Do you know that it takes just five days without food that the internal systems start to lose bearing,
That seven days later the heart rate starts to slow down to conserve energy
or that ten days without a shower and you start to feel that sense of edge creeping in,
that after just twelve days of silence with absolutely no conversation either way that the mind loses its coherence, the ability to form sentences is slowly but surely corroded,
and that all of this even though it sounds clinical on paper that it’s something completely numbing when one actually lives through it.
Even worse is that millions of people live through it day in and day out without us noticing it.
I meet Jonathan on one of my flights to Australia. He is an ex Israeli special force veteran and now runs one of the top five security agencies in the UK just out of London.
After knowing that I am a third-degree martial arts student and learning weapon defense, we bond over tactics and things that work.
He invites me to one of his 10-day sessions that teaches extreme disorientation.
I have heard about this from the Krav Maga instructor but am not terribly interested.
I ask him who his clients are. Most are the usual suspect's ex-navy seals, a smattering of ex-cops and at times even a monk. It’s that statement that catches my ear and I ask why a monk would want to go through that.
He mentions that it’s part of their generating true compassion, that when you actually feel the hunger, the biting cold, the complete silence that takes one to the borderline of insanity that you start to have a true appreciation of how some people live their lives.
I suddenly sit up very interested. I have done a couple of low versions of these but this aspect seems something else as he describes parts of it. I tell him that I have an alternate life.
A family, a boring job, the usual suspects. That this had to be reversible, nothing lasting can happen and then I throw in the kicker just to round it up that I don’t have the kind of money to run through the course, forget pounds not even in dollars.
He considers that for a moment, his face registering no expression.
“You have a talent that seems extremely valuable in my business. You can draw people in,
make them reveal things very subtly, asking the right questions but even more — at the right time and in the right tone. You can wear them down, all with them almost wanting to do it.”
I am basically a church confessional priest without the official decree. I’ve heard this before so I nod and listen.
“ I might want you to run some of my men through the wringer as part of their training”.
It sounds pretty simple so I nod and agree. He turns around in his business class seat and is now facing me full-on.
For the first time, I see a flicker of expression on his face. Its amusement mixed with a slight introspection as he extends a hand with a vice-like grip.
“Welcome to the AR34 batch for 2012. We start in 5 weeks if you are cleared physically”
I have no idea what I just signed up for …
