Name this author/adventurer/fearmonger
October 19, 2008 2:02 AM Subscribe
Looking for an adventurer and author who was noted for confronting specific fears and paying people to ensure he had no option but to follow through.
I may be remembering this completely incorrectly, when I was half way up a mountain and considering turning back my guide told me a story of an adventurer he greatly admired.
He said that this dude would identify a specific fear (e.g. being on boats) and then he would find something epic that would force him to dive right in (e.g. major ocean voyage). He'd then pay folks to ensure he followed through with it, it was never going to be about his personal drive to confront it, but it would be about his inability to avoid it. So he had folks on the boat that he would have paid in advance to make sure he wouldnt bail out.
End of adventure, he writes it all down for people like me to enjoy.
Naturally I just wanted the talking and climbing to stop, so I either ignored the name or just forgot it in a cloud of exhaustion.
Any ideas for the author name?
I may be remembering this completely incorrectly, when I was half way up a mountain and considering turning back my guide told me a story of an adventurer he greatly admired.
He said that this dude would identify a specific fear (e.g. being on boats) and then he would find something epic that would force him to dive right in (e.g. major ocean voyage). He'd then pay folks to ensure he followed through with it, it was never going to be about his personal drive to confront it, but it would be about his inability to avoid it. So he had folks on the boat that he would have paid in advance to make sure he wouldnt bail out.
End of adventure, he writes it all down for people like me to enjoy.
Naturally I just wanted the talking and climbing to stop, so I either ignored the name or just forgot it in a cloud of exhaustion.
Any ideas for the author name?
Most adventurers do this, I would think. They challenge themselves to face their fears and to accomplish some monumental goal. Sir Ranulph Fiennes may or may not be the person you are thinking of, but he is reported to have shared the same strategy (except that he does not seem to have paid people to discourage him from quitting).
In March 2007, despite a morbid, lifelong fear of heights, Fiennes undertook a personal challenge to climb the Eiger by its much-feared North Face, with sponsorship totalling £1.5 million to be paid to the Marie Curie Cancer Care Delivering Choice Programme.
posted by kurtroehl at 12:50 PM on October 19, 2008
In March 2007, despite a morbid, lifelong fear of heights, Fiennes undertook a personal challenge to climb the Eiger by its much-feared North Face, with sponsorship totalling £1.5 million to be paid to the Marie Curie Cancer Care Delivering Choice Programme.
posted by kurtroehl at 12:50 PM on October 19, 2008
This thread is closed to new comments.
posted by ws at 2:22 AM on October 19, 2008