Latest / Go Wildly Podcast / Ep. 2 | Transcendental Cult Kid Turned Playa Dust-Covered Earth Defender
Transcript
- 0:00Epic views for. Sure.
- 0:03What I have seen is a lot of people hopping around on
- 0:06mattresses. It's been alive on this planet
- 0:09at this time, baby. Like, come on.
- 0:11Hey, we're going to burn that. You want to come along the Playa
- 0:16Zamboni. Sit up my shoulder.
- 0:18It's a mountain twerk. It's a mountain twerk.
- 0:21It's a, it's a, it's a mountain twerk.
- 0:24Look at all these sticks. So many sticks.
- 0:26Living sticks. Sticks welcome to the Go Wildly
- 0:29podcast, where the trail or river is our studio and the
- 0:33outdoors is where the story all unfolds.
- 0:35I'm Heather and I'm Emily, and at the heart of it all is 1 big
- 0:39question we ask our guests. What is that one pivotal outdoor
- 0:44story that changed the course of your life?
- 0:46From transformative hikes to river epiphanies and everything
- 0:51in between, stories like these remind us how nature shapes who
- 0:54we are. So thanks for being here.
- 0:56Stick around and together we're go wildly.
- 1:00Thanks guys. We love you.
- 1:04Today's guest is Rihanna Koppel, a sustainability advocate,
- 1:07community organizer, and someone whose life is deeply rooted in
- 1:11the natural rhythms of the earth.
- 1:12Raised in a Transcendental Meditation community, Rihanna
- 1:15blends mindfulness with action, from environmental
- 1:18sustainability efforts locally to foraging mushrooms and living
- 1:21out the Leave No Trace ethic at Burning Man, her story is one of
- 1:25connection to the land, to the community, and to purpose.
- 1:28To experience our adventure first hand and step more into
- 1:31Rihanna's world, complete with absolutely stunning reviews of
- 1:34our hike at Mount Isabel in Southern Oregon, head on over to
- 1:37our YouTube channel to watch the companion film to this episode
- 1:40and let's go wildly together. Hey, girl.
- 1:43Hey, Oh my God, it's really. Nice to have you.
- 1:46It's really good to see you. When was the last time we saw
- 1:48each other? When was it?
- 1:53I don't know. Princess's birthday party.
- 1:55Oh. Yeah, that's right.
- 1:56Yeah, Karaoke Chapel Roan birthday party.
- 1:59Yes, Pink Pony Club. Pink Pony Club party.
- 2:03That was the last. Yeah, that was.
- 2:05That's really fun. I have that little Polaroid of
- 2:10everybody that's up in my fridge.
- 2:11Don't like these more? Friends.
- 2:14Yeah, we're so fun. We know how to have a good time.
- 2:18How to have a good time? It's true.
- 2:21So true. I Part of Rihanna and I's
- 2:24history is it's very karaoke heavy.
- 2:29Home karaoke. Home.
- 2:31Karaoke heavy. We've we've attempted a public
- 2:35karaoke event. Well, we did.
- 2:37We attended a public karaoke event once and we did, Matt, we
- 2:43did really fill the sign up list for a while and then it was
- 2:47like, well, we still have more songs we want to sing, but
- 2:50there's other people signed up. So what do we do?
- 2:53Home karaoke, Home karaokes? Where is that?
- 2:55A. 100% home karaoke all the time, always.
- 2:59Yes. It was going down.
- 3:01Yeah, it's a little. Yeah, we're in rocking chairs.
- 3:07You guys look like it's so warm out here and I'm in like cozy
- 3:11jammies. I would sweat.
- 3:12Look at my leg here. Oh.
- 3:14Yeah, I see that guys. That's why you're so warm and
- 3:17you. Went to shave this morning and
- 3:18my razor had a bunch of rest on it and I was like I'm not going
- 3:23to shave with that I mean. Do you use a straight razor just
- 3:28like a safety razor or like a multi blade razor?
- 3:32Wick story time I when I was on my no waste like no like reduce
- 3:37reuse, recycle journey. I like got a bunch of like
- 3:42reusable stuff. So I bought this really cool
- 3:45looking oil slicked shaver to reuse and then you interchange
- 3:49out the razor blade in it. Well one day I was shaved and I
- 3:55shaved a bit too vigorously and it skinned my whole like to this
- 4:01day, it was years ago. To this day, every time I think
- 4:04about that, I'm like pit in my stomach and I'm like, it
- 4:08literally shaved off my skin. And from that day forward I was
- 4:12like, I'm using Venus, like, sorry, it's going to be the one
- 4:17thing I compromise on. Or you know, I compromise on a
- 4:20bunch of things. But like I was like, I'm not
- 4:22going to worry so much because I literally got.
- 4:24Hurt. Yeah, like.
- 4:26To the point where I should like it could have, I could have
- 4:29needed like a skin graft. I mean, it was like rough.
- 4:32Oh my God, terrifying. Do you have a scar?
- 4:37Yeah, I think there is a scar. Here I got Oh my God now.
- 4:43Let's see if I can find it. Maybe you can only see it when
- 4:48I. When you shave, yeah, like.
- 4:50When it's when? It's like moisturized and stuff,
- 4:53but I can kind of see like see those little white patches.
- 4:56I do see that, yeah. Ouch.
- 4:59Damn dude. Rough SO.
- 5:01OK, lesson learned. And it was user air and then
- 5:05too. But it freaked me out enough to
- 5:07be like I don't ever want to use this thing again.
- 5:10Yeah. So yeah, so yeah, I was just
- 5:13like a Venus throw away. I think you can change out the
- 5:17heads, but that's yeah, I still. Have the handle that my very
- 5:22first ever Venus handle. Even after my brother's dog
- 5:25chewed it up, I still use that's.
- 5:27Cool, see I love. That to use recycle still works.
- 5:30Well, still works. Baby still works.
- 5:32Most of the time I use Sean's beard shaver.
- 5:35Yeah, for all things. No lucky him.
- 5:38I know he says he doesn't care, so I'm like, OK, that's fine
- 5:42then I'm going to continue. Yeah, continue onward.
- 5:45Yeah, I even do my eyebrows sometimes, OK.
- 5:47Yeah. OK, let's get back to the meat
- 5:49of our experience here, back to Rihanna's life story.
- 5:54You were telling us a little bit about growing up in Fairfield,
- 5:58IA Transcendental Meditation community.
- 6:02I have a quick little question to start the conversation off.
- 6:05Maybe I'm curious on how the Transcendental Meditation
- 6:09community culture aligns and is In Sync with your Jewish Jewish
- 6:18heritage and how that religion played into that practice.
- 6:21Because yeah, like how it all if it did or if it didn't or.
- 6:26Yeah. And here's what I'll say to that
- 6:29is that there's a particular terminology that I like to use
- 6:34that I feel like applies to me, which is Hinduism.
- 6:38Yes, yeah. So I would call myself a Hindu
- 6:40100% because I was raised in this Transcendental Meditation
- 6:45comes from a culture, a Vedic culture in India based off of
- 6:49the concept of Brahmacharya and concepts in Sanskrit that have
- 6:55to do with having some kind of spiritual leader or, or having
- 7:00a, a guru, a a, a teacher. And so that element and several
- 7:06other elements within kind of Hinduism at large definitely
- 7:10are. And we're at play in my
- 7:12upbringing in the middle of nowhere, Iowa.
- 7:16But then also Judaism did come into play a little bit.
- 7:20Both of my parents left their respective religions and really
- 7:24committed to Transcendental Meditation when they were very
- 7:26young, in their early 20s. And they still practice it every
- 7:30single day, twice a day. We did celebrate Hanukkah.
- 7:34That was kind of about it, to be honest.
- 7:36And so when I grew older, my brother and sister and I and my
- 7:41cousin as well, have very much returned back to our own
- 7:46understanding of Judaism because it wasn't something that was
- 7:49really taught to us when we were younger.
- 7:53Yeah, you were meditating. We were meditating, we were
- 7:55taught to meditate. We were taught to meditate at
- 7:57five years old, taught to sit on meditation at 10 years old.
- 8:01And then I went back in my 20s and I learned the longer form,
- 8:04which is about an hour and a half and includes yogic flying,
- 8:08which is yogic hopping really. But anyway.
- 8:12What is that? Yeah.
- 8:13Good question, what is yogic flying?
- 8:16Take a look on YouTube and you'll and you'll see what yogic
- 8:19flying is. But yogic flying within the
- 8:21Transcendental Meditation community was this concept that
- 8:26after you go through a few different levels, leveling up of
- 8:29your meditation practice, a standard Transcendental
- 8:32Meditation practice is 20 minutes twice a day.
- 8:35It's a mantra meditation. And after that 20 minutes, when
- 8:39you go to level 2 and do the cities program, you do your 20
- 8:43minutes of your regular meditation.
- 8:45And then you have these other mantras that you utilize for
- 8:49about another 20 to 30 minutes. And then after that you get to
- 8:53this final mantra. And then you go into something
- 8:57that they call yogic flying, which is that you go to this
- 9:01kind of mattress area and you're in an easy posture, sucusana,
- 9:06cross legged posture. And the idea with this
- 9:09particular mantra is that it invigorates some part of the
- 9:13body that is trying to move and trying to eventually hover and
- 9:17actually fly. Like, literally.
- 9:20Levitate. Like levitate, I'm talking true
- 9:24levitation did. You see that happen?
- 9:26I have not ever seen that happen.
- 9:29Which is the true yogic flying is yogic copies and there used
- 9:32to be competitions. OK, my dad was a competitive
- 9:35yogic flyer. So they would have these
- 9:38mattresses set up and it's still like this.
- 9:40You can go into the Dome today and it's all, it's covered all
- 9:44in these mattresses and they do it around the, the center of
- 9:49they're the, the golden Dome. And they would stack up
- 9:52mattresses. So you'd have, you know, 2
- 9:55mattresses stacked on top of each other.
- 9:57And the men would hop all the way up in this like yogic
- 10:02posture and then they would do 3 mattresses and then they would
- 10:05do 4. So people would be happy.
- 10:08Like off of their butt. Town in Iowa this Fairfield Cam
- 10:12and open up a mattress mattress store there.
- 10:14Yeah, you should. You should.
- 10:17That's my entrepreneur seizure. It actually need mattresses.
- 10:21I'll bring them mattresses. They do mattresses and back
- 10:24jacks y'all. Absolutely no tempur pedic.
- 10:26No need the bounce you need. I'm going to a vintage mattress
- 10:31store. The vintage mattresses that
- 10:33really bounce. Give me that yogic.
- 10:35Hot. I'm going to go around and find
- 10:36all of them and be like I got. You guys, I got you guys, yes.
- 10:40But that sounds great. So let's talk about my question
- 10:45is of course maybe to an outsider that sounds a little
- 10:50culty. It is culty.
- 10:51OK, I was, I wanted to ask about that.
- 10:53OK, I. Didn't want to be like.
- 10:56Rude by saying that because like, you know, it's another
- 10:59practice, another religion. Anything can become a cult,
- 11:01really like anything. So you're right, it's just like
- 11:04that. So I was just curious.
- 11:07Yeah, I am very much a part of that idea and concept that I
- 11:12believe that everything is a cult.
- 11:14Everything is a culture. America is a cult, and where we
- 11:18live is a certain kind of cult, certain kind of culture.
- 11:22And where I grew up, absolutely, it's a cult.
- 11:25And there's a variety of other things that I experienced
- 11:28growing up in that that turned me a bit away from meditation.
- 11:33And so when you asked earlier what my meditation practice
- 11:35looks like, it's actually been quite a challenge for me because
- 11:38I grew up in that kind of environment where I was taught
- 11:41meditation at 5. And now moving through my life,
- 11:44having yoga as a part of my life, I really have taken a long
- 11:49time to figure out what that spirituality truly looks like in
- 11:53my daily routine. And for me, it's very much
- 11:56connected to nature. It's very much connected to
- 11:59listening and observing this incredible, beautiful world that
- 12:03we live in and realizing that I'm a very, very small, small
- 12:07component of this environment that we live in.
- 12:10And to look around like I was mentioning the cycles of nature
- 12:14themselves, These cycles are bigger than me.
- 12:17They were here before I existed. They're here while I exist.
- 12:21And they will continue on after my body leaves this beautiful
- 12:24planet. And so for me, I think that that
- 12:27spiritual upbringing helped to sort of make me see the world in
- 12:33that way. And so when people say, oh, you
- 12:35know, what's your meditation practice?
- 12:37It's being alive on this planet at this time, baby.
- 12:40Like, come on, it's, it's, it's absolutely beautiful.
- 12:43And and to really notice everything around us that is
- 12:49beyond our own capacity is is truly magical.
- 12:54Amen. Yeah.
- 12:56Amen. Hallelujah.
- 12:57Yeah, does. That what I understand of
- 12:58meditation is like it is just about noticing, not attaching,
- 13:04not assigning anything, just noticing.
- 13:07Yeah. And sitting out here in nature,
- 13:13that's what you have to do. You just have to sit and notice
- 13:15the whole point of being here is.
- 13:17What's the Jewish Amen not to go up on a tantrum?
- 13:21Maine but look I am is to like that's what I thought it's a
- 13:24like Jews celebration salute. Yeah, yeah, Aloha see Ken yeah,
- 13:31cool. Ken is yes in in Hebrew.
- 13:34Did you have a Obviously you didn't have like a bat mitzvah
- 13:36or anything like I? Did not have a celebrates.
- 13:40I did not I my again, it was like 5 you're taught this
- 13:45meditation 10 and then this. So I, I did not.
- 13:49That was also part of my Jewish upbringing that my parents
- 13:53didn't feel was necessary in order for me to really be
- 13:57Jewish. And I don't feel like it is
- 14:00either for me. My sister did her own bat
- 14:04mitzvah later on in life to reclaim that part of herself,
- 14:08which I think is really beautiful.
- 14:10And I think that each person has their own relationship to
- 14:13Judaism, and whatever that looks like for them is valid.
- 14:18Period, you know. For sure.
- 14:21Do your parents still practice that they live there and
- 14:23practice that, or have they moved on or?
- 14:26Oh they still TM twice a day every single day baby.
- 14:29Wow, dude. But they don't live there
- 14:31anymore. Your well, your dad's still in
- 14:32Fairfield. Yeah, my dad does.
- 14:34Yeah, but are they separated? Yeah, OK.
- 14:36Yeah, but they're still doing their.
- 14:38Oh, wow. Step mom too.
- 14:40Oh, cool. Yeah.
- 14:41So there's a huge so. So yes, it is a cult.
- 14:43It's one of the more benign cults, but not totally benign.
- 14:46Nothing's totally benign. Do we have our dirt bikers
- 14:52arriving? That sounds like.
- 14:55Yeah, A. Whole ass.
- 15:10Right on, boys. Could be women in there women
- 15:14dirt bikers. Yeah.
- 15:15Hi, ladies. Good girls.
- 15:21Sit. Community.
- 15:30Oh, that reminds you that again, Reminds me of my friend Vance.
- 15:34Yeah. I was thinking about today and
- 15:35how to dream. He was in my dream last night.
- 15:40Yeah. And then I messaged him.
- 15:41He was big into dirt biking, so it kind of reminded me of him.
- 15:45Again. He reminded again.
- 15:46I know he'll be listening. To this Oh yeah, we can see him
- 15:49go over there. I wonder if they'll turn around.
- 15:53I'm sure it's out and back. This is well, this would be a
- 15:55really fun trail to dirt bike because it's so steep and kind
- 15:59of techie. Yeah, that's hot.
- 16:04So usually with Colts they're hard to leave.
- 16:08What was it like leaving Fairfield, leaving TM, leaving
- 16:14family and breaking out, Venturing, venturing W?
- 16:20How did you end up in Oregon from that community?
- 16:23So my mom and dad did divorce and separate and my mom knew
- 16:28someone also from that TM community.
- 16:31We had grown up together that had moved out to beautiful
- 16:33Ashland, OR. And so my mom visited her
- 16:37friend, our family friends, and she said if I ever move
- 16:40anywhere, I'm going to move to Ashland.
- 16:43Oregon. And there's a good community of
- 16:45the meditation there too. It's a.
- 16:47Small community, but there is definitely crossover and my mom
- 16:52is originally from California. My whole family on that side is
- 16:55from the West Coast. And so it was kind of an easy
- 16:58move for her to go back to the West Coast.
- 17:00And so that's how I came out here.
- 17:02I went back to Fairfield in my early 20s, and I really thought
- 17:09for a long time that I would stay there and that I wanted a
- 17:13family and I wanted to grow up and raise a family within that
- 17:18community. And I worked at the school,
- 17:21Maharishi International University, for a long time.
- 17:23And all of the friends that I made there are truly incredible.
- 17:28I love them so much. And we had a fantastic formative
- 17:32time. And what's so beautiful about
- 17:35Miu is that you think of Iowa, you think the Midwest, you think
- 17:39the Farm belt, you know, all of these kinds of things, very
- 17:43specific kind of culture. But in Fairfield at Miu, the
- 17:49population of that school, over 50% of it is international
- 17:53students. So you have folks from Ethiopia,
- 17:56you have folks from China, you have folks from India, you have
- 17:59folks from Ecuador, you have folks from like all over, all
- 18:04over. And it was so beautiful to be
- 18:08able to sell it. When I worked for the school, we
- 18:10would celebrate the Ethiopian New Year, we'd celebrate the
- 18:13Lunar New Year, we would celebrate Ramadan.
- 18:15We had all these different events because we had such a
- 18:18diverse little community, because people from all over the
- 18:22world were drawn to this one particular place where they knew
- 18:25that they could go to university, practice meditation,
- 18:28have all organic vegetarian meals and be a part of a
- 18:31community that actually really valued silence and health and IR
- 18:36of aid at its core. And again with the.
- 18:39Legit and. Yeah.
- 18:42And as someone who grew up in that, I often ask my friends who
- 18:45moved to the middle of nowhere Iowa to go to the school, I was
- 18:49like, what are you doing? What are you doing coming to to
- 18:52Iowa? And they said it's all of these
- 18:54things that we don't have in our cities or where we come from
- 18:59that we wanted to come to place that values that.
- 19:02And so is someone who grew up in it.
- 19:04That was natural to me, all of these things.
- 19:08I grew up eating rice and Dal and, you know, knowing Ayurvedic
- 19:13spices like cardamom and asafetida and turmeric and all
- 19:17of these things. And so for me, there's a lot of
- 19:20those elements that are still very much a part of my life in
- 19:25Ayurveda and yoga and meditation that I believe are truly, truly
- 19:31beneficial. And also the element of the
- 19:34community was really, really beautiful.
- 19:37There again, there are certain aspects of it that I don't need
- 19:40to get into so much that we're really, yes, spiritually or
- 19:46psychologically damaging as well.
- 19:49And I did see people that who had been meditating for 40
- 19:53years. And I have learned from personal
- 19:56experience that just because you meditate doesn't mean that
- 19:59you're good at anything else besides meditation doesn't mean.
- 20:02You're enlightened. It doesn't mean that.
- 20:04You're enlightened, and what enlightenment looks like is.
- 20:09If anyone tells you that they know what it is, don't.
- 20:11Believe. Yeah, they don't.
- 20:12Then they don't know they. Really don't know.
- 20:14And, and I learned myself that I did not want to become the same
- 20:21kind of person that I saw as someone who had been meditating
- 20:24for very many decades. And I wanted to.
- 20:27To clarify, so you don't want to, you didn't want to just be
- 20:30somebody that that's just their lives revolved around the
- 20:33meditation piece and not exploring more of what life has
- 20:37to offer. Yes, OK, And exploring with your
- 20:40eyes open because I find again in my own personal experience
- 20:44that meditation is a beautiful tool that once you have it, no
- 20:49one can ever take that away from you.
- 20:51You could be completely disabled, you could be in
- 20:54prison, you could be having the worst day of your life.
- 20:57And that is a tool that you have and you alone that you can
- 21:00utilize and, and whatever way that really works for you.
- 21:04And when you open your eyes and come out of that state, it's
- 21:08also up to you to be accountable for how that piece inside of you
- 21:13internally transmutes into the external world.
- 21:16We cannot live in the ashram for our entire lives.
- 21:19We have to go out into the world and we will have a specific kind
- 21:24of impact in the world, whatever our intent is.
- 21:28And so it's important, I think to have the eyes open meditation
- 21:31as well. And that's really what I learned
- 21:33from growing up within this community and why I stepped away
- 21:36ultimately from what I saw as a cultish community, which it is.
- 21:41And again, pretty benign, but I wanted to have more of a real
- 21:45impact in the real world when my eyes are open.
- 21:50Beautiful. Yeah, wonderful.
- 21:53And do we want to switch kind of just switched off since we are
- 21:57time limited. Yeah, like.
- 21:59Meditation, yeah. Yeah, it's such that's such a
- 22:02core pillar in you, so it's great to talk about and kind of
- 22:06knowing where you come from. How did you get into the Burner
- 22:09community? I went with my meditation
- 22:13friends. Really.
- 22:15Yeah. So yeah.
- 22:15How does how does this name of Fairfield TM Meditation Eyes
- 22:22Open Eyes Open Meditation take you to where you are now and how
- 22:27you commune with nature and community and how these
- 22:31practices that you've learned so early on still play a role in
- 22:36your adult life? Right.
- 22:38So my friends and I, as young people that grew up in this
- 22:44community, as the daughters and sons of people that committed
- 22:50their lives to Transcendental Meditation, a lot of us are
- 22:53weirdos, man, and we like to explore a variety of different
- 23:01consciousness psychedelia. There's something in us that has
- 23:06a taste. For that, that makes sense when
- 23:08you're like really restricted. But also meditation is so much
- 23:13about expansion of the mind and mental and internal exploration.
- 23:20But when you're like restricted and insulated in this little
- 23:24environment, it feels, it seems kind of counter productive,
- 23:29counter intuitive of like explore, but only explore within
- 23:33these walls. So yeah, then you had to unleash
- 23:37yourselves. Blue Mountain to the world, Yes.
- 23:41Yeah. So that we did.
- 23:43Did you start out like exploring psychedelics and stuff before
- 23:46Birdie Man? Or did Birdie Man come and then
- 23:48the opening to the psychedelics, which was first?
- 23:52Psychedelics first. Absolutely.
- 23:54Psychedelics first, because when I went back to Miu in my early
- 23:5920s, there's a lot of other people that came from outside
- 24:02that had experience with psychedelics or otherwise that
- 24:06those experiences of altering their consciousness turn them
- 24:10towards meditation and wanted to have something that maybe they
- 24:13saw as a little bit more sustainable.
- 24:15Oh, totally. Yeah, Yeah, it's hard to sustain
- 24:17a trip, right? It's impossible.
- 24:20You will come back down to ground level reality.
- 24:24And so I experimented in my own way and there was a, there's a
- 24:29bit of that in the youth community of Transcendental
- 24:33Meditation for sure. And the elder community.
- 24:35I'll say that as well. And through that, some of my
- 24:39friends said, hey, we're going to burn that.
- 24:43If you want to come along, let's do it.
- 24:46And it was a bucket list item for me.
- 24:48How old are you? Yeah, I was 24.
- 24:50OK. And you're how old now?
- 24:52I am 36 now so I went 12 years ago and 2012 and it was really
- 25:00so much fun. It was awesome.
- 25:01Check that off the bucket list item and I had a wonderful time.
- 25:07But again, it wasn't something that necessarily called me
- 25:10immediately. It was more that bucket list,
- 25:12Yeah, I've done this. It was so much fun, had a great
- 25:15time, wonderful. And I travelled around the
- 25:17world, did some other things. And then a few years ago the
- 25:22calling kind of came back where I said I'd like to go back to
- 25:25this community and see how it has changed and how I have
- 25:29changed as well. So I came back a few years ago,
- 25:34they had and a few renegade burns because of the pandemic.
- 25:37So I officially went back in 2022 and I've been going every
- 25:41single year since. And also I have gone down to the
- 25:46Black Rock Desert when the big burn, the big party in the
- 25:49desert is not happening, which way I would encourage every
- 25:52single person to do because this desert is so beautiful.
- 25:56It's so quiet. There are these gorgeous Hot
- 25:58Springs there. The sunsets are Immaculate.
- 26:01It is a truly wild. Gorgeous.
- 26:05It's one of my one of my dad's special places.
- 26:08And I always was like, dad, we should go to Birding Man
- 26:10together. He's like, I can't, I can't.
- 26:13Like, I like bird. I like the Black Rock as it is
- 26:16and I enjoy it as it is and I don't want to be.
- 26:19He's also old boomer generation, so he doesn't necessarily want
- 26:23to see the crazy, You know, he's low key, but it's just, yeah.
- 26:28Yeah, it's a. He he talks about it like, just
- 26:31like you did, like it's an amazing, beautiful place.
- 26:34It is, yeah. And what is beautiful about
- 26:37Bernie man in particular that there is the the concept that it
- 26:42is sex, Drugs and Rock'n'roll. And that's not to say that it's
- 26:45not Sex, Drugs and Rock'n'roll. It's a big party.
- 26:48And it's also the largest Leave No Trace event in the world.
- 26:53And when you go down to the Black Rock Desert, when that big
- 26:56party is not happening, you will find it to be a pristine,
- 26:59gorgeous, Immaculate desert. And that is because the people
- 27:03that put on this big party also clean up.
- 27:07OK, cute dramatic cut here. This episode is brought to you
- 27:12by Dead Camera Batteries. May we always have a few more in
- 27:16our backpacks. Enjoy.
- 27:19Phenomenal. Yeah, this is.
- 27:20I know I wanna. Gorgeous, I wanna hang out here
- 27:22all the time. I.
- 27:23Really do like this whole valley back here.
- 27:26I'm like what like? I Is this a wildly, wildly
- 27:29staple hike? Yes, I think so.
- 27:31Like we come out here, I wanna, I have a feeling that there is
- 27:34like almost a 360 view on top. Of here.
- 27:36We're gonna go check it out. Yeah, 'cause of the and we're
- 27:39gonna get there and be like, are you fucked up?
- 27:41No. No, because this is excellent
- 27:44and we'll just do that another time.
- 27:45Yeah, totally. But I can see beyond the that
- 27:48this little section of trees right here, that there's no
- 27:51trees on the other side of it. Yeah.
- 27:54So yeah, yeah, we'll check it out anyway.
- 27:56OK, so take us back to a little bit more Burning Man Leave No
- 27:59Trace principles and like key things that you want people to
- 28:05know about Burning Man, about you and about.
- 28:10Yeah. Life with nature.
- 28:13Yeah, of course. Yeah.
- 28:15I think I was talking about the Leave No Trace element of, of
- 28:18Burning Man. And yeah, like your dad was
- 28:21saying, that desert is so beautiful and Immaculate and
- 28:27absolutely gorgeous and why? Why I do have a lot of, I would
- 28:34say, yeah, investment in value in the Burning Man community is
- 28:38because of the principles. And not everybody follows all
- 28:42the principles all the time, but one of them is Leave No Trace
- 28:46and another one is civic responsibility and so on.
- 28:49This creation of this temporary city in the desert happens.
- 28:53The intent is that we all participate as a part of
- 28:57building this city. Taking it down and leaving a
- 29:00trace is an element to that. And so when I go to the desert,
- 29:04to the Hot Springs with my friends, or to 4th of July when
- 29:07that's going on and you go out there, you would think that
- 29:12there was never 80,000 people out here in the middle of
- 29:16nowhere because of Leave No Trace and because of the teams
- 29:21that stay after the party ends, they're called the Playa
- 29:24Restoration Team, and they spend weeks cleaning up this desert.
- 29:28I volunteered with them about a year ago and stayed for a
- 29:31weekend to help do that. And what they do is the whole
- 29:36reason why the burn happens, Burning Man would not happen if
- 29:41it weren't for this dedicated small group of people.
- 29:43It's about 200 people that stay and they literally walk that
- 29:48entire portion of where the burn happens over and over and over
- 29:52and over again, picking up every single piece of tiny trash that
- 29:57they can find. If it's cardboard, if it's a
- 29:59piece of straw, because straw does not exist in the
- 30:02environment. That's all matter out of place
- 30:05or move as they call it. And then they have an inspection
- 30:08with BLM because this event happens on BLM land and the BLM
- 30:13will go out and select random sites.
- 30:17Totally random. Stick A point kind of down the
- 30:22ground and then they will do a 360 circle and depending on how
- 30:27much trash they find within that circle that they do, they will
- 30:31either pass their inspection there or they will fail it.
- 30:34And they do this a number of times.
- 30:36And the Burning Man organization has to pass a certain number of
- 30:39these random test sites in order for them to utilize the land.
- 30:43Again, that's so amazing that they came up with this awesome
- 30:46compromise to do that, like BLM and then work together to figure
- 30:50out how they were going to gauge that.
- 30:52I think that's really cool that, you know, that synchronicity of
- 30:56such a, you know, prominent government bureaucracy, you
- 31:00know, thing. And then there's like they came
- 31:02together. I like that.
- 31:03I like I like coming together stories.
- 31:05I just think it's cool because like, that just goes to show I'm
- 31:08applying it to my life and it just goes to show that
- 31:11compromise can happen. You know, we can work this out.
- 31:14That whole like. We can all benefit from this.
- 31:17Like experience, how to all do this together, you know anyway.
- 31:20It's really cool. Together, they can go wildly,
- 31:22yeah. Together.
- 31:23Wildly, yes. I had a question.
- 31:27What was it about Birdie Man? Oh, how was the I know that
- 31:32Birdie Man a couple seasons ago had a really crazy rain event
- 31:37happen and like a lot of things got super sunked into the mud.
- 31:42How was cleanup did you hear? About that, I went for that in
- 31:47part, yes. So that was the mud man year
- 31:51where it rained, supernatural occurrence and beautiful.
- 31:54So much fun and there was a huge amount of trash and cardboard.
- 31:59What people would do is they would lay down cardboard on top
- 32:01of the wet Playa, and then the cardboard would be embedded into
- 32:06the Playa itself and then dry up and be stuck in there.
- 32:10And so because of what I saw when I was there for that, I
- 32:15knew that I wanted to go back for Playa restoration.
- 32:17Because it was. It's going to be a issue and you
- 32:20needed help. Yes, and I and I wanted to help
- 32:22and I. Can imagine that year being such
- 32:24a tough cleanup year. It was and it also showcased
- 32:28with the camps that are there, because what happens with the
- 32:31Playa restoration team is that they also mark out and record
- 32:36where they find all of the trash because of the placement of all
- 32:40the camps. They'll say this particular camp
- 32:43you guys sucked at leave no trace and you're going to have
- 32:46to showcase to us that we can let you back on the Playa based
- 32:51on how that's cool. Trashy you you left it and I.
- 32:55Love being held. Held accountable.
- 32:57I love being held accountable too and it's and that map is
- 33:01public. Anybody can go online, look up
- 33:03the Burning Man moop matter out of place map and you can see
- 33:07what camps are trashy and what camps cleaned up period.
- 33:10It's public accountable. Public shaming on their
- 33:14trashiness. That's correct.
- 33:16That's correct. So it was more difficult that
- 33:20year. But something that's really cool
- 33:22that they have is something called the Playa Zamboni.
- 33:27That sounds awesome. So if someone will bring out
- 33:30something, please don't ever do this.
- 33:32If you bring out fake turf, you know, the grassy whatever stuff,
- 33:37please don't bring that to the desert.
- 33:39Number one, just don't. But people will do that and
- 33:41they'll lay it out on the Playa. Imagine that gets rained on and
- 33:45then all these little pieces of green plastic turf just get
- 33:49embedded into the desert. Don't do it.
- 33:54So when that happens, that's not something that people can
- 33:56individually pick out, which is what they're doing for all of
- 33:59the other MOOP that they find out in the Playa when they're
- 34:02walking in and cleaning up. So they mark it on the map and
- 34:05they say bring the Playa Zamboni out here, they bring out this
- 34:08machine and it literally turns up the Playa and then they scoop
- 34:13it all up and take it away. So put it into a dumpster.
- 34:17And that is pretty much the only thing that can be done in those
- 34:21situations. And that does happen, right?
- 34:25And again, it's a part of that restoration team that helps to
- 34:30truly clean all that up. And I would encourage anybody
- 34:33that wants to go to Bernie manner has gone to Bernie man to
- 34:36come back and be a part of that to because that is the core.
- 34:41You will understand what this event is really about outside of
- 34:45the sex, drugs and Rock'n'roll is.
- 34:47This is maintaining the beauty of this incredible area that we
- 34:51are so lucky to be able to create this temporary city of
- 34:55magic within. One of my yeah.
- 34:58It's so easy for people to go out and just experience
- 35:02something and let that experience stay there.
- 35:07But until you actually go and do the aftermath of it and see the
- 35:13impact, what it takes to put it together and break it down, you
- 35:17you're just living on like the surface of that experience.
- 35:21Yeah. Getting to the real nitty gritty
- 35:25bones of it and seeing, wow, this is what goes into making
- 35:30this happen. Like I experienced that on river
- 35:32trips a lot where people can just show up, get on the boat,
- 35:35go float, have a great time. But then when they actually see
- 35:39the days of planning that go into it and how much gear is
- 35:43coming out of the raft and how they're having these amazing
- 35:47meals that they didn't even know was in that cooler, and then
- 35:52they see all of that get cleaned up and put away and stored.
- 35:57It expands their capacity to have that experience and
- 36:01understand like, wow, this isn't just surface level.
- 36:05This is there's depth. Yeah, and maybe they'll be a
- 36:08little bit more graceful when something does, you know, a
- 36:10mistake happens or you know something.
- 36:12That's when we were doing like waste management, 0 waste
- 36:16practices in community. People would be like, Oh well, I
- 36:20just throw it away. And the whole concept of, well,
- 36:22there is no away. When you take people to a
- 36:25landfill and they see all of the stuff that they threw away that
- 36:31is still just there, it has a trickle down effect of how they
- 36:36purchase things later and they're thinking about this
- 36:39thing does have to go somewhere. Somebody has to deal with where
- 36:43this is going to go. If it doesn't leave with me,
- 36:47somebody else is gonna figure out what to do with it.
- 36:49So how can I not leave as many things?
- 36:52Well, it's reduce comes before reuse and recycle.
- 36:56Yeah, you reduce 1st. And I was always trying to like
- 36:59imprint that into all my like, master recycler people when I
- 37:02did that certification. Yeah, I'm a master recycler too
- 37:05and there's like 7 other Rs. Yeah, we're all master
- 37:09recyclers. But there's like there's almost
- 37:14a dozen Rs, there's repair, there's repurpose, there's help
- 37:22me out here. Master recyclers reduce, reuse,
- 37:26recycle, repair, repurpose, repurpose.
- 37:31There's something about like decomposition rebuild.
- 37:37There's a bunch of other Rs that come long before recycle and
- 37:42reuse that are all about reduction.
- 37:47Yeah, I need to get better about it.
- 37:49I've been off my game a little bit.
- 37:50Me too, honestly. It's hard.
- 37:53I, when I was thinking about having this conversation with
- 37:56the both of you, I was thinking about Leave No Trace and I the
- 38:03concept of morale, there's spirituality and then there's
- 38:06morality, right? And one of the things that I
- 38:09feel like is a core tenet of my morality outside of spirituality
- 38:14is that I believe that every single person that exists on
- 38:17this planet today has a moral obligation to pick up trash.
- 38:22I. Really do.
- 38:23We were all born. Every single person alive on the
- 38:26planet was born into an era where there's all this
- 38:30production, there's all of this consumption there, and they're
- 38:33systems beyond our control. And so we have a moral
- 38:36imperative as people that exist on this beautiful planet and
- 38:40rely on it for our entire livelihood to pick up what we
- 38:45see. And it's not to say that, you
- 38:48know, like trash exists. There is no way, like you were
- 38:51saying. And we can still protect things
- 38:55in the wild like rivers, waters, this beautiful side of a
- 39:00mountain that we're on. And if we see things that are
- 39:03there, that we see matter out of place, we can decide that there
- 39:07is a place for trash and we can decide what to do with that.
- 39:10And we need all of us, every single one of us, again, that is
- 39:14alive, could be picking up trash for the rest of our lives and we
- 39:17still would not be done. We are the clean up generation
- 39:20and that's everyone alive now. Today, let's get it.
- 39:26I love that. Yeah, yeah.
- 39:27I try to pick up as much as I can too.
- 39:30Yeah, and it's hard. It's overwhelming.
- 39:31Oh my God. I used to.
- 39:33I used to go down to the Illy in the summer.
- 39:36Have you been down to the Illinois Rivera to enjoy?
- 39:39Well, we'll have to go down there.
- 39:42I used to bring giant black trash bags from Applebee's
- 39:46because I worked at Applebee's at that time and I used to steal
- 39:48a few trash bags at a time. And yeah, thanks Applebee's.
- 39:54Fringe Fringe benefits of corporate jobs.
- 39:57And I would literally fill up one of those, like I think they
- 40:03were beyond 13 gallons. Like I think they were like 16
- 40:09to 20 gallon bags. Like they were giant dumpster
- 40:11bags and I mean diapers. I even got like a little virtue
- 40:18on somebody and I was like. They they just changed their
- 40:22baby. I kind of like saw it out of the
- 40:24corner of my eye. I was young.
- 40:25I don't didn't know how to approach people really about
- 40:27stuff, but they just like left their fucking.
- 40:29I was like, do you shit in your backyard too?
- 40:32Like they're like, go ahead, beautiful.
- 40:36Place like that, you can be there and it's so gorgeous and
- 40:39you look down and it's covered with trash and it didn't
- 40:41completely ruin store experience.
- 40:44It can ruin the the inherent beauty of the place and those of
- 40:50us who have this moral imperative to clean things up,
- 40:53leave things better than we found them, remove things that
- 40:56don't belong in the setting, in the environment.
- 41:00Now we don't get to enjoy that place freely and in a relaxed
- 41:05state. When I go to places like that,
- 41:07then my whole time there is spent picking.
- 41:10Up the trash. Well, you know, like.
- 41:12Oh yeah, I have fun doing that. Sure.
- 41:14That is my moral imperative. I'm like, oh, OK, I can pick up
- 41:17trash, but like, I don't want to fucking pick up other people's
- 41:19trash. I want to be able to come and
- 41:21enjoy this place as relaxed as you did when you were tossing
- 41:25your shit. Well, I just thought of a really
- 41:27good compromise because I'm all about finding the deals these
- 41:30days to work with all sorts of people in my life and like to
- 41:33come up to like a come to a compromise in all sorts of
- 41:37backgrounds. And I just thought to myself,
- 41:39better way I could do that. And maybe I'll do it this summer
- 41:42if I see it happening is I'll bring extra trash bags and say,
- 41:45Hey, did you bring a trash bag? I have one for you.
- 41:48And usually if you kind of offer that, I feel like people are
- 41:52more receptive because part of the problem is they forgot a
- 41:54fucking trash bag. Let's be real, like some people
- 41:56just fucking forgot. I have been in the situation
- 41:58where I'm like shit next I have to leave this for whatever
- 42:02reason because I don't like something happened.
- 42:04Next time I'm going to come and pick up two trash bags worth to
- 42:07make up for what I. Did whenever I forget a dog poop
- 42:10bag. The next time I'm out I pick up
- 42:12multiple piles of dog shit. What do you think about that?
- 42:16Is that would that be? I think that's great.
- 42:18OK, good trade off. I I do that all the time where I
- 42:21go out to a place and I think naturally like, yeah, there
- 42:24won't be any trash out there. Of course, it's a beautiful spot
- 42:26and then you go there and there's trash and you go, you
- 42:30know, so having something, even if it is like a, a plastic dog
- 42:34bag, a dog poop bag, I can say words, you can use even that or
- 42:40I love the idea. And I've done this too, where
- 42:42I've gone back to a place where I went on a walk in a park and I
- 42:46was so upset about what I saw and I didn't have anything with
- 42:51me and my partner at the time. I told him about it and he said,
- 42:54let's go back there and let's bring bags and let's clean it
- 42:58up. And I really thank him for that
- 43:02moment because I was depressed. I think that's what happens to
- 43:05me when I see trash out in the world is that I literally feel
- 43:09depressed about it. And the, the resolution to that
- 43:13is to do something and, and to, to go back there.
- 43:16And I think that carrying extra bags, it's like if I was out
- 43:19again on a trail and someone is like, Hey, I brought this trash
- 43:23bag. If you see anything, you know,
- 43:25you use it. I I'm offering something for you
- 43:28to use. That's such an empowering thing.
- 43:31And it's, it's kind. It's, it's, it's awesome.
- 43:34And it would make me think, even if I saw no trash on that trail,
- 43:38I would go, I have that I can use it.
- 43:41And now that I have that tool with me.
- 43:45Yes, well, I found that. I found that there was another
- 43:49time close to that time I was talking about with the diaper
- 43:52situation where we were back like the next weekend or
- 43:55whatever in my group didn't have any bags to put their cans in
- 44:00when we were enjoying the beers, you know, and it's like shit.
- 44:02And I was putting them all in this like half broken down, you
- 44:05know, Barber. Box, Yeah.
- 44:07To try to and I did as much as I could, you know, but if somebody
- 44:10was like, hey, you didn't bring a bag for those here, here's a
- 44:14bag and I'd be like. Thank you, you just saved my
- 44:17stress instead of oh you didn't bring it back for that you piece
- 44:20of shit, because that's where you're just going to leave.
- 44:22Some, you know, and so I think it's more.
- 44:25It builds community too, even if it's not like a tight knit
- 44:29community, just making that connection of I have something
- 44:33that I see that you need. Thank you for giving me that
- 44:36thing that you saw that I needed.
- 44:37Now we have like a tie of love and connection and the whole
- 44:44world is better through that love.
- 44:47So it's such a good talking point too.
- 44:48Yeah. Yeah, anyway.
- 44:50We're at our cut off time for where you have to go to next.
- 44:55Yes. Do you have any final parting
- 44:57words? I have a question about it.
- 44:59Part it, part her, part her out. We got 2.
- 45:03X we got 2R. S we got.
- 45:06When you leave this earth, what do you want your being to be
- 45:12remembered as? Like what do you want to be
- 45:14remembered as when you pass? I hope that I am remembered as
- 45:21someone who is loved. I think that's the important
- 45:25thing for me at my core, is that I, when my body and my spirit is
- 45:31no longer present on the planet, I hope that I am, and this is
- 45:35Judaism here. I hope that my memory is a
- 45:37blessing to other people. And I hope that I how I lived in
- 45:43this world impacted, yeah, someone's heart to know that
- 45:48either I love them and I was loving, or just that they love
- 45:52and miss me. I don't think there's no trash
- 45:55and otherwise, and I don't know if there's really anything else
- 45:58besides that. Just love, yeah.
- 46:00Cool. Your existence is a blessing to
- 46:03me and hopefully all of our viewers and fans will also feel
- 46:08the blessing that your existence is.
- 46:10Thank you for joining us and being here on this planet and
- 46:13being an inspiration and an expander of existence in my
- 46:18life. And I loved getting to know you
- 46:21more. Yay, yay and.
- 46:25Well. We're going to have you back for
- 46:26a Part 2. Yeah.
- 46:27I feel like there's so much, so much more.
- 46:29Yes. We just are a little time
- 46:31limited today. Yeah, and do you want people to
- 46:34be able to find you on the Internet?
- 46:36And if so, where would they find you?
- 46:38Oh sure, you can find me on the Internet, I suppose.
- 46:42I do have a private account on Instagram but you can find me
- 46:47Rihanna Shree, that's my name. Slide into her DMS and ask
- 46:50permission first. DMS ask.
- 46:53Can you do that if you're things on private?
- 46:55It'll go into like a, oh, that's requested messages or something.
- 46:59Yeah, correct. OK, cool.
- 47:01Yeah, that's very. Cool, slide into the to her DMS,
- 47:04yeah? Nothing else.
- 47:07Like, I'm pretty cool. Yeah, yes, yeah.
- 47:10But also, if you don't want people to find you on the
- 47:11Internet, that's OK too. Yeah, it's all good.
- 47:13Yeah, that's fine. I mean, you don't have to find
- 47:15me. Is there any particular like
- 47:18company or account where you could direct people like Yeah.
- 47:22Actually yes, OK, you can find me on Instagram at Jewish
- 47:27Forager which is all of my mushroom for a gene.
- 47:31I try to collect it all in one place.
- 47:34So yeah, follow me. And that's her.
- 47:36For, is that an open account? It is an open account.
- 47:38Cool. Perfect.
- 47:39Open account Forager you can find me.
- 47:42It's there with all the mushrooms and awesome.
- 47:45Yay, mushrooms. Yeah.
- 47:47Thank you for being part of our community and being our friend,
- 47:50OK? We got to do a deep squat.
- 47:51We love you. Are we ending all of them with
- 47:53deep squats? I don't know, let's let's do my
- 47:54gorgeous. Squat.
- 47:55Do you want to do this? What do you want?
- 47:56Yeah. Deep squat.
- 47:57Deep squat. Show me.
- 48:00OK, heels have to be on the ground.
- 48:02Yeah. And there you go.
- 48:05I bet this. Yeah, it's this.
- 48:07It's Velocina. Yeah, my back isn't.
- 48:10Back and you're probably probably spend a lot of time
- 48:11like this looking for mushrooms. I do, yes, yes.
- 48:15And I hope that everyone feels comfortable in this position.
- 48:18It's really good for your Physiology.
- 48:20It's a resting position. This is how humans should.
- 48:25Be. Sitting, resting, I like.
- 48:28To poop like this, Yeah. Yeah, it's great for your
- 48:30bowels. Let let me just say I love me a
- 48:33good forest shit. Yeah, yeah.
- 48:36Moves faster. Is that breeze coming up?
- 48:41Yeah. Kind of like breathe your sun
- 48:42the butt hole while you're. Get the sun in your perineum.
- 48:46Yeah, How do you? Feel about real quick.
- 48:48How do you feel about when I do? I dig a hole for my poop.
- 48:52When I poop and then I wipe with teepee, I bury that teepee.
- 48:57Is that OK? I don't think it is Technically
- 49:00yeah, but I feel good about it because it's paper.
- 49:04Maybe I should use like non bleached paper but like that's
- 49:07what I do. I mean, it's not visible ever.
- 49:10Buried is better than left on the surface.
- 49:12Right, Buried is better. Well, my dad did.
- 49:15My dad's all about leave no trace and he's always like bury
- 49:17your poop. He recommends packing out your
- 49:21teepee, but bury your poop always.
- 49:23He always gets pissed. He's like.
- 49:24I know that was human shit right there.
- 49:27What the fuck? Yeah, I mean if.
- 49:29You want to be really strict. The TV have a separate like, you
- 49:32know, right paper bag that you put it in, you know.
- 49:36And then let's do a twerk. Yeah, then.
- 49:38Oh yeah, I can't twerk my shoulder.
- 49:42It's a mountain twerk. It's a mountain twerk.
- 49:44It's a it's a it's a mountain twerk.
- 49:47Floss it. Oh yeah, I will do this with you
- 49:49mountain floss. Mountain floss.
- 49:55Awesome. I want to know what these
- 49:56mountains are right there, that whole range.
- 50:00Yeah, yeah, dude. Oh my gosh, that's so
- 50:02interesting. Isn't she?
- 50:03Oh, she's like, fascinated. I'm.
- 50:05Always. I'm so fascinated by Colts.
- 50:08General SO. That's like, insane.
- 50:11Yeah, there's. A nice one where they're like
- 50:13many women are separated and you need to wear masks and don't
- 50:18grow up here. Like, I didn't want to get it
- 50:20all that like Wagy, like the bad.
- 50:22Shit, all of it. You know, or like you.
- 50:25Can only entrances and your head should only be to the north like
- 50:30all like don't enter through the South the butt hole of this.
- 50:33Building Wow. My God, it goes.
- 50:34It goes well. I I imagine that once this
- 50:39episode is published and people listen, people will be like, we
- 50:43want to hear more about the cult.
- 50:45We brought Rihanna back, so. Bring Rihanna back for Part Part
- 50:494 about the cult. Cult Life.
- 50:52Cult life with Rihanna. Yes, it's like a part 4.
- 50:57We're in Fairfield Reddit film edited and produced by Heather
- 51:06White and Emily Berlant. The go wildly music is rainmaker
- 51:09by Jared Masters. Special thanks to Rihanna Koppel
- 51:12recorded on location at Isabel Mountain in Southern Oregon.
- 51:16Thanks for listening. Please follow, like, subscribe
- 51:18and of course, share. New episodes drop every Friday.
- 51:21Remember to rate and review. Find us at Go Wildly Podcast
- 51:24everywhere. Yeah.