Ben Alderson-Day
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The Walnut of Reality
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This chapter begins with the story of Leven Brown, who rowed from Cadiz to Tobago. The author talks to Leven to understand more about the link between endurance and presence. There is a dearth of accounts of experiences that sound like presence for extended pursuits done solo: ultrarunners, free divers, long distance swimmers and sailors, for example. But what drives that connection? Is it just isolation, leading us to conjure companions? Is it about people being pushed to the extremes of their limits, mentally and physically? Or is it something more individual than that, something unique to the people who have these experiences? Some of the encounters reported are similar to the classic ‘Third Man’ experiences discussed in chapter 2. They come about in adverse situations, but they occur more in continuity with everyday life. The author is left with some questions: is it stress or adversity that prompts these experiences, or do they tend to occur for a certain kind of person? Do you have to be someone extraordinary already to enter this realm? And if you do need to be a certain kind of person, how can the experience ever be separated from the individual?

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Presence

The strange science and true stories of the unseen other

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