The Bison Principle: What It Is and Why You Will Need It

Reprinted with permission from Lee Kessler’s The Clear View

Throughout our lives, political and social winds will change and swirl around us, each with a different plot, different set of characters, different staging in different locations. It can seem overwhelming to deal with issue after issue after issue, and it can appear to us that there is no end to the various insanities that pop up and threaten our way of life.

You are correct that there are endless combinations of disturbing, threatening situations that arise. Some are natural like natural disasters. Others are totally man-made by Man’s incessant setting up of conflicts – spiritual, economic, educational, political, social, and religious. The list is a litany of things we have to deal with because once a storm is gathering – even if we did not create it – we often have to deal with it.

What I like to emphasize on The Clear View are underlying principles which can serve as guidelines to deal with anything you may be confronted with now and in the future. The facts may be unique to a specific time period, the people may be threatening in various ways, the jeopardy may vary and the solutions can appear illusory, or, if you find them, exhausting to implement.

We often ask ourselves, “what can one person do in the face of this awful situation?”

Well, if you understand The Bison Principle, I believe you will have something to anchor on, something that will enable you to face anything you need to, no matter how hopeless or overwhelming the scenario appears.

By The Bison Principle, I am referring to the difference between bison and other species – including Man – in the way they deal with an incoming storm. It is said that when the gathering storm is bearing down many animals will try to ignore it and pretend it doesn’t exist, or they will neglect it and make no preparations. They may scatter and try to hide from it. Or they will run away from it, trying to outrun the winds, the debris, and the ferocious precipitation. Some will just lie down and succumb to it.

Each of those leaves the individual or the animal in jeopardy, with the outcome out of their control. If you for example try to run away from a storm, it will eventually overtake you, and you will be exhausted in the exertion of running away. If you try to hide from it, you may not have time to find a suitable place, or the storm’s force is too great and the storm wins. Anyone who has been in the direct path of a hurricane or tornado knows that running or hiding very often don’t work. Giving up is also a terrible option, especially for Man.

The bison, however, take a different approach. It is said that when a storm is coming in, the bison turn into the storm – not away from it. They run headlong into the storm. That action does not mitigate the strength of the storm, but it puts the bison in the best position to survive.

How so? In running into it, they run through it faster as the storm is going in one direction, and they are going in the opposite. They therefore can come out the other side into the calm much quicker. And while others are hunkered down hoping to survive the storm’s duration, or running, running, running with the storm still on their tail, the bison is in the clear.

And one other thing. The bison is stronger for facing into the storm, and meeting the resistance. In going against it, it’s a form of “resistance training.” Any athlete knows that resistance training builds muscle strength, endurance, and mass by working muscles against an external force.

So, for us, turning into the storms of life will enable us to face them, no matter how frightening and threatening. In facing them, and running toward them, we come through the trial faster, and we gain strength – mentally and psychologically.

Further, it is a causative choice. You didn’t run, you didn’t hide, you didn’t cower, you didn’t succumb. You took on the challenge.

Your mind may be saying, “Yeah, well, some of the issues we are confronting here and around the world are pretty big, and if I charge into them I could get hurt. I could lose my job. I could lose my friends. I could get beaten, run over, shot.” Yes, that could happen to you. Just like some bison won’t make it through the storm they are charging into. But those that do are free and clear faster, and they are stronger.

And I would like to suggest that many of the frightening insane issues we are grappling with today have come about because we as a people tried one of the other approaches to gathering storms. We turned a blind eye to corruption of education until all of a sudden we are being governed by the Woke, and we fear for our sanity and freedom. We tried to run away from immigration issues until we find ourselves now running for our lives in our own neighborhoods.

We tried to hide our objections to political candidates who openly espoused communist and Marxist views until now our cities are falling one by one, and your “property rights” to your own home are now in their sights.

Collectivism – a term they are brazenly using in the open now – is a philosophy that devours everything in its path. Individuality succumbs. Excellence succumbs. Innovation and progress succumb. Freedom is snuffed out, one institution at a time. Mental illness is rewarded. Redistribution of money becomes king, especially if it is money that can be taken from you. And power of choice is ridiculed and forced into non-existence.

For these gathering global storms, I suggest we all follow the lead of the bison. Turn and face it, no matter how threatening it is. Charge into it, and suffer the consequences. Some of us will survive and prevail in doing so. Some of us will not. We may not come out unscathed. But those who charge the storm carry one thing with them that no one else does—their personal integrity.

That, my friends, is what we carry into eternity.

This is a principle you can use now, and in all future “dramas” that pop up. Man does love his “drama.” Don’t play “whack-a-mole” with drama creators. Anchor on a principle, and embody it.

Copyright 2026: The Clear View with Lee Kessler

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