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Christopher Mccandless

Decent Essays

A person can ponder the meaning of life for hours, days or an entire lifetime. A student can write an entire critical essay on the topic of the meaning of life and not truly understand it, but you will never understand the true beauty of life until you completely immerse yourself in it and experience it for yourself. The story about Christopher McCandless in the book, Into the Wild by Jon Krakauer, gives the reader Insight on how Christopher McCandless searched for his soul through living one with nature. Everybody has their own set of needs, wants, and desires. But it isn’t until you go out and finally do the things that you’ve dreamt about, that you really discover what you love, and most importantly who you are. McCandless wanted to find …show more content…

The little money he did have he would hide it so that he would not have access to it for a certain amount of time. And before he went off into Alaska, he put his Social Security number on the last work paper he ever filled out, something he never did. This makes Chris’ story so tragic, because he knew that this was a journey to find out who he was, and he planned on returning back into society to start a family and tell his story, but he was unable to. He acknowledged the fact that he may or may not return, he embraced it to the fullest, because continuing life would not be worth it or even a choice until he entered the wilderness of Alaska and completed his journey. When Alaskans found out about Chris’ death they did not understand his story, and found him utterly stupid and disrespectful, because of his unpreparedness and little knowledge of the land. The significance behind this is that they did not know that he was challenging himself to grow. Chris kept journals and photographed himself to keep track of himself transforming into the person that he desired to be, the person he was supposed to be. A book that was found with Chris’ remains had a highlighted passage in Thoreau’s Walden, “If the day and night are such that you greet them with joy, and life emits a fragrance like flowers and sweet-scented herbs, is more elastic, more starry, more

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