Each mind is a mythology of Self and Non-Self, woven out of facts and fictions. "Bottom Feeder" is a collection of stories by Pavel Somov, a Russian-American psychologist-author, who grew up in the Soviet Union.
Psychologist, author (Lotus Effect, Present Perfect, Eating the Moment), international speaker, CrossFit enthusiast, on Advisory Board of Mindfulness Project (London, UK). A modern-day ape continuously lost and found in the jungle of Real and Abstract, ever interested in the monkey business of being human. I grew up in Russia, served in the Soviet military, and immigrated to US in my early twenties. You can find me online at drsomov.com or pavelsomov.com. I am also on Twitter @pavelgsomov and on Instagram #unprincipledknowledge
There are lessons in drowning. I learned one such lesson - vicariously - from a childhood friend of mine, Dimka Tokarev. He drowned in 1976 in Moscow.
Book Excerpt
BOTTOM FEEDER
When you drown, your mind becomes a bubble of air that rushes to the surface, while defragmenting into ever smaller bubbles as your body keeps moving down, like the dead weight that it has always been, in the opposite direction. The marriage of matter and consciousness, as indivisible as it seems, is the flimsiest of all. Consciousness is in a constant state of infidelity: eyes see, ears hear, and skin touches the things out there, while the matter that makes these eyes, these ears, and this skin remains mostly unattended to, taken for granted, and ignored.
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