The Tim Ferriss Show
#571: Boyd Varty — The Lion Tracker's Guide to Life
Episode guests
Podcast summary created with Snipd AI
Quick takeaways
- The art of tracking animals involves reading signs, following tracks, and understanding animal behavior.
- Renius Matanja exemplifies exceptional tracking skills, attunement to the environment, and mastery of the wilderness.
- Leopards are the most challenging animals to track due to their solitary and secretive nature.
- A tracker's mindset involves navigating uncertainty, embracing the unknown, and focusing on immediate steps and signs.
Deep dives
The Art of Tracking and Attunement
The podcast episode explores the art of tracking animals and the importance of attunement to the wilderness. The speaker describes the skills and mindset of a tracker, highlighting the ability to read signs, follow tracks, and understand animal behavior. The episode emphasizes the deep connection between a tracker and the natural environment, as well as the importance of curiosity, presence, and adaptability. Through personal experiences, the speaker expresses the transformative power of tracking and the healing potential of attuning to the unknown.
The Mastery of Renius Matanja
Renius Matanja, one of the best trackers in the world, becomes the focus of the podcast episode. His exceptional tracking skills, attunement to the environment, and ability to read animal behavior are discussed. The speaker recounts an incident where Renius refused to return to camp, opting to continue tracking a male lion despite the fatigue of the clients. Renius' unwavering dedication to tracking and his innate understanding of the wilderness illustrates the depth of his mastery.
The Challenges of Tracking Different Animals
The podcast episode acknowledges the challenges of tracking different animals. Leopards are identified as the most difficult to track due to their solitary and secretive nature, their light footfalls, and their preference for dense terrain. The speaker shares stories of skilled trackers who specialize in following leopards. Other animals, such as lions, are mentioned as more manageable but still requiring expertise in observation, attunement, and skillful reading of tracks and signs.
Finding the Way without Knowing the Destination
The episode explores the mindset of a tracker, emphasizing the ability to navigate through uncertainty and embrace the unknown. The speaker shares a line commonly used by trackers: 'I don't know where I'm going, but I know exactly how to get there.' This mindset involves being comfortable with not knowing the destination but trusting the process and focusing on the immediate steps and signs. The speaker draws parallels between tracking in the wilderness and personal transformation, highlighting the importance of attunement, being present, and following one's curiosity and passion.
The Healing Journey: From Trauma to Purpose
The speaker shares his personal experience of going through a series of traumatic events, including a home invasion and a crocodile attack. He discusses how this led him on a healing journey and the challenges he faced in finding a path towards healing. He emphasizes the importance of finding a structure of meaning and purpose, as well as being open to different healing modalities. The speaker highlights the significance of ceremony work, specifically in the context of plant medicine and its role in supporting his healing process. He also mentions the transformative power of addressing and questioning one's beliefs using Byron Katie's work, which has helped him navigate through stress and find clarity. Finally, the speaker explores the connection between personal healing and activism, and how living an authentic life infused with meaning can contribute to societal transformation.
The Power of Natural Connections
The speaker reflects on a transformative experience in nature, where he realized that healing and restoring our relationship with the natural world starts within ourselves. This realization came to him after a psychedelic experience, which made him feel newborn and more attuned to his emotions and the emotions of others. He shares a story about witnessing a solar eclipse with a meditation guide, highlighting the deep sense of connection and feeling of love that can be experienced in unexpected moments. The speaker concludes by discussing the importance of letting go and allowing others, including animals, to guide us to places we couldn't reach on our own.
Profound Encounters and Healing Opportunities
The speaker tells a powerful story of a man named Lawrence Vanderpost, whose encounter with a wild animal helped him regain innocence and courage after experiencing the horrors of war. This story resonated deeply with the speaker, and he shares his own encounter with a leopard during a bushfire, where he felt a profound stillness and connection with the animal. The speaker reflects on the lessons learned from these encounters, emphasizing the importance of non-verbal connections and the ability of animals to see and heal us in ways that humans cannot. He invites listeners to explore the transformative power of nature and suggests supporting initiatives like safaris and tracker academies that promote the preservation of wildlife and the well-being of local communities.
Brought to you by Wealthfront automated investing, Athletic Greens all-in-one nutritional supplement, and Helix Sleep premium mattresses. More on all three below.
Boyd Varty (@boydvarty) is the author of two books, The Lion Tracker's Guide to Life and his memoir, Cathedral of the Wild. He has been featured in The New York Times, on NBC, and in other media and has taught his philosophy of “tracking your life” to individuals and companies around the world.
Boyd is a wildlife and literacy activist who has spent the last ten years refining the art of using wilderness as a place for deep introspection and personal transformation. He grew up in South Africa on Londolozi Game Reserve, a former hunting ground that was transformed into a nature preserve by Boyd’s father and uncle—both visionaries of the restoration movement. Under his family’s stewardship, the Reserve became renowned not only as a sanctuary for animals but as a place where once-ravaged land was able to flourish again and where the human spirit could be restored. When Nelson Mandela was released after 27 years of imprisonment, he went to Londolozi to recover.
Boyd has a degree in psychology from the University of South Africa. He is a TED speaker and the host of the Track Your Life podcast.
This episode is brought to you by Wealthfront! Wealthfront pioneered the automated investing movement, sometimes referred to as ‘robo-advising,’ and they currently oversee $20 billion of assets for their clients. It takes about three minutes to sign up, and then Wealthfront will build you a globally diversified portfolio of ETFs based on your risk appetite and manage it for you at an incredibly low cost.
Smart investing should not feel like a rollercoaster ride. Let the professionals do the work for you. Go to Wealthfront.com/Tim and open a Wealthfront account today, and you’ll get your first $5,000 managed for free, for life. Wealthfront will automate your investments for the long term. Get started today at Wealthfront.com/Tim.
*
This episode is also brought to you by Helix Sleep! Helix was selected as the #1 overall mattress of 2020 by GQ magazine, Wired, Apartment Therapy, and many others. With Helix, there’s a specific mattress to meet each and every body’s unique comfort needs. Just take their quiz—only two minutes to complete—that matches your body type and sleep preferences to the perfect mattress for you. They have a 10-year warranty, and you get to try it out for a hundred nights, risk free. They’ll even pick it up from you if you don’t love it. And now, Helix is offering up to 200 dollars off all mattress orders plus two free pillows at HelixSleep.com/Tim.
*
This episode is also brought to you by Athletic Greens. I get asked all the time, “If you could use only one supplement, what would it be?” My answer is usually AG1 by Athletic Greens, my all-in-one nutritional insurance. I recommended it in The 4-Hour Body in 2010 and did not get paid to do so. I do my best with nutrient-dense meals, of course, but AG further covers my bases with vitamins, minerals, and whole-food-sourced micronutrients that support gut health and the immune system.
Right now, Athletic Greens is offering you their Vitamin D Liquid Formula free with your first subscription purchase—a vital nutrient for a strong immune system and strong bones. Visit AthleticGreens.com/Tim to claim this special offer today and receive the free Vitamin D Liquid Formula (and five free travel packs) with your first subscription purchase! That’s up to a one-year supply of Vitamin D as added value when you try their delicious and comprehensive all-in-one daily greens product.
*
Setting the scene. [05:44]
How the Londolozi Game Reserve came to be, and what happened during Boyd’s childhood that instilled him with a “get on with it” attitude. [08:02]
Why did Boyd’s father and uncle insist on keeping the property that would become the Londolozi Game Reserve when, at the time, it was considered useless, overgrazed wasteland? [10:18]
Boyd shares what it was like growing up as a regular passenger/survivor of The White Knuckle Charter Company. [12:25]
How a man named Ken Tinley and the native Shangaan trackers helped a trio of teenagers transform their expanse of scrub-encroached land into a thriving safari business. [21:03]
On the ancient lineage of the Shangaan trackers, and how the local wildlife came to trust the human caretakers of Londolozi. [27:05]
Renias Mhlongo is supreme among world-class trackers — and sometimes the importance of the work outweighs the will of his clients. [32:21]
Which animals are hardest to track at Londolozi — even if you happen to be Richard Siwela? [37:53]
Because nature can be unpredictable, how do people protect themselves in Londolozi? [41:03]
“I don’t know where we’re going, but I know exactly how to get there.” —Renias Mhlongo [42:56]
How the tracking process has changed for Boyd over the years — from confident child to young adult traumatized by a home invasion and crocodile attack to competent grown-up thanks to people like Dr. Martha Beck and Solly Mhlongo. [45:00]
What is Ubuntu? [1:02:50]
Boyd talks about that time he lived 40 days and 40 nights up a tree — the questions he was trying to answer for himself by doing so, the primal fear he experienced while waiting out a storm, the pros and cons of extreme solitude, and if he’d do it again. [1:05:15]
Stories about bees, the birds who help humans rob them, and the power of the hive algorithm. [1:17:45]
The dos and don’ts of interacting with lions in the wild. [1:29:42]
On the eerie conversation of death, modern confirmation of ancient myths, and the inexplicable movements of beasts and men. [1:34:16]
How did Boyd’s own path toward healing after trauma differ from the way his mother and sister recovered from a trauma they experienced? [1:39:57]
What is ceremony work, and how can it help someone deal with trauma? [1:43:32]
What Boyd means when he says “an authentic life infused with meaning is a kind of activism.” [1:46:40]
How Boyd and I have both been affected by the Work of Byron Katie. [1:52:03]
Boyd’s first medicine encounter in an Arizona sweat lodge, and what he took away from the experience. [1:56:31]
Feelings. Nothing more than feelings. [2:02:49]
Kudus and nightjars and leopards in the fire (oh, my)! What a close encounter with a beautiful predator taught Boyd about Ubuntu. [2:04:14]
Examining the therapeutic value of spending time with animals. [2:13:05]
Laurens van der Post poetically described the sound of a lion’s roar. And, in a packed presentation hall at a major Silicon Valley company, Boyd did not. [2:17:57]
An invitation to visit Londolozi and other parting thoughts. [2:22:10]
*
For show notes and past guests, please visit tim.blog/podcast.
For deals from sponsors of The Tim Ferriss Show, please visit tim.blog/podcast-sponsors.
Sign up for Tim’s email newsletter (“5-Bullet Friday”) at tim.blog/friday.
For transcripts of episodes, go to tim.blog/transcripts.
Discover Tim’s books: tim.blog/books.
Follow Tim:
Twitter: twitter.com/tferriss
Instagram: instagram.com/timferriss
Facebook: facebook.com/timferriss
YouTube: youtube.com/timferriss
Past guests on The Tim Ferriss Show include Jerry Seinfeld, Hugh Jackman, Dr. Jane Goodall, LeBron James, Kevin Hart, Doris Kearns Goodwin, Jamie Foxx, Matthew McConaughey, Esther Perel, Elizabeth Gilbert, Terry Crews, Sia, Yuval Noah Harari, Malcolm Gladwell, Madeleine Albright, Cheryl Strayed, Jim Collins, Mary Karr, Maria Popova, Sam Harris, Michael Phelps, Bob Iger, Edward Norton, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Neil Strauss, Ken Burns, Maria Sharapova, Marc Andreessen, Neil Gaiman, Neil de Grasse Tyson, Jocko Willink, Daniel Ek, Kelly Slater, Dr. Peter Attia, Seth Godin, Howard Marks, Dr. Brené Brown, Eric Schmidt, Michael Lewis, Joe Gebbia, Michael Pollan, Dr. Jordan Peterson, Vince Vaughn, Brian Koppelman, Ramit Sethi, Dax Shepard, Tony Robbins, Jim Dethmer, Dan Harris, Ray Dalio, Naval Ravikant, Vitalik Buterin, Elizabeth Lesser, Amanda Palmer, Katie Haun, Sir Richard Branson, Chuck Palahniuk, Arianna Huffington, Reid Hoffman, Bill Burr, Whitney Cummings, Rick Rubin, Dr. Vivek Murthy, Darren Aronofsky, Balaji Srinivasan, Sarah Silverman, Dr. Andrew Huberman, Dr. Michio Kaku, and many more.
See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.
Remember Everything You Learn from Podcasts
