There is a version of your life story that lists the jobs you have held, the relationships that have worked or haven't, the things you have achieved and the things you have not. And then there is another version, a wilder, older, truer version that begins with 13.8 billion years of evolution and asks what gifts you arrived here with that you have perhaps forgotten.
That second story is what Mary Reynolds Thompson has spent her life helping people find.
Mary is a British-born award-winning author, poetry and journal therapist, and eco coach whose work weaves nature connection, wild language, and therapeutic writing into a path of soul recovery and re-enchantment with the earth. In our conversation for the Writing with Purpose podcast, she spoke about childhood freedom in Positano, her years as a copywriter, her own recovery from addiction, and the wild language philosophy that runs through everything she writes and teaches.
This is Mary’s story, and what it means to pick up your journal and let the earth lead.
What Is a Wild Soul Story, and Why Does It Matter?
When Mary first uses the phrase "wild soul story," it is worth pausing on what she means by it because it is not what most of us might assume.
Mary explains that the wild soul story has nothing to do with your job history, your relationships, or your accolades. "What it is, is really an invitation to view your life through this extraordinary, amazing thing that you are — a product of 13.8 billion years of evolution.
"You are nested in this very particular moment in a very particular way, with very particular gifts that you have to rediscover."
The last word rediscover is important. Mary's premise is that we have forgotten something essential about ourselves, and the wild soul story is the practice of finding our way back.
For many people, that forgetting began early. At school, through social expectations, and the pressure to perform a particular kind of identity can gradually domesticate us, in much the same way, Mary suggests, that we have domesticated language itself. Wild writing is her invitation to let both run free again.
A Childhood That Planted Everything
It is hard to speak with Mary Reynolds Thompson without feeling the freedom and excitement of her childhood holidays in Positano, on the Amalfi Coast, in the late 1950s and early 1960s, when the village was Bohemian and artist-filled, long before it became the resort it is today.
She and her brother, known locally as Maria and Davide, were left largely to roam. They slept in a cave above a shepherd's hut with a couple, Rudy and Vali – Vali a flame-haired Australian artist and dancer, Rudy Romany and dark. They rode a pig called Romana. They danced. They were, by Mary's own description, operating under what she gently calls "benign neglect."
"It was pure enchantment," she says. "It was a world out of my world… just freedom and creativity and beauty and wild animals and wild dance."
She would throw up all the way back to Naples Airport because she was so furious at being wrenched away. That fury, along with the sense that she had a true self somewhere that could not easily be contained, feeds through everything she has gone on to create.
The Ocean That Told Her She Was Strong
There is a moment in this conversation that I suspect will stay with many listeners.
Mary is in her mid-twenties, about a week into sobriety after years of drinking. She is shaking, sweating, not at all sure she can do this, and she walks to the bluffs of the Marin Headlands, above the Pacific, on a wild and stormy day.
She remembers the Pacific churning and racking itself against the rocks, and her own thoughts mirrored the ocean’s actions. “And I thought, wow, that's how I feel, completely churned up completely in turmoil.” Yet, at the same time, Mary realised that the ocean is strong, despite its turmoil. She recalls tasting salt in her mouth, unsure whether it was the oceans spray or her own tears. “And this thought came to me… I am really strong, too."
And it’s wonderful to hear that Mary has been sober for 42 years.
What strikes me about this story is how naturally it illustrates her whole philosophy. The landscape gave her a mirror where she found something she could hold onto.
Wild Language: What It Is and How to Begin
Mary describes wild language as a way to pay attention. Nature, she believes, is always speaking through the stone that catches your eye, the tree you feel drawn to, the landscape you find yourself longing for. The work is learning to notice, and then to write.
Mary believes that nature is always speaking to you. No matter how vast or tiny the elements may be, parts will always be calling to you. “There's something about that stone that is mirroring something that's happening within you."
This starting point is simple, curious attention.
For anyone who has felt shut out of writing, told they weren’t good at it, or that they got it wrong, Mary has a straightforward answer in that wild language cares nothing for grammar, spelling, or syntax. There is no getting it wrong. The invitation is to let language "jump outside the picket fence," to go ferreting through forests and splashing through rivers, to be lush, playful, and without agenda.
And the practice can begin with three minutes. A springboard image, a short write, no pressure to make sense of it. "It is my experience," Mary says, "that most people are pretty excited and surprised by what actually lands."
The Five Landscape Archetypes
At the heart of Mary's work is a framework of five earth archetypes: desert, forest, ocean, river, mountain, and grasslands. Each archetype is a powerful metaphor for different aspects of the inner life and the creative process.
She describes these not as fixed types we are assigned to, but as landscapes we are drawn to at particular moments, for particular reasons. The desert, for Mary, is the archetype of clearing and beginning, and the silence and spaciousness that precede a new project. The forest is discovery and incubation, following trails that may lead nowhere or somewhere remarkable. The ocean and river bring emotional depth, longing, and the yearning that sustains long creative work. The mountain is the hard nuts-and-bolts stage, where the making-it-manifests. And the grasslands are the community and sharing in how you bring your work into the world.
Rather than describing your emotional state in flat, abstract terms, you might instead ask: which landscape am I travelling through right now? As Mary puts it, instead of saying "I'm fine," you might find the language to say: I'm in the desert. I feel parched. I don't know what I'm thirsting for. I need solitude. I'm not pushing you away; this is just where I am.
It is, as she says, a whole different vocabulary.
What the Copywriter Learned About Language
Before she became the writer she is today, Mary spent years as a copywriter and branding consultant. She talks of scouring dictionaries for metaphors to sell cosmetics and cars, working for companies that built their brands on myth, image, and the power of the right name.
Mary always knew that language was persuasive because she had grown up listening to Churchill's speeches and later to Martin Luther King. The power of words well used was never in doubt, but the question that eventually became impossible to ignore was a moral one: did she want to use her love of language to encourage people to buy things they did not need?
The answer, eventually, was no. And that turning point, moving away from the ego-driven satisfaction of a well-landed campaign toward something more soul-driven, is perhaps its own wild soul story.
A Multi-Week Journalling Practice: Write with the Earth
Inspired by Mary's wisdom, here is a four-week practice to try in your own journal. Each week, spend 10 to 15 minutes on one prompt. There is no right or wrong. Write for three minutes if that is all you have.
Week 1: The 10 Things Practice
Take your journal outside. Write the heading, ‘10 things I notice’. List them. Then choose one item and write 10 things you notice about this one thing. When you get stuck (and you likely will, around number five), pause, breathe, and look again. Something small will reveal itself.
Week 2: Your Landscape Right Now
Ask yourself, ‘Which of the five landscapes am I in right now: desert, forest, ocean/river, mountain, or grasslands? Write freely from that landscape. What does it feel like to be here? What do you need? What are you moving towards or away from?
Week 3: The Stone, the Tree, the Thing That Caught Your Eye
On your next walk or time outdoors, notice what draws your attention. A particular stone, a tree, a cloud formation, a bird. Sit with it and write a character sketch of it. Ask, ‘What is this mirroring back to me right now?’
Week 4: A Dialogue with the More-Than-Human World
Choose a tree, a body of water, or a landscape element that you feel drawn to, and approach it respectfully. Mary suggests literally asking, Can I come closer? Can I ask you a question? Then sit within its energetic sphere and pose one question that is alive for you right now. Write whatever comes.
This conversation with Mary Reynolds Thompson is Episode 68 of the Writing with Purpose podcast – listen on your preferred platform by searching 'Writing with Purpose' or visiting YouTube here.
Mary's books, including Reclaiming the Wild Soul and The Way of the Wild Soul Woman, as well as her forthcoming The Wild Scribe (Simon & Schuster, October 2026), are available from her website.