Everand Logo

Welcome to Everand!

  • Discover millions of ebooks, audiobooks, and so much more with a free trial

    Only $11.99/month after trial. Cancel anytime.

    The Uncertain Sea: Fear is everywhere. Embrace it.
    The Uncertain Sea: Fear is everywhere. Embrace it.
    The Uncertain Sea: Fear is everywhere. Embrace it.
    Ebook45 pages38 minutes

    The Uncertain Sea: Fear is everywhere. Embrace it.

    By Bonnie Tsui

    4/5

    ()

    Switch to audiobook
    Read preview

    About this ebook

    Bonnie Tsui, the bestselling author of Why We Swim, a Time magazine Must-Read Book of 2020, writes about finding strength in the face of fear and uncertainty. Enlightening and inspiring, The Uncertain Sea is just the story most of us need right now.

    Fear and uncertainty—emotions we’ve become all too familiar with this past year. From the pandemic to political upheaval to the recession to lurking environmental disasters, we’ve been battered by one unfathomable event after another, with more to come. How do we handle the emotional fallout from such traumas? How do we bounce back?

    Bonnie Tsui tackles these big questions in The Uncertain Sea, her insightful look at fear and the many ways people handle it. Plagued by the anxiety she herself was feeling in 2020, she looked for guidance from an old friend whose very career would make most of us shudder. Ron Elliott is an underwater photographer specializing in sharks—in particular, the great whites of the Farallon Islands, off San Francisco, notorious for being one of the sharkiest spots on earth. Over the years, Elliott has had numerous close calls and was even attacked by a great white in 2018, nearly losing a hand. Yet still he returns to the water. Tsui wondered how Elliott managed risk and fear and what his resilience might teach the rest of us.

    In her 2020 bestseller Why We Swim, Tsui—an accomplished swimmer and surfer—examines the cultural and biological aspects of our relationship to water. In The Uncertain Sea, she uses open water—and what lurks beneath the surface—as a metaphor to explore our psychological responses to the unknown. She draws on scientific research to better understand how and why fear manifests itself in humans, and frankly discusses her own deep-seated anxieties. She takes a thoughtful look at the movie Jaws, the blockbuster that cemented sharks in our collective unconscious as the symbol of all that is dangerous and scary. As a result, sharks—animals that are crucial to the food chain and present a statistically insignificant threat to people—have been threatened by overhunting. The fact that shark-liver oil is being used in developmental COVID vaccines that could save millions of lives adds to the dark irony of our shark mythology.

    Throughout her narrative, Tsui turns back to her friend Ron Elliott, who, Buddha-like, finds his quiet center in the sharks’ cold, forbidding “living room.” He is comfortable with being uncomfortable; in fact, that’s how he finds his strength. It’s a lesson we all should learn.

    “We are imperfect beings, teetering on a razor’s edge between reason and emotion,” Tsui writes. “What does resilience look like? Why do we embrace risk? My very human answer: We risk, sometimes a lot, so that we can seek joy.”

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherEverand Originals
    Release dateMar 2, 2021
    ISBN9781094412924
    Author

    Bonnie Tsui

    Bonnie Tsui is a longtime contributor to The New York Times and the author of American Chinatown, a San Francisco Chronicle bestseller that won the 2010 Asian/Pacific American Award for Literature. Her most recent book, Why We Swim, was published in April 2020; it was a New York Times Book Review Editors’ Choice, a Time magazine Must-Read Book of 2020, an NPR Best Book of 2020, and is currently being translated into five languages. Her first children’s book, Sarah and the Big Wave, about the first woman to surf Northern California’s renowned Mavericks, will be published in May 2021. She lives, surfs, and swims in the Bay Area.

    Related to The Uncertain Sea

    Related ebooks

    Adventurers & Explorers For You

    View More
    View More

    Related podcast episodes

    Related articles

    • Article

      Love Thy Enemy

      Jul 8, 2022

      Love Thy Enemy
      2 min read

    • Article

      Starshift

      Sep 9, 2019

      Starshift
      16 min read

    • Article

      The Whale Who Will Come Soon

      Sep 8, 2021

      The beachfront narrows to an ocherous ribbon, belted by blue, above and below. After a while, a handful of shearwaters appear in the air above the Cat Balou. The birds flash around us; like knife-thrower tricks at a circus. Diving through the water,

      8 min read

    • Article

      The Boatman And The Bear

      May 27, 2022

      The Boatman And The Bear
      9 min read

    • Article

      Nature’s Gentle Giants

      Jun 12, 2020

      ‘I CAN’T hear anything.” “Nothing at all?” “Honestly, just feedback. Wasn’t his last point here?” “Oh, but that point was very early this morning. Let’s look for him.” I sighed and took the radio receiver from my ear. I was tracking a male elephant n

      8 min read

    • Article

      Secrets Of sand River

      Apr 9, 2021

      Secrets Of sand River
      6 min read

    • Article

      The Lions And The San

      Jun 1, 2022

      The Lions And The San
      12 min read

    • Article

      Red Tide Warning

      Mar 4, 2024

      Red Tide Warning
      16 min read

    • Article

      Rhino Named SUDAN

      Feb 5, 2022

      Rhino Named SUDAN
      6 min read

    • Article

      Rhino Named SUDAN

      Jan 5, 2023

      Rhino Named SUDAN
      6 min read

    • Article

      The Hermit Of Suvarov

      Jul 30, 2020

      The Hermit Of Suvarov
      5 min read

    • Article

      Mosi-oa-tunya

      Jun 30, 2021

      Mosi-oa-tunya
      3 min read

    • Article

      Roger’s PROFANISAURUS

      Jan 5, 2022

      Roger’s PROFANISAURUS
      5 min read

    • Article

      As the Worm Turns

      Nov 15, 2021

      As the Worm Turns
      3 min read

    • Article

      Cicada Cray

      Jun 3, 2021

      Cicada Cray
      6 min read

    Related categories

    Reviews for The Uncertain Sea

    4/5

    56 ratings6 reviews

    What did you think?

    Tap to rate

    Review must be at least 10 words

    • 5/5
      Short and easy read, you wont want to stop. Written clearly, it is a beautiful analogy of ocean life versus humans and the world today!
    • 5/5
      Brilliant! Addresses our humanity & out current tenuous world situation.
    • 5/5
      This book/audiobook taught me the fundamental of fear in a short and wonderful analogy that everyone can relate to.
    • 5/5
      Very timely and poignant. And great writing!
      Fear and sharks, the pandemic and the environment, it is all there and all connected.

      1 person found this helpful

    • 5/5
      Another amazing work by one of my favorite authors!! Go Bonnie! Very poignant words in the midst of a frightful global pandemic...

      1 person found this helpful

    • 5/5
      Wow. Just wonderful. I know Bonnie so I am biased, but this short story can take one to a tranquil stasis Jackson Browne called a peaceful easy feeling. A place I tried to get to for many years but only experienced for moments. It's what AA calls 'getting it' and is a calming state of mind without alcohol or drugs. It's the essence of why I think AA people say they are thankful to be a recovering alcoholic. It's the transcendent state of being alive and present in the world yet aware and involved without fear being in charge. This short story will save lives. Thank you so much Bonnie, I think you've got it.
      Jan Van Sickle, March, 2021

      1 person found this helpful

    Book preview

    The Uncertain Sea - Bonnie Tsui

    <{bbook_preview_excerpt.html]Vn6~9u (Á[8 'A\jb"eڅrC˓gE3.sI1?Ї뇻/}j?>/LLlNO M.PI6{ט\nXb,=dv]*3 suF GL벍 ũfs Ri\q@Ѳ -tʑ=8<`K ͎&5Gc]nʄ\],T"mhc$^Z٤)N]+}VbH1ҞyCf*T 8NZ:Ӡ1&-5hֻR50)|}<*0{UCF#JRb0t^"RucmA)~&QwV.,%SO]nװ>&vyC&ۛ,_b@g! nB)zf&B!iF>Іw9bv. lqsӦ}.,1\Ԛ?ay<,L(`P3#}͉GH09IvLa\K,]YP1{>յ,jOGyԢP_(=1XX'CEr4۽/:e_LHit!\)x|R{ |PIpNP NyM(Z `BQSZg ;6H.ԢxEC{}s6xG7 i^D!D 4v\v:<ƒtpdFט۝ jO<4jP#ʠ'8ѡHpO-+n3[ ٚ7$CJ'd? ?M`й:֖UL,Xo轙aUxN);IQR(Ő0 EOed nYĨc8Vz,,'AK*YL6 FX"! f#1@7nE Wf)nT*?Ŭ*DG8&qE rb!8a‚)c-q f5᎑FS E XnOWdiG+AM>hp+tk^$~ma5v&xeȪ]JѾET:ݿ6PR!p}?>`n@#E/Leq61v;z |XɴS@Ģe Rrppx F^IQs$$E%>t<??+Kdt)$;Gς_/.~[>bM-3؃X6'gaJIKJ 㢱uxL^3⾼h*Ȃ]}lEǓM_*jMYH uw,-@_l"7E'z  Z1KϋRÂ<Љ{[HF̪-wSldw6_䊶Nb)#ыs$]l֝s[PMXҚ"𞈻n)Q:WL)WaV`x)S<~/Ko$2ܤէ(`t8s@9s?7$:0x*x˛IK7 MB_.mQ/}
    Enjoying the preview?
    Page 1 of 1