Where the Self Actually Lives

I recently watched the season of Alone set in the Arctic Circle, where contestants attempt to survive for as long as possible in remote wilderness with almost no equipment and no human contact.

The show is often framed as a test of survival skills, but what struck me most while watching it was not the hunting, fishing, or shelter building. It was the stories people carried with them into the wilderness.

One contestant in particular stayed with me: Michela Carrière, a Cree-Métis bushwoman who grew up on a trapline in the Saskatchewan River Delta. Unlike some contestants who arrive hoping to escape the noise of modern life, Michela’s relationship with the land was already deep and familiar. She brought traditional knowledge, foraging skills, and a spiritual connection to the environment with her into the Arctic.

For her, the wilderness was not a place to rediscover something lost.

It was home.

And yet, after only eighteen days, she chose to leave.

Michela later spoke openly about how the isolation affected her. Even with her deep knowledge of the land and her comfort in the wilderness, the psychological weight of being completely alone took her by surprise.

Her experience stayed with me because it revealed something subtle but important: a deep connection to nature does not eliminate the human need for connection with other people.

Watching the show, I began to notice that the contestants arrived with very different relationships to solitude.

For some, the wilderness seemed to represent escape — a place to step away from the noise of modern life and rebuild something simpler and more self-reliant. For others, like Michela, it was already part of the fabric of their lives.

But regardless of how they arrived, complete isolation uncovered something deeper.

Another contestant, Dub Paetz, entered the competition describing himself as someone who was comfortable being alone. He leaned into the identity of a loner, someone who preferred the quiet of nature to the complexity of human relationships.

At first, that seemed like an advantage.

But as the weeks passed, the isolation began to shift something in him. With nothing but time and silence, he started reflecting on parts of his life he hadn’t examined closely before — his childhood, the bullying he had experienced growing up, and the ways those experiences had shaped how he related to other people.

Slowly, the identity of the “lone wolf” began to change.

By the time he eventually left the competition, Dub spoke openly about a realization that surprised even him. The experience had made him see that the independence he had long valued might also have been a kind of protection.

He discovered something many of the contestants eventually confront in one way or another: human beings are not designed to live entirely alone.

At one point he spoke about wanting something he had never seriously considered before: finding a partner and building a family.

The wilderness had not confirmed his independence.

It had revealed his longing for connection.

As the season went on, another contestant’s journey began to stand out in a different way.

Timber Cleghorn had managed something very few contestants ever do. Deep into the competition, he was not starving. In fact, he had succeeded in harvesting a bull moose with a recurve bow, which provided him with hundreds of pounds of meat. Along with fish and rabbits, he had secured more food than many contestants who had lasted similar lengths of time.

By most measures, he was in a strong position.

He had the skills, the experience, and the resources to remain in the Arctic far longer. Many viewers assumed he might win.

But after eighty-three days, Timber chose to leave.

The moment didn’t come after a failed hunt or a medical evacuation. It came during a moment of reflection.

Alone in the Arctic winter, with food stored and the competition still underway, he began reflecting on the purpose of staying. The prize money was substantial — half a million dollars — and for many contestants it represents a life-changing opportunity.

But as he thought about it, something began to shift.

He already had the life he cared about. His work in humanitarian aid, his family, the people he hoped to help — none of those things depended on winning the competition.

At one point he asked a question that seemed to capture the moment perfectly:

What’s money for anyway?

With that realization, the logic of the competition began to unravel. If the prize would not meaningfully change the life he valued most, then there was no real reason to remain.

So he went home.

Later he described the experience not as a loss, but as something closer to completion — a kind of healing journey that allowed him to reflect on his life, his work, and his role as a father.

In the end, the wilderness had not simply tested his ability to survive.

It had clarified what mattered most.

Watching the season unfold, I began to notice that the wilderness was revealing something slightly different for each person.

For Michela, the experience showed that even a deep connection to the land does not replace the human need for relationship.

For Dub, the silence stripped away the identity he had built around independence and revealed a longing for connection he hadn’t fully acknowledged before.

For Timber, the isolation clarified something else entirely: that survival, skill, and even winning were not the things that ultimately gave his life meaning.

Each of them entered the Arctic carrying a different story about what mattered most.

And yet, after weeks of solitude, they were all confronting some version of the same realization.

The wilderness strips life down to its essentials. When the noise and distractions of ordinary life fall away, people begin to see more clearly the relationships that shape their lives.

Not just the relationships they have with other people.

But also their relationship with the land they inhabit, and the more personal relationship they carry with themselves.

Watching these moments unfold, I kept returning to a simple recognition.

We cannot know what it means to be human without other humans.

And we cannot understand reality without the natural world that makes life possible.

Both relationships are necessary.

And somewhere between them, we learn how to live in relationship with ourselves.

 If you’d like to receive new essays when they’re published, you can join the newsletter here.