmedicinal plants that you can take with you while you're backpacking because you're not

(57:30):
going to take all your books and your apps are probably not going to work out there.
Get out of cell service and trying to connect to the satellite, you know.
You can use your app.
Just a plain simple pocket guidebook on.
The foods, the plants that you need to know the most for first aid and food and poisonousones, and even utilitarian plants like plants can make cordage or arrows, like wild rose

(57:59):
or ocean spray.
Mm-hmm.
So that's coming out in the next week or two.
I'm taking pre-sales for that orders right now for that.
We're in the final editing of it.
Then I have another book you probably didn't know about.
I started this book about seven years ago.

(58:22):
And I did some filming about it in 2019.
And then last year I worked on it some more and it kind of set it aside for a year becauseI want to focus on survival sisterhood.
But it's a book, I don't know if this will be the title, but it's what I call the Art ofSacred Living.

(58:42):
It's about what we've been talking about, how you can go out in the woods and connect intothat deep spiritual place with the land and yourself.
So it's...
how you live with reciprocity, because we live in this world where we just take, take,take, take.

(59:03):
But how often do we actually say thank you or offer tobacco or hair or a song?
And one way, simple way of reciprocity with the environment is conservation programs.
You are giving money to help a conservation group protect our wild lands.

(59:27):
This book is...
um
Kind of on the back burner now, but I'm going to bring it back up this next year because Iwant to reintroduce that.
And I think it's really important, and that's really what my experiment was on the show,was, everything that I'm writing about in my book, let's put it to the test.

(59:49):
Let's see if this works without interruption, interruption of modern life or the phonecall or, you know.
Many of us are good, like in the morning we'll maybe not do our yoga, but we'll get intothat space and...
say what we're grateful for and then you go out in traffic and you're like, we can't holdit.

(01:00:09):
But out there on the show, didn't have that.
Any kind of frustration came from me, you know?
So I put it to the test and that's part of what I'm writing.
I'm incorporating my stories out there into the book now as examples of how this works andwhy it works.

(01:00:31):
But it's really about that.
connection and and then really Rick to be honest my my goal here is I want to see peopledoing what their purpose in life is who you truly are and why you are here to help you
remember that was that song I sang I remember why I came here that was my soul song tohelp me remember why I was there when times got tough and so I want to help you know at

(01:01:00):
first I was like my god
because I sang it on the show.
Now the History Channel owns it.
It's like, oh no, I sold my soul song.
But at first I was like, oh, I don't know if I should have done that.
That was my song.
But I'm realizing that really it's not.

(01:01:21):
It's a song for everyone because I want to help you remember who you are and why you'rehere.
So let's get out in the woods.
get rid of all that identity and stuff and crap from this world and just be.
So I'd like to share not how to do in the woods, not how to do, how to make a fire, how todo this or to do that, but how to be, how to be in the woods.

(01:01:49):
so that's where I'm going with this book.
I like hearing that because I think people need to hear that.
We need these wild places to be wild and we need to learn from these places and becomebetter stewards of the land and as well as learn that it fills us not just with

(01:02:23):
the beauty, but it fills us spiritually and physically and that we will be the that thatit gives and we have to give back to by being good to the land is what I'm trying to get
at.
know, so yeah.
land will help you.

(01:02:44):
uh
you know, who you are, truly who you are inside.
and how to help you discover what your gifts are and how you can contribute that back tosociety.
Because society is nature.

(01:03:04):
Yeah.
We can't just that belief that we live in a dual society or a dual.
That duality of being in the spirit world or the physical world, we're both.
And just that belief that there's a separation creates that disconnect.

(01:03:26):
And that's a quote from grandmother Margaret, one of the 13 indigenous grandmothers.
It's just that belief in duality is causing the disconnect between the physical world andthe spiritual world.
because you are a spiritual being in a physical body.

(01:03:46):
uh
I always say when I'm in the woods, like if I get up early in the morning, it doesn'tmatter what I'm doing.
If I get up, well, I always get up early in the morning because I always, I go out and Iwalk every morning as the sun comes up or in the winter with the sun doesn't come up

(01:04:07):
before I go to work.
I always get up to go.
to get the fresh air and have the peace.
But where I'm going with this is when I have time and you lay on the ground and like atnoon, you should say, if I've been hiking or whatever, and I lay on the ground, I've

(01:04:28):
never, and it's hard, you you're just in your clothes or what, know, hiking clothes.
It's not a bed, but I have the best sleep naps I've ever had just.
Like you're earthed.
It's more like you're earthing and you're feeling the peace and the quiet.
And then there is nothing that I feel is more peaceful than that to me.

(01:04:52):
I've never, I am rested.
It can be an hour.
It could be a half hour, but I feel more rested than I've ever, than laying in a bed.
You know what I mean?
Like coming home and taking a nap.
And I think that people seem to miss that stuff.
They look over it, look past it, and I think we're getting to those places.

(01:05:14):
Yeah, well we wear rubber shoes all day and we live in wood houses and wood and rubber areinsulators.
So that's our disconnect.
I was talking to someone just yesterday, I'm not going to keep going on.
uh We were talking about electromagnetic frequencies and you know the big scare with 5Gand

(01:05:44):
We have more, there's more electromagnetic frequencies than ever before.
And that's not true.
So not true.
There's always been the same amount of EMFs, but we are self electromagnetic beings.
So we have a North pole and a South pole as our feet.

(01:06:06):
Mm-hmm.
And when we wear rubber shoes, so we need to have that biofeedback from the earth.
And when we wear rubber shoes and wood houses, we are disconnected from the earth.
But if we go outside, we don't have to be barefoot.
But when we're outside, we can create that connection when you have skin-to-skin contact,especially.

(01:06:30):
However, if you're wearing wool socks or leather, those are animal proteins.
So those are not, they're conductive, they're not insulating.
So you can go outside, if it's cold, wear some wool socks or leather patent shoes.
We used to wear them, we don't wear anymore.

(01:06:51):
And they now make shoes that have little leather patches on them.
And that's gonna help you connect to animal protein.
But cotton, cotton is a plant protein and it's an insulator like wood.
So that's just a little tidbit there.
That's why wearing buckskin is so cool.

(01:07:13):
Or moccasins, because you are connecting to the ground.
And we need that.
And when you're grounded, the 5G and these electromagnetic frequencies that are nowconcentrated, that's the problem.
They're now concentrated and they can drill through your body's energy field or your aura.

(01:07:36):
That's what 5G is doing.
It's drilling through your energetic field that you can't protect yourself from ah outsideinvaders.
You're wide open.
But when you're grounded, that supports everything.
And that 5G you can't get through when you're really, really, truly grounded or any of theradiation or whatever is out there.

(01:08:00):
So that's my little spiel on EMS.
uh
I'm probably having you talk longer than you want to, or I don't know.
I love this conversation, so we'll have to get together again sometime.
ah I always ask one question at the end.

(01:08:21):
It's, what's the good life to Carrie Lee?
What's the good life?
What's a good life?
Whoo.
Hehehehehe
Well, I think the good life is when you don't have, is when you're thriving, you'reresilient, you're full of joy, laughter and love, hope.

(01:08:48):
when you're doing what makes you happy and what makes other people happy.
And no one can touch you when you're in that state of being.
Whatever that is, whatever that is for you.
Mm-hmm.
For me, to me it's just being out in the woods.
And not just being out in woods either, but that's my happy place.

(01:09:11):
And when I can share it with friends, that's even better.
Yeah.
Well, I like hearing that.
So I just want to thank you so much for being on here.
mean, I understand our, it was, it's interesting how when you're trying to get ahold ofpeople and it goes back and forth and stuff, but thank you for sticking with us here.

(01:09:34):
And, and thank you so much for being on.
I truly appreciate this.
And I want to get back on and pick your brain again.
Okay.
I do because this is so interesting to me.
I said, plants are interesting to me and the spiritual part of things are interesting me.

(01:09:55):
And, and I really want to get to keep you, I might have to get you on a couple of times soyou finish that book so I can read it, you know, so that'd be good too.
And, but I truly thank you for being on the Don't Die Rusty podcast.
Thank you so much.
yeah, that plant book will be out before Survival of His Sisterhood retreat, July 8th.

(01:10:16):
But thank you for having me.
It's been wonderful.
Good.
And we'll get your information.
We'll put it in our Serow Notes so people can contact you or do whatever you want.
We'll let you, we'll do that.
And if you have any, if you want to tell us how we can contact you on anything, you canjust tell us right now too.

(01:10:37):
Sure, my best place to find out what I'm doing is on my website, is carrieleekinoki.com.
Make sure you spell it right.
That's the hard part.
There I have information about the show.
I have my class listings.
I have a store there with my products.

(01:10:58):
And you can reach out to me through email that way.
That's the easiest way.
Or on social media.
Yep.
So that's where I got to hold you and thank you for answering that too.
So anyway, don't die rusty nation as usual, keep chasing your dreams, being the best youand don't die rusty.

(01:11:18):
you