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Outdoor survival guru Cody Lundin says students come to his school to learn how to be self-reliant. Courtesy photo
Survival Skills in Demand Cody Lundin’s Aboriginal Living Skills School marks 30 years of preparing people for emergencies By Bonnie Stevens, FBN
Lundin’s students range from 7-year-olds to 80-somethings, although most are middle-aged, s a series of severe winter storms walloped educated professionals. “The No. 1 reason they come to me is they want to learn how to do more Texas in February, causing a crippling statewide power crisis that led to shortages with less. This has been true since the school’s inception. And the confidence they gain is huge of water, food and heat, one woman in her late 60s was texting Cody Lundin from her San Anto- when you can put someone in the field and bring them back a more confident person.” nio home, thanking him for the life-saving skills Those skills, he says, are going to be applicable she and her husband learned in the Sonoran Desert Daze course they took through his Aboriginal in any stressful situation, whether it happens in the African bush, the Red Rock Secret Wilderness Living Skills School (ALSS). “They got out the sleeping bags that had never or the concrete jungle. “One of the biggest causes of a survival been used since the course, were eating a chipped situation is the case of a day hiker who is not beef sandwich that was cooked over a bunch of physically, mentally and emotionally prepared. candles, had filled up their bathtub with rainwaThese hikes are notorious for killing people. For ter and snowmelt that they caught, and didn’t example, say you have Jeff from Connecticut understand why people were short on water,” said Lundin. “They had transferred their mindset who’s visiting Northern Arizona on a business trip. He’s not familiar with the area or the climate. from fear to coping skills.” He’s not hydrated before the hike and he didn’t The news came as the Arizona outdoor bring enough water on the hike. He doesn’t have survival instructor was about to mark 30 years the right gear and didn’t tell the front desk at the in business with his Prescott-based school. For hotel where he was going and when he should decades, Lundin has taught a cave full of courses be back. There are a million ways this can go at Prescott College and Yavapai College and has wrong. When his core body temperature rises, he walked thousands across Arizona’s harsh desert begins to have all kinds of issues, including poor and frigid high country. His Aboriginal Living judgement. When disaster happens, he goes into Skills School is one of the oldest survival schools a form of mental and emotional shock.” in the United States, where he teaches outdoor Lundin draws wisdom from a lifetime of being survival skills, primitive living skills, bushcrafting in nature and his insatiable appetite for knowland urban preparedness. “We’re in a physiological body, yet most know edge, much of it coming from medical journals. very little about their biological needs. Most don’t The best gift he ever received was the book “Wilderness Medicine,” which came from his mom, have any idea where their water comes from, a doctor of pharmacy, who worked at Yavapai where to find it, how to make it safe and where to store it. Most don’t know how to regulate their Regional Medical Center. In the 1980s, Lundin had a revelation about body temperature. We are so dependent on the creating his Aboriginal Living Skills School while grid and people don’t realize the extent they rely on it for their survival, let alone the complacency hiking in Sedona. “I saw a need to educate people going into the backcountry, I wanted to be my that comes with it. This creates the lack of being own businessperson and I adore nature. I wanted prepared and the feeling of shock when being to tie in to the natural world and teach others caught off guard. The body shuts down.” how it can influence them for the better.” He says everybody will be scared in a survival Those who spend any time with Lundin may situation, including him. “Fear uncontrolled can kill people. Ninety percent of survival is psycholo- quickly assess that he is part rugged caveman, part savvy businessman. Lundin lives what he gy and 10% is everything else, like hard skills. I teaches and has the wildland credibility to do so. teach people how to be more self-reliant. Once He loves the outdoors, thrives on a connection to people know how to deal with their needs, it nature and maintains a minimalist lifestyle in his simplifies their thought process – their focus can narrow in on what’s important to their safety and passive solar subterranean home. Whether he’s that brings down their fear.” Continued on page 38
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APRIL 2021 // Flagstaff Business News
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