Customer Reviews

Explorers of the Infinite: The Secret Spiritual Lives of Extreme Athletes-and What They Reveal About Near-Death Experiences, Psychic Communication, and Touching the Beyond

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I bought Maria Coffey's "Explorers of the Infinite" a few days ago and ate it whole. This book is fascinating since it is about the endurance athlete- a group I count myself among- and what drives us. I've been privleged enough to participate in about 250 triathlons, the Marathon des Sables (154 mile desert running race),the Eco-Challenge and the Raid Gauloises and the Jordan Desert Cup 105 mile running race as well as the Antarctic marathon. It is nice to read ideas about what makes a fellow like me "tick".

"Explorers of the Extreme" is perhaps one of the first really credible, readable and entertaining examinations of the endurance athlete's psyche, motives, mindset and even "spirituality". Coffey is apparently not an endurance athlete herself but treats our kind with loving adoration. If you are a marathon runner, triathlete, surfer, cyclist or other "extreme" or endurance sport athlete you'll appreciate the insights and feel some of the pages in Coffey's book become an interesting mirror. This is also a fantastic read for an athlete's spouse who may have questions about why a person would ever subject themselves to the rigors of preparation and participation in endurance/extreme/risk sports.

Coffey explores the extreme athlete mentality from mountaineering to ultra-running to the Tour de France and even more amazing feats like free diving and extreme skydiving. It is refreshing to read a respectful treatment of our sub-species, the endruance/extreme athlete. Other books I've read on the motives and inner realm of us freaks treat us with a sort of detached disdain and label our motives as self-destructive and self grandizing. Coffey sees other inspirations as told to her by the people in the sports themselves.

There is also a readable and engaging thread throughout the book of the sociological theories behind risk and endurance sports, a particularly fascinating one pertaining to surfing.

This book is a delight and makes you feel good about being an endurance athlete, a rare breed, a risk taker. It is interesting to read about the ideas that may shape our motives. Highly recommended- great read. I hope you enjoy it as much as I did.

A very interesting book for ANYONE with an adventurous spirit who feels connected with nature.

I have often wondered why I only felt the connection to something bigger than me when out in nature or pushing myself to my limits. This book actually goes into the science & spirituality of it all.

"He advocated going into nature, for an experience of the sacred...to reestablish your contact with the core of things, where it's really at...The way back to the meaning is to go out into the wilderness with an open heart, to feel it as a mystery...something totally outside your ordinary thought patterns. The Holy Other."

In other words, push yourself beyond what you think you are capable of and share the real rawness of the outdoors and there is no doubt you will come back a richer person.

I finished this book a few months ago, and in retrospect I think it is a breath of fresh air in the Spiritual department. Why do extreme athletes risk their lives doing these things? Read to find out, and find out as well all of their very unconventional Mystical experiences they often have while doing these crazy activities. I'll probably read this book at least once more again sometime in my life, if not twice. Definetely recommended to the adventurous soul prone to extreme ways.

I bought the Kindle version after hearing Coffey on Oprah's Soul Series. I read it more as a spiritual searcher than as an endurance athlete. The book was comprehensive in its exploration of what drives people to put themselves in the path of great suffering (made me think of the monks who built monasteries on chunks of rock off the coast of Ireland)... why? While the book is full of ghosts and other psychic phenomena, Coffey is even-handed in exploring these. She approaches mysteries with a true spirit of inquiry.

Also, I couldn't put it down. In this snowy season, it did change my attitude about facing the cold as a mini-adventure.

This is an insightful book for those non-adrenaline-seeking types, and an affirmation of what us junkies already know about pushing the limits. Easy to read in sections as it isn't one long story but interesting chapters that nicely segueway from one ot the next.

Maria Coffey will be on Oprah in a few weeks (November 2008) because of this book - get a copy now and love it as much as I did! She gets right to the heart of what makes those who push physical limits tick, and does it in an incredibly palatable way. I highly recommend this book for extreme and armchair athletes alike.

I found this to be an interesting and thought provoking examination of why many extreme athletes do what they do and what their minds?/spirits? do when the are doing what they do. However, it has application to those of us who are not extreme but can, just the same, be overwhelmed by the grandeur of nature.
Through a lot of first person stories of odd "spiritual" experiences and a good mix of possible "scientific" explanations, including her own, the author probes what we perceive at times of heightened awareness. I found it a fascinating read. Sources are cited if you want to go look them up and a good index is provided, essential if you want to use this for some reference.
There is some repetition that could have been handled better by a brief explaining that a return to that person's story was coming up.
If you hike, ski, snowboard, climb, swim, surf, fly, jump, sail, bike, or rum it will have some great stories for you.

I can't tell you how disappointed I was in this book..If I could return it and get my money back, I would.

Some of the embedded stories are riveting and characters compelling, but those would be compelling anywhere (and in fact many appear to lifted wholesale from other published pieces). It's the very tenuous overlay of loosely coupled spiritual themes that I have an issue with...there was no compelling thread that bound these together into anything that expanded my understanding of the athletes or the spiritual vectors.

I feel that this was an mildly interesting Outside Magazine article that was "forced" into book length.

For those of us that spend alot of time outdoors, and on mountains, we understand completely. This book reads so well, that the read itself is its own ten star review. Yes, it really is that good of a read. Go ahead, pick it up and start understanding why you need to get up from in front of that stupid tv you are attached to at the hip. Your tv can't come close to the knowledge contained in this book, but I will say this; Banff films do. Got Banff Yet?

First of all, the stories in this book are incredible...riveting...fascinating. Really. This could have even been a great book if the author left it at that--stories that show the spiritual side of adventure sports...

Instead, for each story the author tries to come up with a plausible explanation, and each time she turns to one of two places: Modern Science or Eastern Religion.

The scientific explanations for the paranormal can be quickly dismissed--of course the spiritual world can't always be explained with logical, scientific responses.

It's her attempt at spiritual explanations that are frustrating. She turns to Chinese mysticism, Buddhism, Hinduism, Taoism, Transendentalism, the Occult, the New Age, even voodoo to find the answers. In fact, she tries to find her explanations in no less than TWENTY-SIX different spiritual and cultural movements, even Greek mythology.

HEAVEN FORBID that she should consider God, Jesus or even Christian mysticism for any answers! After about the 20th explanation, where she's grasping for answers within the Inuit spiritual tradition or morphic fields for her answer, it gets ridiculous. You won't even find "Christianity" in the index, as if it were irrelevant to any major spriritual discussion.

One chapter focuses on spiritual visitors that been documented to have helped explorers and adventurers throughout history and up through modern times. The author happens to mention that more than 1/3 of Americans report having seen angels at some point in their lives. Do you know how many millions that is? Yet could any of the "spiritual friends" she mentions have been angels? HEAVEN FORBID that she would even HINT in her writings that Christianity exists! It's ultimately sad to see how far out her way she goes to avoid it.

So in the end we have a tragic indication of where Western culture has come--to the point where our own religious traditions can't even be mentioned in a wide-reaching book on spirituality.

Read this book for the spiritual adventure stories if you must, but take the rest of it for what it is: A politically correct tome based on Eastern religion.