James Nestor is the author of Deep: Freediving, Renegade Science, and What the Ocean Tells Us About Ourselves. He also has written Half-Safe and Get High Now (Without Drugs), and his work has appeared in a variety of publications, including Outside and Men's Journal. He lives in San Francisco.
Q: You write that your interest in freediving began when you
were assigned a piece for Outside magazine. Did you know right away that the
topic would become so important to you?
A: When I went to Kalamata, Greece to cover the world
freediving championship, I knew next to nothing about freediving: I hadn’t seen
anyone do it and certainly hadn’t done it myself.
What I saw out there absolutely blew my mind. Who knew
humans were capable of diving 200, 300, even 400 feet on a single breath of air!
I came back home to San Francisco and needed to know more. Deep grew out of
that curiosity.
Q: One of the concepts you explain in the book is the Master
Switch of Life. How does it affect people's ability to dive deeper into the
water?
A: Something amazing happens the second you put your face in
water: the heart rate lowers about 25 percent its normal resting rate, blood
begins flooding from the extremities into the core, your mind enters a
meditative state.
The deeper you dive, the more pronounced these reactions
become, eventually spurring a whole-body transformation. We turn into
deep-diving animals. And what’s amazing is that these reflexes only occur in
deep water, and that we are all born with them, just many of us will never feel
them kick in. We are, quite literally, all born to dive deep.
Q: You write, "I begin to wonder: If we've forgotten an
ability as profound as deep diving, what other reflexes and skills have we
lost?" What were some of the more surprising things you learned as you researched
this book?
A: Oceanic animals must rely on “extra senses” to navigate,
communicate, and sea in the cold, black, pressurized underwater environment.
Whales and dolphins use something called echolocation, a form of sonar, to find
their way around and to track down prey; sharks and other animals use
magnetoreception, a kind of internal GPS with which they can attune themselves
to the subtle energy of the earth’s magnetic field.
We too have these “extra sensory” abilities, we’ve just
forgotten how to use most of them. Deep is, partially, about relearning this
ability, and redefining human potential.
Q: The book's chapters take the reader deeper and deeper
into the water. How did you come up with this structure for Deep?
A: It just seemed like the natural trajectory. As my
research progressed, I kept wondering what else was in the ocean, and so I kept
digging deeper until I reached the bottom of the deepest ocean.
Q: What are you working on now?
A: Sleeping, mostly. The deadline for this book was very
aggressive and it almost killed me. My goal has been to try to rest, but it
hasn’t worked out too well. I’m currently recording the audiobook, which should
be out in the next few weeks.
I’ve spent most of the last few months touring with the book;
it’s been an incredible experience meeting so many people who know so much more
than the ocean and our connection to it than I do.
I’m also freediving more now than I ever did while writing
the book. This wasn’t just a one-time thing I’ve explored to write a book
about; it’s now become such a huge part of my life. That was the real blessing
of writing this book: being introduced to this world and all the amazing people
working within it.
--Interview with Deborah Kalb
No comments:
Post a Comment