Will to Live: Dispatches from the Edge of Survival
Read Will to Live: Dispatches from the Edge of Survival Online
Authors: Les Stroud
WILL TO LIVE
Dispatches from the Edge of Survival
Les Stroud
with Michael Vlessides
For my dad, Ron Stroud, whose last few words were
“This is my son. He’s a bushman.”
Those of us who study the kinds of survival ordeals related so powerfully and intelligently in this book would heartily agree with Les Stroud’s central thesis: sometimes the only explanation for why some people survive a hell beyond hell is their steely will to live. Survival often goes so far beyond the capacity of psychologists to explain it that there is simply nothing else left to say, and experts themselves can only stand—like everyone else—in awe of the power of the human will. I have read hundreds of real-life survival stories and interviewed dozens of survivors since I began studying the subject over thirty years ago, and the resiliency, ingenuity, and toughness of these people still confounds and moves me. Sometimes survival is more poetry and mysticism than it is psychology and physiology. Les Stroud conveys this brilliantly, all while remaining true to the practical “survivorman” that he is.
The more I have studied survival, the more I have come to admire Les for his courage to do what precious few (including me) have ever willingly done: go to the edge of survival to see what he can learn and if he has what it takes, using himself as a guinea pig. Since he has been there and done it, Les Stroud’s credibility is peerless. Les has not only mastered the practical science of survival (as this book and his previous one,
Survive!
, show), he is also a master of the creative art. This book shows he is a master teacher as well, drawing lessons from people’s ordeals.
In this book, Les has chosen well from the vast array of survival literature. He recounts a range of stories, from the heroic to the foolhardy, the inspiring to the informative. Very few people set out on solitary ordeals. At most, they set out to have adventures or are on journeys of exploration when things go terribly wrong. Some are merely living their lives and stumble, or are wrenched, from everyday life into living hell. Les blends accounts of these ordeals with his observations, criticisms where appropriate, and recommendations, then inserts his signature lists of practical pointers and survival kits. He adds the counterpoint of some of his own experiences, which gives further perspective to the reader as well as the opportunity to reflect.
I applaud Les for including the stories of two of my own personal heroes, who are among the most inspirational survivors ever: Nando Parrado and Douglas Mawson. In the exclusive survival fraternity where so many merit the label “hero,” very few deserve it more than these men. Nando Parrado’s courageous journey (with fellow trekker and hero Roberto Canessa) out of the High Andes for the entirely selfless reason of rescuing their stranded, starving, and freezing friends is not only one of the greatest survival treks of all time, but also an act of epic humanity, ranking up there with Shackleton’s journey over violent Antarctic seas and then icy mountains to save his stranded men. Secondly, the survival story of Douglas Mawson, whose tale is told by Lennard Bickel in the very fittingly titled
Mawson’s Will
(2000), is equally powerful. Mawson’s long, cold slog out of the Antarctic while frozen, starving, and severely ill is surely one of mankind’s greatest examples of surviving against all odds. If Parrado (or Canessa) is the essence of the selfless hero, then Mawson is the icon of the epic hero. Thank you, Les, for including these powerful stories.
Even though Les draws lessons from hardscrabble wilderness survival, it is clear—whether we realize it or not—that we read these accounts because, in the end, survival stories are about having what it takes to cope with life. Sure, Les gives us practical advice about making it in the real wilderness, but what we learn, too, are lessons about coping with the wilderness of Life:
Plan ahead. Get your stuff together. Think things through before you act. If you get your *** in a crack, remember that you are tough, not fragile. Remember, too, that you are smart; be creative—whatever stuff you have you can use in a helpful way.
Les focuses on the pragmatics of surviving extreme ordeals, but he also captures the universal humanity of those who suffer. In doing so, he finds the poetry that causes our eyes to well up as we consider what others have endured . . . and somehow managed to overcome. Ultimately, we
all
have to find our own way—and what it takes to make it in the world. Survivors are pure inspiration, role models, examples to emulate. (If Parrado and Mawson can make it through life-and-death struggles, we should be downright embarrassed by the puny stuff we complain about.) Survivors are also reassuring figures in a world of uncertainty. And the Les Strouds of the world (there are too few of them) are our reassuring guides. They know what to do and how to do it, and they remind us that inside each of us is the hard-to-encompass, mysterious, and powerful will to live.
—Richard D. Logan
RICHARD D. LOGAN is a psychologist with many years’ experience studying the psychology of solitary survival. He has written several articles on the topic, some of which focused on the ordeals of Charles Lindbergh, Sir Francis Chichester, and Admiral Richard Byrd. He also wrote the book
Alone: A Study of Those Who Have Survived Long Solitary Ordeals
(Stackpole, 1993), which used survivors’ first-person accounts to illustrate both the psychological effects of ordeals as well as the means of coping with them. More recently, he is the primary author of
Alone: Orphaned on the Ocean
(Titletown, 2010), the story of the four-day ordeal at sea and improbable survival of eleven-year-old Terry Jo Duperrault, who escaped the sinking yacht
Bluebelle
on which her family had been murdered.
As long as there is an adventurous spirit living in the hearts of everyday people . . .
As long the weather proves bigger than man’s best-laid plans . . .
As long as there are people more interested in getting somewhere quickly than considering the journey . . .
And as long as our species defines itself by exploring the remote regions of the world . . .
There will be survival stories to tell.
Welcome to
Will to Live,
a collection of what I feel are some of the most compelling survival stories the world has ever known. These tales run the gamut from world-famous, well-funded extravaganzas to the rarely told (yet equally fascinating) narratives of quiet determination. Yet they share a common thread: every one of them has sent my mind soaring with thoughts of how
I
would fare under similar circumstances, when life and death hang in uncomfortable balance. I may have watched
Tarzan
on TV, but Douglas Mawson was real. I may have practiced my shelters in a survival class, but Yossi Ghinsberg did it for real.
Therein lies one of the greatest problems I and other survival instructors have always faced. We rarely get the opportunity to really do the one thing we are best at: getting caught and subsequently tested in a true survival situation. We know too much, prepare too well, rarely get lost. Yet beneath it all, our hidden desire, our secret guilty pleasure, is to one day put our skills to the test when life hangs in the balance.
So, over the years, through countless books and stories, I have filled my head with the experiences of others caught in surreal, sometimes horrific, and always life-altering situations. I did my best to put myself in their shoes. In my television series
Survivorman,
I stranded myself with minimal supplies and no camera crew (I shot all the footage myself) in some of the most remote regions on earth, usually for a period of seven days. Seven days alone to put my survival skills to the test . . . it was as close as I could get to the real thing. When I first started
Survivorman,
I expected I would acquire some new knowledge in the field. But I never imagined just how much I would learn. At each location, before setting out on my own I spent a week training with local survival experts. After several years, my expertise had grown substantially. No longer would I focus only on a microcosm of North America; the world became my survival arena.
It was then that I began to notice a change in my perspective. I started developing opinions on the various survival stories I read. I pulled lessons from them with much more confidence than before. And, most surprising—although I would never dare to compare my experience with those of other adventurers—I could on some level relate to what they were going through. When Dougal Robertson and his family talked of never getting comfortable in their little life raft as the salt water filled the bottom of the craft, I knew what it felt like. When my heroes of survival talked about bone-chilling cold, horrific dehydration, sleep deprivation, food hallucinations, debilitating loneliness, physical exhaustion with no respite, fear of forest predators, or endless hunger pains, I could relate. I had experienced them all at one time or another.
Sometimes, when I put students through particularly tough survival experiences, I caution them on one important point: they may well share their experiences with their family and friends, but no matter how patient they are or how interested they seem, their friends and family will never, ever, truly understand what they have gone through. Only other survivors will be able to really relate to their stories.
It is with this empathy as a backdrop that I came to write about the stories I have read myself. Let’s face it: nobody—and that certainly includes me—can ever truly know what the people in this book went through. I was not there. Decisions were made because they had to be made. So, even if I state that someone made a poor decision, I am doing it through the lens of time and distance. All I have to base my opinions on are the words in a book or comments from the press. Ultimately, I am in no position to pass judgment on any of the characters in this book, especially since most of them survived. And in the end, that’s all that matters.
I have always preferred to describe people who endure survival ordeals as
victims
. After all, nobody went looking for the circumstances that placed them in a race against death. I also prefer to use the word
ordeal,
especially after spending so much time alone in survival situations. They were manufactured, to be sure, but they were also ordeals I had to endure. Here’s how Richard Logan defined
ordeal
in his book
Alone:
• a situation of prolonged physical suffering, pain, and debilitation.
• a prolonged threat to life.
• the prolonged stress of fear and arousal.
• being forced to live with one’s freedom severely confined by circumstances.
• having to cope with prolonged and extreme uncertainty.
• facing demands that constantly threaten to overwhelm one’s physical and psychological resources.
If that doesn’t adequately describe all the victims in
Will to Live
’s stories, I don’t know what does.
In his book
Deep Survival,
Laurence Gonzales
says, “To survive you must first be annealed in the fires of peril.” I don’t believe this to be true. I was looking for stories of people who eventually had to employ an array of methods to keep themselves alive, rather than simply enduring an ordeal for a short period of time. I find it fascinating that these victims came to their scenarios from vastly different backgrounds and for vastly different reasons. As a result, they reacted in very different ways.
The crew of the
Karluk
and Douglas Mawson were pursuing science. Chris McCandless was searching for himself. Yossi Ghinsberg was pursuing adventure. The Robertsons were on a family vacation and looking for a new life. The Stolpas and Nando Parrado were simply en route. Yet they all ended up with their lives in their hands. True, some of them perished along the way. But
their mistakes leave a powerful legacy for the rest of us, and the lessons learned from their tragedies may prevent someone else’s someday.
If, as Gary Mundell (who ran aground while sailing alone in the South Pacific) wrote, ninety percent of surviving is in the head and the difference between adventure and ordeal is attitude, then I’m interested in the other ten percent. I don’t feel for a moment that Douglas Mawson would like to consider what he suffered in Antarctica an adventure. The same goes for the Stolpas, who nearly lost their lives
and
that of their infant. Looking back on their ordeal, which led to their toes being amputated, I don’t believe they just had the wrong attitude. The victims in this book went through hell, not adventure, and they did not intend to be “annealed in the fires of peril.”
With that in mind, I have tried to focus on the pragmatic side of their experiences. Where did they first go wrong? How did their initial reactions affect their survival? How did their actions change along the way, and were they for better or worse? What do I think they should, or could, have done? What would I have done in that situation?
Sometimes, I have been critical, as with Mawson, who taxed his energy reserves by pulling useless scientific equipment on a sled, long past the point of necessity. More often than not, I have been blown away by the apparently limitless human powers of ingenuity and inventiveness, such as Lyn Robertson realizing she could get more water into her family by giving them enemas with otherwise unpalatable water.
More than once, I shook my head while reading incredible accounts of dogged willpower to keep going, to push through, to survive, no matter how horrific the circumstances. Yossi Ghinsberg likely didn’t seem like a rugged outdoorsman to his other three travel mates, but his will to live was unyielding. Nando Parrado lost his mother and sister on that mountain in the Andes and had to suffer through the grisly ordeal of eating his dead teammates, but he never lost sight of his ultimate goal: survival. These people did what they had to do in horrific circumstances. They did what they could. They used their minds and their bodies. They used their humor and their determination. They used their love and their sense of duty. They employed their will to live.
In and of itself, survival is a fascinating phenomenon. Yet, as these stories illustrate, even more fascinating is how different people react to different survival situations. And it is these reactions that determine whether they survive or perish.
As Gonzales points out, “The first rule is: Face reality. Good survivors aren’t immune to fear. They know what’s happening, and it does ‘scare the living shit out of them.’ It’s all a question of what you do next.”
And what they did next is what this book is all about.
