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 last update 4.9.07

Track

verb
1 a : to follow the tracks or traces of : TRAIL b : to search for by following evidence until found: track down the source
2 a : to follow by vestiges : TRACE b : to observe or plot the moving path of (as a spacecraft or missile) often instrumentally
3 : to travel over : TRAVERSE: track a desert>
4 a : to make tracks upon b : to carry (as mud) on the feet and deposit
5 : to keep track of (as a trend) : FOLLOW

intransitive verb
1 : TRAVEL: a comet tracking eastward
2 a of a phonograph needle : to follow the groove undulations of a recording b of a pair of wheels (1) : to maintain a constant distance apart on the straightaway (2) : to fit a track or rails c of a rear wheel of a vehicle : to follow accurately the corresponding fore wheel on a straightaway
3 : to leave tracks (as on a floor)

Track·er: noun
 

Tracking starts with a landscape: the Earth, for example. Following the marks left on the Earth by the life around you is where most people start. After following deer, fox and squirrels for a while, people often start tracking other things: birds, weather, landscapes. After a little while longer, the tracks always lead back to themselves. Then begins 'Inner Tracking.' (...or what I call 'Tracking the Wild Human'.)

No matter where you start or what you track, you almost always end up where you started. It's kinda fun that way.

Here are a few journaling techniques to try. Each of them helps you to work with your whole brain, but in slightly different ways. For all these exercises, hold the event you are examining in your mind, making it as real as possible. Involve all your senses, sound, sight, taste, smell, feel, even your 6th sense. While in this state, follow the directions for the method.

Word List

- Write a word (or short phrase) as a key or foothold into the event. Underline the word or phrase. - While in the space of the event, write a list of words beneath the underline that describes anything that comes to mind - emotion, images, feelings... Be as literal as you can. For example, if you start with the word brick you might write underneath: red, rough, rectangular, heavy, coarse, wall, mortar, sand, building, apartment, home, comfort, cool...

- When you've exhausted your list, take a breather. Not a long break, but definitely a break.

- Return to the space of the event, and to your list. As you go down the list, circle the words that 'jump out' off the page at you.

- After going through the list a second time, take the circled words and write them in order to the side of the list. Gaze at them and see if they bring light to the circumstance you are evaluating.

The 'Bubble' Method

Begin with your subject word or phrase, written somewhere on a blank piece of paper (doesn't matter what size or shape,mind you!) Draw a circle around it. (You can emphasize it if you want, so you don't lose your starting point.)

- While in the space of the event, write other words or short phrases relating to your starting point, circling them and connecting them to the original event by a line.

- Keep going until you've exhausted yourself for the moment. Remember you can always go back and add.

- Put the page aside for a moment or two. (Very important!)

- When you go back to the page, try looking at it from a distance, look at the patterns or groupings of words that come up. You may even find themes emerging from the groupings. These themes contain your keys for understanding the event you're analyzing.

Page Scatter

This method requires some research into your own language, and may be considered a intermediate Inner Tracking method.

- Begin with a blank page.

- From the space of the event, write words or phrases that spring to mind, anywhere on the page, at any angle, even overlapping. Words, doodling, sketching, everything is viable here.

- Examine the layout- the positioning of words relative to eachother and the page - will show you a deeper layer of your thoughts. Pay attention to where certain types of words are grouped:
example: all words to do with family appear in the upper left hand corner of the page, written at an angle, perhaps with respect to cardinal directions in this example, take the top of the page as north, so family references are in the Northwest. What does 'Northwest' mean to you? Here is where you would begin to research your own language...

Continue from here, making note of how you feel about different words, or maybe where some words or drawings link together into larger concepts. Follow this far enough and you may see a bigger picture you didn't expect, or uncover details you'd forgotten about.

As I'm sure you can see, all these methods lead to a possibly endless stream of questions. Don't get caught in the web too fast, you'll get squirreled away into a corner and lose sight of the bigger picture. Set yourself a theme that will give you a boundary to stay within. Then go play!