“Humans are like wolf dogs: half domesticated, half wild”

BarcelonaWhat can wolves teach us about bonds, intuition, life, and death? When still a psychology student, Patricia Pasquín first stepped into the high-altitude desert of New Mexico, in the United States, she was not aware of everything she was about to discover. She had only arrived there to make one of her childhood dreams come true: to work with wild animals.

During the following almost four years, she collaborated at the Wild Spirit Wolf Sanctuary, where, day by day, she learned to live with them, adapting to their way of relating to each other and understanding life. An experience that, in the end, helped her realize that wolves are not so different from us. From all this vital learning arises the book Wild Lessons (Diana, 2026).

One of the first lessons that Pasquín discovers when she arrives at that red earth desert is that wolves are very fearful animals. “We always have the idea that they are fierce and imposing, but in the wild world, a vital part of animal survival is fear, even in predators,” explains the author of the book. All those new objects or situations are potentially dangerous to them. “For us humans, new things and changes also scare us,” she points out.

Probably for this reason, being part of a group, having bonds, is essential for them. Despite the preconceived idea of the alpha male, the wolf hierarchy is much more similar to our most traditional family structures. “There is the couple, male and female, who are alphas and their role is to lead and procreate, but not aggressively, rather seeking to offer trust and security. The rest are other members, such as grandparents or siblings, who trust them, each with different roles,” points out Pasquín.

Mind you, each and every one of them with their own personality and always very loyal. “We are used to dealing with animals like dogs, which we can ask to do things. With wolves, it doesn’t work like that. Their autonomy is sacred and must be respected,” explains the psychologist, who remembers with special affection the relationship she had with a wolf named Luna.

This wolf had arrived at the sanctuary after several bad experiences with humans and found it very difficult to trust them. Even so, with great care and patience, Patricia managed to get Luna to break down her walls and open up. "In the end, the only real way we have to heal our emotional wounds is through bonds. And not by trying to solve others' problems, but by allowing them to be and exist in the way they need to," she reflects.

Another of the great lessons the psychologist learned from the wolves has to do with intuition and the difficulty we humans have in distinguishing it from fear or anxiety. She especially remembers the death of Naz, a wolf she was caring for. When the animal was dying, she decided to take him to the vet. But while they were trying to remove him from his habitat, the female wolf, who was the animal's companion, approached the psychologist. "I felt what she was trying to convey to me: not to take him away, that Naz had to die there, peacefully," she recalls. But her fear ended up prevailing: "What if I'm wrong? What if we can save him?" she wondered. On the way to the vet, the wolf died in her arms. A painful experience that, over time, allowed her to understand that anxiety needs answers and certainties, while intuition, on the other hand, is much stronger and quieter.

When you work with animals, which live fewer years than humans, death is also a constant learning experience. After having accompanied so many wolves in their dying process, Pasquín has learned the importance of accepting it and embracing its uncertainty. "I was very impressed to see with how much awareness they lived through everything that was happening to them and the peace with which they seemed to accept it," she says, moved.

And the female wolves have also taught her another way of understanding femininity. Pasquín feels that during her stay there, they gave her “permission” to connect with a part of herself that women often learn to repress: strength, assertiveness, the ability to get angry or to say no. “We are very used to thinking that women are a certain way, more tender, nurturing, and docile, and we give men more permission to have a strong, assertive, or even aggressive energy,” she explains. But the female wolves showed her that both things can coexist together. “Why is a female wolf not less of a wolf for having her strength well-integrated, and yet, women are made to feel that this is not very feminine?” she asks. For Pasquín, recovering this part of ourselves, becoming friends with our strength, can also be a form of rebellion: “We must be more like wolves.”

In the end, perhaps we have much more in common with wolves than we think. With them, we share the desire to give meaning and sovereignty to our own lives and, at the same time, the need to feel connected to others. “We are also pack animals,” she reminds us. We need bonds to feel safe, but also to have the feeling that we are somewhat the leaders of our own lives, that not everything is in the hands of other people or the systems that surround us.

Perhaps it is precisely in this tension that the figure of the wolf-dog appears, halfway between two worlds. “We have the desire to do wild things, but also all the conditioning of domestication, of life in society.” And, sometimes, we live in the midst of this struggle. In other words, “we humans are like wolf-dogs: half domesticated, half wild.”

Therefore, rather than teaching us to be wild, wolves perhaps remind us of something simpler: the importance of listening to ourselves again. It is not about returning to the forest or renouncing everything that has domesticated us, but about remembering that, under the layers of norms, expectations, and customs, there is still a part of us that knows what it needs. A part that is a little wilder, which, from time to time, also asks to be heard.