the 9 to 5 alternative

This is a review of Laurence Gonzales’ Deep Survival.  I am participating in the Personal MBA project, and this is the sixth book that I have completed and compiled notes for. To read more about my involvement with PMBA, click here.

Book Details
Title: Deep Survival
Author: Laurence Gonzales
Page Count: 318
First Published: 2003

The principles apply to wilderness survival, but they also apply to any stressful, demanding situation, such as getting through a divorce, losing a job, surviving illness, recovering from an injury, or running a business in a rapidly changing world.

It was the summer of 2004, just outside of Aspen, Colorado in the Maroon Bells wilderness. Two friends and I were hiking the Four Pass Loop, a 25.4 mile trail that traverses four different mountain passes, each over 12,400 feet.

I’m no stranger to the outdoors. I was suitably apt for the challenge. My friends Brandon and Perry, both accomplished hikers, were right there with me. We had plotted and scouted out the hike beforehand, deciding to spend an extra day attempting to summit Snowmass Mountain, at 14,092 feet Colorado’s 34th highest peak.

In the summer, in Colorado’s mountains, the middle of the afternoon is the most likely time for the orographic lifting of warm, moist air. If you find yourself above treeline (11-12,000 feet) in the afternoon, you can expect storms. Quick-moving, wild and violent storms. It’s remarkably predictable.

The altitude made us sluggish and lethargic. We had neither a turnaround time nor backup plan. We underestimated how difficult and technical the ascent and descent would be. By the time we reached the summit, it was just before noon–clouds were rolling in. The sky, deep gray, ripped open. Rain and hail and snow, all at once. Lightning flashes and subsequent crackles.

As we scrambled down the other side of the mountain, I slipped. Luckily my 50lb backpack wedged itself into some rocks, so I only rolled about 15ft. My knees and arms were bloody, my adrenal glands operating at full capacity. It was only at that moment, staring at the red streaks on my limbs, the mixed precipitation still crashing down, that I realized–I could have died. This could have..been it.

After that experience, I never thought about survival the same way again. I understood how quickly one can be thrust into another environment.

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In his book Deep Survival, Laurence Gonzales explores survival–why is it that only 10-20% of people can stay calm and collected in the midst of a survival emergency? He interviews F-18 Hornet fighter pilots, cites drowning statistics in Hawaii and mentions a Japanese Imperial Army sergeant (Shoici Yokoi) who lived in the jungle, by himself, for 28 years before being told that World War II was over.

It’s a quick and entertaining read, a personal tale about the author’s relationship with fear and survival. Ultimately, Gonzales explains, a deep knowledge of the world around us is the best survival out there. “In certain kinds of systems,” he writes, “large accidents, though rare, are both inevitable and normal. The accidents are a characteristic of the system itself.”

What I Learned

I learned that when a decision to act must be made instantly, it is made through a system of emotional bookmarks. In nature, in business, in relationships–we all have to make tough decisions. It’s important to understand how the brain, the only organ with no clear function, Gonzales explains, processes these decisions. How to slow your thoughts down and make an intellectual and emotionally rational decision.

Psychologists who study survivors–of shipwrecks, plane crashes, prison camps, you name it–conclude that the most successful survivors are those open to the changing nature of their environment. Be flexible. Laugh. Stay curious and interested in what’s happening around you.

Would I recommend this book to you all? Absolutely. It’s full of unique tales of survival, and Gonzales is quite good at explaining the science behind the stories.

Notable Quotations

Survival is a continuous spiritual and physical act that spans a lifetime…nothing can truly be said to happen by chance, which is just a word we invented to explain the troublesome boundary between order and chaos.

There is evidence that laughter can send chemical signals to actively inhibit the firing of nerves in the amygdala, thereby dampening fear. Laughter, then, can help to temper negative emotions.

Unfortunately, there’s no such thing as a “beginner’s mountain.” It’s a concept that doesn’t work, like beginner sex.

Psychologists who study the behavior of people who get lose report that very few ever backtrack.

Miscellaneous Notes

-U.S. Army Ranger School is INTENSE—we’re talking eight weeks, 3.5 hours of sleep a night, eating only 2,200 calories a day on average

-St. Elmo’s fire: sailor term for when the negatively charged lower portion of a thunderstorm attracts a positive charge from the Earth as it moves over it. Anytime that charge reaches anything that can conduct electricity, such as a person, it moves up through the person and creates what’s known as a corona discharge (called “buzzing”)

-Risk homeostasis—people tend to keep the risk they are willing to take at about the same level; if the conditions are perceived as less risky, the person will take more risk, and if the conditions more risky, less risk is taken. [example: when antilock brakes were introduced it lead to an increase in traffic accidents!]

-Case study in not updating your mental model—Xerox. It ignored cues from a changing world and from inside its own Palo Alto research facility, nearly destroying itself in the process.

-Add “survival school” to my bucket list!
Have you read this book? What are your thoughts?