In Learning To Breathe: One Woman's Journey of Spirit and Survival Alison Wright, a renowned photojournalist with a lifetime of world travels behind her, tells of riding a packed bus on a winding mountain road of Laos in the first few days of the new century
In an instant of crushed metal and shattered glass, Alison Wright's life utterly changed: taking a dangerous blind curve, the bus collided head-on with a logging truck, nearly killing her. In unbearable pain, severely injured and barely able to breathe, Alison lay by the side of the road and drew upon her years of meditation practice, concentrating on every breath as if it were her last.
It would be fourteen excruciating hours before Alison finally received any medical attention, although in a life-saving gesture her glass-mangled arm was first sewn up by a young man with a needle and thread. Eventually reaching Thailand, she began a series of excruciating surgeries which continued back in the States. She had survived injuries no one thought she could, and now determined to get her life back; she struggled to remain positive when her doctors discouraged her from thinking about returning to her previous career and athletic lifestyle. Never one to accept defeat, Alison set herself the goal of achieving a new dream: to one day climb Mt. Kilimanjaro.
Learning To Breathe is Alison Wright's searing account of the accident, its aftermath, her recovery, and her triumph: from Kilimanjaro on her fortieth birthday, through an extraordinary pilgrimage of gratitude to Mount Kailash, to an eventual return to Laos and a reunion with the people who helped her in those crucial first hours.
Filled with stunning accounts of a lifetime of adventure and photojournalism, and informed by a spiritual quest to find a universal human connection among cultures around the world, Learning To Breathe is an unforgettable tale of one woman's urge to not only survive but to live a life filled with meaning and compassion.
Listen to Alison Wright discuss her book, Learning to Breath, in this podcast »
Read an excerpt from Learning to Breathe:
Introduction
"One step at a time, one breath at a time" is my mantra as I struggle up the snowy 18,700-foot Dolma pass, icy wind whistling around my head and searing my lungs. My stomach churns and my head aches from altitude sickness, but my spirits are buoyed by the Tibetan pilgrims who trudge with me on this sacred thirty-three-mile circumambulation of Mount Kailash, the holiest peak in Tibet.
Despite the cold and the blinding snow, I stop at the crest of the pass to rest and have a warm drink. Pungent incense wafts through the thin air. I join my companions in adding to an array of prayer flags, which whip so hard in the wind they sound like horses' hooves drumming the ground. Each color symbolizes an element: earth, fire, water, and lung, or wind. We tie flags to lines strung up at the mountaintop, so prayers will blow to the heavens. Kneeling, I make an altar by propping up photos of Claire, Hannah, and Erin—my three young nieces—with the colorful hand-painted rocks they gave me to leave at the pinnacle of my pilgrimage.
Both Buddhists and Hindus believe Mount Kailash to be the center of the universe. It is considered so powerful that simply visualizing loved ones here will bring them good fortune. Circling it is said to cleanse one's karma: each circumambulation inches you closer to nirvana and washes away a lifetime of sins. As I plod along, I can see pilgrims scattered along the path far ahead and far behind me, some of them creeping along one prostration at a time. It is humbling to be surrounded by such unwavering faith and devotion.
Even as my lungs labor and my legs protest, I feel a huge wave of gratitude wash over me, a prayer of thanks that I'm alive and that I've recovered the strength to make this journey. Many Tibetans save for years and travel hundreds or even thousands of miles to perform the kora, this ritual trek around the mountain. But for me, this is more than the fulfillment of a fifteen-year dream. Every step is a celebration of the life I nearly lost and a symbol of the physical and emotional challenges I've faced in my long, arduous healing.
I am a photographer. I have spent a lifetime immersed in other cultures, documenting the human condition in a quest to understand the world around me. Living in Asia has led me to insightful encounters with the Dalai Lama; Aung San Suu Kyi, living under house arrest in Burma (the politically correct name for the country that the military junta, her captors, have attempted to rename Myanmar); and Thich Nhat Hanh, a Vietnamese monk and teacher who for years was exiled from his country. I admire their courage and fearlessness.
I aspired to develop their attributes of wisdom and compassion in my own heart while documenting the human dramas and devastating social conditions—the poverty, disease, and suffering—unfolding around me. I strived to find a way to balance my not-so-subtle yearning for a sense of inner peace while bearing witness to life's atrocities and injustices.
Apparently, the universe felt I needed more than a gentle nudge. In fact, it took the impact of a one-ton logging truck to find it.
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