Voices in Bushwalkers' Heads

[whynotwalk]

G'day all - this is a bit of a weird one maybe But sometimes it seems to me we have voices in our heads while we're walking. I don't mean of the certifiable kind, but those internal "encouragers" or "disparagers" that can make us feel great - or terrible - about what we're trying to achieve when we bushwalk. Not with me? I've tried to explain it in my latest blog post (see link below). I'd be interested to hear how others go with these "voices",

http://www.naturescribe.com/2012/04/whether-to-whinge-or-whistle.html

cheers

Peter

[stepbystep]

Hi Peter,

The Whinger and The Whistler reside in me.... the most disturbing thing I find is when solo walking and in the midst of these internal debates another voice appears. At first it is confusing and rather bewildering, so best ignored and then all of a sudden a real person appears babbling to their companion(s)....it's all very strange to be jerked out of my own internal debates to have a conversation with people doing their sociable thing. It is rather amusing when you silently bump into another solo walker whinging or whistling to themselves....

btw your link is not quite right, just to have a whinge.

EDIT: haha you fixed it!

[whynotwalk]

Thanks for the quick and courageous response Dan.

Hopefully the link is right now, so quit whinging

Cheers

Peter

[Vozzie]

When I'm soloing across the high plains, and there's not another sound for a gazillion miles ... my tinnitus steps up to the plate and fills the void. I often think there's an aircraft circling over me !

[Moondog55]

"Just 10 more steps and you can rest"
"wait until you get th[o that big tree on the crest '
Just another 10 steps mate' C'mon you can do it!!"
Why am I here? Why is my heel hurting? Am I having fun yet? " Why is my pack so heavy, why didn't I train for the walk, do I need new boots,??, Why do my friends think I'm crazy??"

No!!
No voices in my head

[ILUVSWTAS]

When I'm soloing across the high plains, and there's not another sound for a gazillion miles ... my tinnitus steps up to the plate and fills the void. I often think there's an aircraft circling over me !

Know exactly what you mean my friend.

[doogs]

I have similar voices when out bushwalking but I prefer to think of them as "Logic" and "paranoia". Logic dissects my performance and fitness telling me what I can and can't feasibly achieve. It breaks down the walk into easy bitesized sections. I love this voice as it gives me a huge amount of confidence which can often be lacking in everyday life.
"Paranoia" on the other hand tells me you are pushing yourself too hard, your not quite sure where you are are you?, you may as well give up now as you aren't going to make the summit etc.
There is a third voice I have, this voice is not a voice I hear when out bushwalking, it is the voice calling me to bushwalk. It tells me to rearrange my busy life to find time to get out and bushwalk and to often be quite selfish when doing so. I have a love/hate relationship with this voice which I call it "addiction".

[Stibb]

I have those voices (and others) all the time when I'm on my own, and not only when bushwalking. Often when I'm driving or just walking along in town. Can be very embarrassing They keep talking to me and then I have to answer, right? Not sure if I'm just nuts but nice to know I'm in good company!

[anotherwalker]

I 3 have voices Mr Logic and a Positive and a Negative voice.

Mr Positive says things like
"20 more steps and you can rest".
"Not long to go now till a break, lunch, dinner, food and rest"
"Enjoy the journey, enjoy the view, enjoy the feeling of being alive".
"You can do this, cause the last person obviously did".

Mr Logic says.
"Take care near that cliff edge or steep set of steps/ladders or boulders".
"Am I still on track ?".
"Am I progressing to make camp or the car before nightfall."
"What does that weather say, does it look like rain, cold or hot".
"Make sure you drink enough so you keep hydrated".

Negative.
He whinges about being too hot, cold, tired, hungry or thirsty or how steep the mountain is.
But I try not to listen to him and tell him to suck it up and get on with it

And when my wife hikes she even hears me saying these things out loud

She's not too impressed with the "Just get on with it" saying though

[Nuts]

Wow.. bushwalking does attract oddballs !!

[corvus]

It sure does, are we not
coevus

[Nuts]

Ha, well.. that's the sort of question I avoid asking myself

[Overlandman]

I hope I am not the only one that keeps hearing that last song that was playing on the radio before exiting my car to go hiking!
My moto for resting is, I cannot rest if I can still see the last place I stopped for a rest!
Regards Overlandman

[Pteropus]

I don’t really have a “voice” in my ear as you describe, just the regular internal thoughts that we generally have. When out in the bush I spend a lot of time thinking about many different things. If the going is tough, the only thing I really make sure I do is tell myself that I could be stuck in the office, which would be a lot worse. I do have a habit of talking to trees and animals though....but (thankfully) they never talk back
From time to time I sometimes think I hear people talking through the bush and then discover it was a creek (a babbling brook even).

When I'm soloing across the high plains, and there's not another sound for a gazillion miles ... my tinnitus steps up to the plate and fills the void. I often think there's an aircraft circling over me !

Know exactly what you mean my friend.

Yes, this happens to me a bit too, especially on a calm night when I am trying to get to sleep...fortunately I am mostly buggered at that point and it doesn't really annoy me that much...

[puredingo]

The voices in my head I can deal with it's the same song on repeat that get's stuck in my head that drives me mad because it's usually a lame song I can't stand.
Note: Make sure the last thing you hear isn't your 14 yr old daughters Ipod on the drop off ride.

[north-north-west]

*shrug*
The voices are always there. It's just that out bush they make more sense . . .

[rogo]

The voices in my head I can deal with it's the same song on repeat that get's stuck in my head that drives me mad because it's usually a lame song I can't stand.
Note: Make sure the last thing you hear isn't your 14 yr old daughters Ipod on the drop off ride.

My husband says give the song a big finish. Put it to bed with a huge stage finish. Draw out the last note. Then forget it. (unless you find a better way of finishing it)

I find I sing songs when I'm tired, like the ants go marching and ten green bottles. That quietens the crazies for a bit.

[whynotwalk]

So ... now we expand to unwelcome tunes in your head. Aarrgggghhh!

The Germans came up with an apt word for that, "ohrwurm" - which translates ear worm. I somewhere heard about a "cure" for it, which I've adapted and expanded into what I call "the Womble Cure". It works well for me, and other people of a certain age. More details on my blog here

http://www.naturescribe.com/2010/02/womble-cure.html

cheers

Peter

[puredingo]

Its the ad jingles that are the real killer....It's like "I can't buy a zinger burger...I'm in the middle of fricken nowhere!!!!" get outa my head.

[Nick S]

I did an overnight solo walk along the low rocky point track on the west coast some years ago, it was wild, beautiful but totally monotonous for about 8 hours until reaching the turnoff.
I remember the first few hours being occupied with usual thoughts about recent events and everyday stuff, but after a while things changed. I felt completely in the moment, my mind was only occupied on objects around me and maybe planning the route ahead, the weather.. I would have the occasional intrusive thought about home/etc. but it was quite an interesting, almost spiritual experience. Never reproduced as I always tend to walk with others, but a loss I think.

I've never had a problem with getting top 40 rubbish stuck in my head.. maybe because I usually have so many other songs I can think of to push them out..

[nakedape]

When I'm soloing across the high plains, and there's not another sound for a gazillion miles ... my tinnitus steps up to the plate and fills the void. I often think there's an aircraft circling over me !

Trucks! Always big diesel trucks. They're a constant companion - *&%$#! tinnitus

[abowen]

Hi Peter,
Interesting thread. I don't have voices so much as I think I hear muffled voices when there are none. Particularly if I am solo. Maybe this a comfort thing, where my mind deals with the isolation by making up human voices so that I feel as though I will be ok as someone is nearby. However, this backfired on one remote off track walk on the Central Plateau- although this time I was not solo. I started to hear voices - as I normally do - but this time there were many and I thought I could catch the odd word and laugh. I thought this odd as this would have been a new mind experience altogether - maybe my mind was getting really inventive. I couldn't shake them, so I bravely said to my walking buddies, 'Do you hear voices or are they just in my head?' Initially there was some denial and I thought - oh, this is an interesting twist to my head voices. Almost immediatley some new human like sounds wafted across us and with some obvious relief they all said, 'Oh yes we can hear those noises, but didn't want to say'. Eventually, all became clear as we emerged from some scrub and discovered a bunch of walkers having a laugh while having a break. Much to our surprise we knew them and not long before had talked about their walk, but had no idea that our walks would intersect in such a remote area.
Cheers
AB

[anne3]

When the going gets tough the chant in my head starts....
give me give me cocoa pops
give me give me coffee
give me give me cocoa pops
give me give me coffee......


Sad thing is I don't even like cocoa pops.

[Swifty]

I normally don't hear voices, however a walking companion suffered a serious bout of deja vous when on a walk - he swore he "knew" I was going to say what I just said, he knew it from six months before. I explained to him about deja vous, but he didn't believe me. In the end I just told him to be a post-modernist and then everything would be true.

[WarrenH]

This is an entry from my journal, written when I was on the BNT, last Autumn. It's a twist on the theme of this thread.

The Shadow People
Saturday April 9, 2011

Several times during this tour I have heard sounds that could have been made by the voices of others ... most likely it was a sound made by birds, running water, the wind or several sounds in combination.
There is a phenomena an illusion called 'pareidolia' where a vague stimulus like a moving shadow or a soft sound at the edge of one's awareness is perceived as being a 'shadow person'. An illusion of someone being near, when no one is near. We are well tuned into hearing voices more than any other sound.

After the rain eased, about midday, I thought I heard voices. No one appeared. Half an hour later I thought I heard a voice again and again no one appeared. I was finding this very odd and I put it down to the sounds of 'shadow people'. Then half an hour later four horsemen appeared. When they topped each saddle the wind carried their voices for kilometres. I found this fascinating how far their voices traveled.

The horses found the steep track difficult in the wet. I certainly wasn't going anywhere fast, until the track firmed up.

The camp was in the only relatively clear spot on a ridge that I could find. About 50m above the Naas and about 20m above the track. Not easily seen from the track but I could see parts of the track reasonably well.

Alas, not 'Shadow People', just riders in dark rain gear.




Warren.

[Rick]

Fantastic thread Peter!

I'm having trouble writing this because I don't know which voice to listen too!!

I have different voices for different situations!

My fly fishing and bushwalking voices get on very well, I guess it is because I am so relaxed and doing something I love! My mind does wander to weird places but it soons comes back to the the task in front of me! When I have a break for lunch or rest is when things will start happening!

My trail running voices are nasty......one is optimistic, one is a pessimist, one is afraid to fail and the other wants to give up! It is a constant battle for me while running but I somehow get it all together and make it through!

I definitely have song issues!!!

Last time I fished Christys Creek I may as well had The Wiggles with me!!

Cheers

[abowen]

After the rain eased, about midday, I thought I heard voices. No one appeared. Half an hour later I thought I heard a voice again and again no one appeared. I was finding this very odd and I put it down to the sounds of 'shadow people'. Then half an hour later four horsemen appeared. When they topped each saddle the wind carried their voices for kilometres. I found this fascinating how far their voices traveled.

Warren.

The same thing happens on lakes and tarns. I think this is what happened on the Central Plateau. Sounds must have been bouncing off the lakes from many kilometres away. Particularly if you are above their level. At home I live on a steep sided hill overlooking a bay - very suburban - but on a still morning, I can hear muffled conversations from people on the water who might be rowing.
Great thread.
Cheers
AB

[TerraMer]

The voices in my head generally talk about the weather, analysing the cloud cover, reminding me of the hills ahead and how long I have to walk so far before i can stop for a break or to camp. They analyse the smells of animals, water, plants, dirts, etc, i pick up in the air, on the wind, as I walk. Occasionally, when exhaustion starts getting the better of me, i'll get stuck in a spiral of negative reflection. On a couple of occasions I thought I heard someone call out my name but it was just my head playing tricks. I told my psychologist about that but she wasn't at all worried, explained most people will experience a false voice calling out to them, it is only a problem when it starts telling you to do things
Similar to Vossie, I've had something like tinnitus since about 5yo and when everything is silent in the middle of the night out in the middle of nowhere it sounds like a roaring river cascading inside my head.