About Mystic Wild and Deer Ryder

Here is a wandering tale of a man who rides the deer and pays his respects to those who teach and taught him . . .

Mystic Wild is fed by Deer Ryder: wilderness and human development guide, writer, dreamworker, poet and storyteller. He resides in the American Southwest where he works supporting and mentoring youth and adults on their journeys of growth, healing, and deepening their soul’s path in relationship to the holy wild.

Deer’s primary lineage for the past six years is with the Animas Valley Institute, a nature-based mystery school in the southwest founded by wilderness guide, depth psychologist, and world-renowned author Bill Plotkin. Deer is currently a “Soul Initiation Guide” apprentice, a 5-7 year apprenticeship in the Nature Based Map of the Psyche and Soulcraft (dreamwork, shadow work, cross-species communion, ceremony, ritual arts, trance states and more) with a specific focus on guiding their vision quest model.

Deer spent two years as a senior field guide with Open Sky Wilderness Therapy and is certified in nature-based practices and eco-psychology by Rupert Marques: former School of Lost Borders trainer, worldwide rites of passage guide, and Dharma teacher. During his year-long training with Rupert at the bi-lingual radical ecology Eco-Dharma Centre in the Catalan Pyrenees, Deer learned to blend contemplative practices, earth-based wisdom traditions, and contemporary rites of passage work. There, he experienced his first 5-day wilderness solo fast, which inspired him to the path of apprenticeship to that ceremony.

Deer has been a dedicated meditation and mindfulness practitioner for nearly 10 years, as well as an occasional co-facilitator, primarily in the Vipassana/Insight traditions. He has participated in many silent retreats all over the world, with contemporary teachers and traditional monks, with special emphasis on blending practice and service to the earth. In this vein, he honors his former teachers: Sangha Seva’s Nathan Glyde and Zohar Lavie and friend-mentor, Mai-Linh Leminhbach: teacher and co-founder of the Himalayan Dharmalaya Institute for Compassionate Living.

Deer pays his deepest respects to the Kogui people of the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta,Colombia. He is most thankful to Mama Luameko and Mama Pedro. Deer lived in the Sierras and spent significant time with the Kogui in support of the Amazon Conservation Team’s efforts to help the Mamas reclaim stolen territory, make offerings, and cultural preservation. Deer does not offer or teach anything he learned directly from the Kogui, but was irrevocably transformed and imbued by their teachings and way of life. He supports them in their fight to curtail global ecological disaster.

Lastly, Deer is a certified Wilderness First Responder with field experience. He received his Permaculture Design Certification from LA Permaculture Academy and applied its teachings while living and working in gardens, farms, alternative communities, eco-centric and permaculture-based projects around the world, including ancestral land practices research at Navdanya Earth University in northern India. He has his BA in Literature and Creative writing from UCLA and is a student of worldwide mythology, storytelling, and traditional cultures–including euro-centric traditions. He is currently writing and seeking representation for a novel trilogy. He has traveled to 30 countries and lived in 9 before calling the southwest home.