Deep Roots

Let's visualise! Me vs. me and no getting away from that battle. Stumbling on an unseen solution to the constant battle. 

Day 46:  40 miles; Tough finish to the morning working against Northerly winds; Doubling up on breakfast & lunch; No salt, pepper or hot sauce; Singing songs about grinding; The holes are growing wider on the perch.

Intra days: Singing the 'Ratlin Bog' and numerous other random sequences of words to get me away from the constant conversion surrounding the physical discomfort from sores; The importance of the phone and documenting my days.

Day 47 (1): "Fucking fed-up man"; Knocked by numbers; Read one new letter from Tony B; Some positive listening despite the words. 

Intra days: Unpacking the 130 sec vent; The value of the phone in a cathartic way; How a number 'knocked me for six' and drove me into a very negative place; The disempowering nature of outcome focus; The Westside Barbell method of not counting reps and why; Contrasting self-talk despite the overarching general mood; Galvanised from some visualised imagery to get my daily target no matter what. 

Day 47 (2): Getting smashed by NE winds all day, 50 miles of course and counting; Losing the very valuable position on the perch again and again; Losing time; Feeling sorry for myself;  

Closing: A terrible general disposition and low frequency; But what good was that?? Take fucking responsibility and reinforcing that behaviour until it became my character; "What are you doing about it?" 

A Mount Everest expedition update and current training progress. 

My week on Patreon. 

Videos: 

Day 46:  https://youtu.be/5roIVtBf81M

Day 47 (1):  https://youtu.be/cxVGVnQvuqE 

Day 47 (2):  https://youtu.be/PUT5UH87nDY 

Patreon:  https://www.patreon.com/DamianBrowne

With gratitude, 

Damian 

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Introduction: I am desperate to live; Listening to my internal compass; Finding things very important during my search; The other side of the desperate coin = pain; Learning to listen to the feedback; Avoid, accept, change?; The need I value most in life is; An addiction on the truest level; Becoming good at finding a way to what's important to you

Day 44 : A progressive degeneration off sores over 3 weeks; 10 minutes on, 10 off for 800 miles?; Advice from Mr Ian Couch brought a solution; two 39-mile days which were huge for my psychological state; Adapted, kept grinding and found a way; Happy out. 

Intra days: Atlantic Campaigns support; They've seen everything through experience and leading the safety of the race for many years; cutting up a spare seat I had put together made up of yoga matts into bits to raise the sores off the fixed seat; Talc clouds in the cabin and every other attempt at a solution; the importance of hitting those 39 mile days and continue to fight despite the situation; the power of the decision to take the hard option; build your relationship with yourself; Why I put myself in situations like these; the decision tightrope on the edges; Know thyself, Be thyself, Love thyself. 

Day 45  : Best days mileage in a long time; Working hard for my miles and dodging squalls at 3am; Sores are finally less sensitive thanks to the perch; Psychological pressure point unveiled; Very sore fingers in the mornings before the blood gets flowing into them; Goodbye to my beloved nut butter combos; Loving it and having ideas for another ocean rows; Mimicking Russell Crowe in Gladiator while naked. 

Closing: An indescribable adventure & challenge; exploring the amazing facets of the Atlantic and exploring your internal world; the manifestation of Project Empower; Stumbling on a concoction of super fuel; Claws in the morning are not conducive to untying and rowing; counting down the first 10 strokes each morning; 

The epic story continues.

Keep striving for more from yourself. 

Videos: 

Day 44 : https://youtu.be/OW_-GR0lttU 

Day 45 :  https://youtu.be/Yabdg117ctI 

Patreon:  https://www.patreon.com/DamianBrowne

With gratitude, 

Damian

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Introduction: Visitors in their natural habitat on Day 40, visitors well distance from their natural habitat on Day 41. 

Day 41 :  Delighted with an extra 3/4 miles in the last 24hrs; Deceptive conditions; A visit from Thor!; After 41 full days and thousands of sq miles of ocean, I'm 1 mile from another ocean rowing boat; I can see Remolon from time to time between the waves.

Intra days: How I knew my race status; Welcome positive feedback for the hard graft being put down everyday; 18th or 19th of 21 at this point; The story of the support boat Suntiki, Remolon and my wild imagination; Along came Jorge! Who was also having an incredible crossing after his partner had had enough during the 1st week and pulled plant; Working harder now than at any time previously in the race and being the person I wanted to be on the oars. 

Day 42 : Perplexed & Frustrated; Not anywhere near as competitive as I imagined; Some physical indications of my effort; Arse sore, a slow form of torture and needing 6 hours of sleep to help the discomfort the next day; Questioning absolutely everything after Remolon makes up 40NM on me in 4 days; getting no answers; "this isn't exactly the Isle of Man TT"

Intra days: Demoralised & dejected: Both of us experiencing the exact same conditions and Jorge disappears into the horizon! It rocked me!

Day 43 : The nightmare worsens as the arse sores become too painful; Who would have guessed ignoring the signals all the way back to Day 19 would lead to this; WORRIED; Sitting down is now agony; searching for solutions; rowing naked; Compromise, 20 mins on/off for 20 hours? "I want to be tearing into it and now it's like I'm on the bloody lake in Versailles"; Perspective on what's most important. 

Closing: The 2 hardest parts of my crossing, Day 1 and The Sores and the crescendo of them on Day 43. The story of how I had let it get to this point. 

 Note: I am going to record a new outro tomorrow and add it to the Drive. So the audio from 3.27 on Part 7 will be taken out. 

Videos: 

Day 41 : https://youtu.be/Vz68urA8MSE 

Day 42 :  https://youtu.be/3jtmK7V6-Wo

Day 43 : https://youtu.be/WpfgNJknb_c 

Patreon:  https://www.patreon.com/DamianBrowne

With gratitude, 

Damian Browne 

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My adult life = an obsession to get better, a desperation to improve; The genesis of this was a decision, my decision; Pain inducing questions I posed to myself; Find what's valuable to me with a boot to the face; My love for rugby and how it fuelled the person I am today; layering and rewiring through actions and experience; The surpassing of rugby as a prioritised value; The importance of "Body First" focus for me; Adventure the perfect fit to explore myself and the world; Finally my thirst for full responsibility for my own training is quenched; How an unstoppable concoction of elements push you to your edges and over, and that's where you learn, grow. 

Day 39:  In a mentally weak place; Wanting to stop, get off the oars, go to bed, give up; Thinking of things that were out of my control and it was weakening me; Negative thinking = "a sneaky little bastard that can seep into your thinking despite what you know about your psychological workings"; Awareness and analysis helped me reset my mind by redirecting my concentration to actions within my control; Getting back to an unbreakable mindset with 3 windows of effort; The power to take the hard option over the easy option; Turning around a "shit day"

Intra days: The birth of "The 4 Controllables" in words; How the accumulation of 39 days of fatigue, pain, discomfort, isolation, space, challenge and a will to be my best everyday led to me seeing clearly my actions and being able to word it; The essence of the method- a redirection of concentration after awareness; A state changer; The hierarchy of order of the 4 Controllables; The power of choice is within you no matter the physical state you find yourself in; What do those 4 concentrations do exactly?; 'Controlling the moment' - the present moment; How awareness unveils the innate laziness of our body; You can always do more!; Equally scary and empowering realisation; A spiritual moment in training described; How we have the power to will yourselves into calmer states despite the level of physical duress; How self-talk can do more than neutralise the power of time over yourself; Strengthening the process over the last 2 years by adding a training/practice structure; The steps in the process - prepreparation- Cues & Questioning- do the work - Reflection; Changing perspective and raising myself up with 3 windows of huge effort & buzzing into day 40 from that. 

Day 40: If only our minds had a little off switch from time to time; fighting temptation and the easy impulses; Trying to find nonsense in my thinking; Being visited by a pod of dolphins; Seeing them surf down waves, go in and out under Darien, breach and play; The happiness and joy this induced in me as it was a huge hope that I would experience the Atlantic wildlife in its natural habitat, far from the maddening crowd;

Closing: Setting the scene of the dolphin pod visit; the demoralising effect of the sores; Playing and having fun in the waves; The amazing effect it had on my state, like their energy transmuted into me; So transfixed that I forget to try and record their visit until they had nearly gone; Greedy for all the experience an Atlantic row can bring. 

Videos: 

Day 39:  https://youtu.be/ajVhOuC-Pes

Day 40:  https://youtu.be/_pqEQPhe9Ss 

Patreon:  https://www.patreon.com/DamianBrowne 

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Day 36:  A sleepless night with an unexpected GPS surprise at 4am; The hidden importance of a window of sleep; The absorption of some hard-fought miles; The real time reality of outcome focus versus process and a headspace treaty. 

Day 37: 7 miles bringing mental deflation; Expectations are not my friend; Fighting winds but little mileage; The mindset that every moment counts.

Day 38: Obsessed with numbers as they pass the days; Hot with little winds today; Counting down to under 1000NM to Antigua; Positivity is a choice; A lunatic on a boat in the middle of the Atlantic

Videos: 

Day 36:  https://youtu.be/OAst11R2nUk 

Day 37:  https://youtu.be/QJpa1D8a6sI 

Day 38:  https://youtu.be/RtvOT28Ev2w 

Patreon:  https://www.patreon.com/DamianBrowne

With gratitude, 

Damian 

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One of my favourite moments from the Marathon des Sables; Dense & intense skies full of more stars than imaginable; Magical!; A beautiful compliment shimmering on the ocean's surface.

Day 32: Pain meds & ceasing up fingers; Long duration events and finding psychological battles; Is this programmed?; Resets, visualisation and perspective. A shooting star or the International Space Station? Respect & admiration for Mark Slats

Day 33: Lowest mileage but most hours rowed; A New World Record by Mark; and now I'm the last Paddy on the water. 

Day 34: Strong state - High Spirits; Living hard; Calm again = a unexpected longer 2nd half; Worked hard for every mile; Want big conditions again; Real Turmat for lunch.

Day 35: 5 Weeks! Lived every minute of them; No winds; Slow work and a week or more of it ahead; Controlling the moment; Wouldn't want to be anywhere else, 588 days of work just to get to the start line.

Videos: 

Day 32:  https://youtu.be/HIXoI5zJ-tk 

Day 33:  https://youtu.be/tUewxpqA7dc 

Day 34:  https://youtu.be/d0xkt0gG1c8 

Day 35:  https://youtu.be/Ubydr7q-2LY 

Patreon:  https://www.patreon.com/DamianBrowne

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Sometime I feel like I don't belong in the modern world; Unleashing the wild man inside me; becoming uncomfortable in comfort; A coded deep communication I trust and listen too; Accepting my dark side; and feeding off actions that align with my values.

Day 28- Benign conditions; Hands flaring up dramatically overnight; This is exactly where I want to be, no complaints; Taking in as much as I can while I'm here; James Glynn and Joe Rogan Tweeting; Milestones on the horizon.

The power of perspective; The irony of ocean rowing; The relief of having only one thing to concentrate on, rowing.

Day 29 - Calm day again; Working hard for every mile; The consequences of that effort, dehydration; Drained just after getting on the oars; Rowing later into the night; Using the stars to guide the boat; Grinding out the days.

'Go South until the butter melts, then turn West; The trade winds; My weather router and our system of comms.; Mood = positive; The watermaker and its strain on the system.

Day 30 - A video update for social; 14NM from halfway; Sitting in literally the middle of the Atlantic; Congratulations to The 4 Oarsmen, Team Antigua and Swiss Mocean; Pushing South; Steady state physically and mentally; A call to support my 3 charity partners.

Why I try to use my expeditions/challenges to support people doing great work in their corners of the world

Day 31 - Halfway! 1330nm rowed, 14 days now without a steering system, very happy about this; Late start this morning and I'm getting on my own case about it again; Text messages from Kris and Team Noble and their generous words bring with them a rising of my emotions; 38NM is last 24hrs; dodging night squalls; mood is generally down; Perspective shift needed. 

Hard to rise yourself day after day and face the fight again. Lack of self-discipline in rising on time = a red flag for me. These flags worry me hugely.  

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Day 28:  https://youtu.be/GFei00otcLY 

Day 29: https://youtu.be/h6kj79p8H5g 

Day 30:  https://youtu.be/_MLV-Z6-Ddo 

Day 31:  https://youtu.be/-Gk0H2K93F4

Patreon:  https://www.patreon.com/DamianBrowne 

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In this episode I answer your questions sent in over the past few weeks, such as, what to do during a major storm in the middle of the Atlantic. And why would a man who has stated to 'not being a strong swimmer', decide to row a boat across the ocean?

All that and more on the latest bonus episode.

Produced Niall Killeney-Taylor

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One corner of the vast answer to the title question. Striping back the layers of protection and exposure to thyself; 3 choices available to me with the exposed information; The empowerment of choosing the brave option & having a bit of fun in the process.

Day 26: Ill-disciplined start; The daily battles especially night time rowing; The stark difference between two spaces separated by one metre and millimetres of plywood, 1st fresh water wash in 26 days; "Disgusted with myself" and solutions to stop it happening again; The fight between outcome focus and its powerful allies the monotony of the task, the discomfort in entails and the duration involved versus striving to be present and control the moment. 

The difficulty & frustrations of steering with the oars at night with no moon; The consequences of not having more specific purpose than rowing the Atlantic once I was clearly out of the race; One component of my mental preparation - Affirmations and the 3-step process to an effective practice and how I used it; The scary and empowering fact that there's always more within us.

Day 27: Groundhog Day; Solace from my relentless drive for more from myself; 'Demand the impossible for maximum results'; Joe Rogan retweets; The worry of a fast-disappearing supply of chamois cream; The continued deterioration of my arse and fingers; Creeping close to the halfway mark.

The power of purpose and an aligned life; The paradox of the relationship; & The peaceful existence of being your driver. 

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Day 26 -  https://youtu.be/4AIOq5hUhZA 

Day 27 -  https://youtu.be/zkc7YNg2DDY

Produced Niall Killeney-Taylor

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Day 24: An ocean rowing warning playing out, 'Everything breaks', My first video diary after 5 days of technical difficulties, Spares for spares, My one luxury on hold, 1000NM done, The story of a non-swimmers first plunge into the ocean and the reason behind why I had to do it, The electric blue of my first wash in 23 days, wearing something normally found on glaciers to keep me safe and alive & Having no Deathwish. 

Day 25: Waking low, No energy, enthusiasm, Solution focused, Tracing back through my thoughts to find the valuable information, The learned and lived consequences of not embodying my highest values, Super high levels of self-awareness is the desired goal. 

Videos:

Day 24 -  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RH7fp8zB16Y

Day 25 -  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c3R4KlLaybM 

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