It is impossible to go through life without an outlet in which to relieve your mind of worry. For some people it is meditation, for others it is running, there are endless options. For Chris McCandless, it was pushing himself to be the best he could be. McCandless was motivated to trek into the wilderness by his disdain for his parents and his unusually large appetite for adventure, but he was also looking to become a different person while he trekked through the Alaskan wild. Before leaving on his adventure, McCandless’ relationship with his family was rocky. While he headed across the United States to Alaska, he, “...Introduced himself as Alex”(Krakauer 4). Chris intentionally gave up his given name because he did not want any ties with his family. Things may have been different if he had not gathered together all, “...The facts of his father’s previous marriage and subsequent divorce-facts to which he hadn’t been privy”(Krakauer 121). Chris had never been extremely close to either of his parents before his discovery, but this extinguished any chance of there every being a meaningful …show more content…
This was evident to everyone around him, especially when it came to cross country, as he would tell his teammates to, “...Imagine [themselves] running against the forces of darkness, the evil trying to keep them [them] from running [their] best” and would try to lose them while leading runs (Krakauer 112). This gives us a small but important window into Chris’ brilliant mind. Typically, high schoolers trudge through their class periods and sports practices and scrape up just enough motivation to do the bare minimum, but Chris was never a typical person. Chris always, “...Had a need to test himself in ways, as he was fond of saying, ‘that mattered’”(Krakauer 182). He tested himself by not bringing ample supplies, abandoning his car, hitchhiking, and burning all his cash. What most see as arrogance, Chris saw as an opportunity for