Flow State - Justice Le Tran Alexander

While reading towards the end of Chapter 5 in American Camino I found the interpretations of wilderness as sacred to be insightful. Redick incorporates the written experiences of hikers on the AT I feel offer a glimpse into the way we perceive time.

Sometimes my mind wanders while studying and oftentimes I catch myself spending hours caught in a flow state. When I used to play football a similar phenomenon would occur; I would find myself in an ultra focused frame of mind unconscious of the passage of time. Each play itself would only last about 10 seconds on average but It was hard to actively think about that when you had to worry about the task at hand you were assigned to do.

Again a common theme in the book being the exploration of wilderness and how it manifests for individuals I feel can connect to my experience. One hiker named Siren states in one of their journal entries on the trail, "There's suddenly so much time to think and so much to think about!" (American Camino pg. 227-228) The sublime state Siren reminds me of is what I describe when I was fully immersed in the game a merging of the physical and the cognitive. On the AT, the same fusion happens through walking, breathing, climbing, and simply being present. The body is occupied, but the mind becomes strangely free. 

On the trail, the sublime arises not only from dramatic mountain vistas but from the unexpected depths of inner life. 

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