Hylophobia comes from a deep, ringing, primal fear. It lingers deeply in every one of us,  resounding through our bodies until we realise we were always afraid of the forests. The reasons for the stories of “Sasquatch” and “Bigfoot” weren’t just myths to tell around the fire. They were written in the days when, if a child wandered into the woods that meant you might as well call it wolf food. You needed a way to keep them away. The reason we know the woods to be a place of both beauty and fear is because when you submit yourself fully into their grasp, they never let you go. They haunt you. They whisper from a distance, through the wind: 

“Why do you keep coming back?” 

“Have you ever really left?”

When you hike the Superior Hiking Trail, whether by chunk or all in one go, you start to feel the pull, dragging you deeper in, as you drift from society and populated areas. Nature starts to retake the hold it once had over our ancestors. The first night you spend out there, alone in a small tent, you hear sounds you wouldn’t hear if you were camping. When you go camping, you hear sounds of the highway a short distance away, low voices by the fire next door, the occasional car alarm or shifting log. 

When you are truly alone, you hear the whispers of that call, magnified one thousand fold. And that, my friends, is when the fear truly sets in.

When in the city or suburbs, the line between forest and civilization can be a hard one to draw in the sand. It often is more difficult to find than you would think, because given our human nature and our ever-expanding society and technology, telephone poles, fire towers, and all sorts of other things still exist that are man-made out in those woods. Think about it this way: You are walking through the woods on your own, no trail, no destination, just some time in nature. Before you know it, a cell tower looms over you, and you can’t help feeling chilled, or uneasy. After all the time in the woods, a solitary looming structure seems alien and imposing. It falls so deep into the uncanny valley, you are overwhelmed by its presence. 

Hylophobia isn’t like other phobias, either, because most phobias have situations that cause those fears. We don’t know we are afraid of tight spaces until we go caving. We don’t know we are terrified of spiders until we come face-to-face with one in our basement. With Hylophobia, it doesn’t take such “triggers”. All it takes is a walk in the woods, something decently normal for a human being, to be tipped over the edge and into that spiraling fear.”