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I once participated in a 23-day wilderness program in the mountains of Colorado.

If the purpose of this course was to expose students to dangerous lightning and half the world's

mosquitoes, it was fulfilled on the first day. What was an essence of forced march through

hundreds of miles of backcountry, culminated in a ritual known as the solo, where we were finally

permitted to rest, alone on the outskirts of a gorgeous alpine lake, for three days of fasting

and contemplation. I had just turned 16, and this was my first taste of true solitude since exiting

my mother's womb. It proved a sufficient provocation. After a long nap and a glance at the icy

waters of the lake, the promising young man I imagined myself to be was quickly cut down by

loneliness and boredom. I filled the pages of my journal not with the insights of a budding

naturalist, philosopher or mystic, but with a list of the foods on which I intended to gorge

myself the instant I returned to civilization. Judging from the state of my consciousness at the time,

millions of years of hominid evolution had produced nothing more transcendent than a craving for

a cheeseburger and a chocolate milkshake. I found the experience of sitting undisturbed

for three days amid pristine breezes and starlight, with nothing to do but contemplate the mystery

of my existence to be a source of perfect misery, for which I could not see so much as a glimmer of

...