Alternative highs

Alternative Highs

An idea, coming to life

By Jody Anderson

Photo: The beginning of something beautiful, brought back to life by a man half dead Alternative Highs is a concept born almost 40years ago by 2-schoolmates, inspired by then University of Western Ontario, Director of Health Services, the late Dr. Tom Macfarlane, a zany and brilliant promoter of health lifestyles, during a time when unhealthy habits were the norm amongst our peer group. The spirit of the concept lives on, and has taken on a life of its own.

  “A ship is safe at harbour, and that’s not what ships are built for”. John A Shedd

Today, Alternative Highs is a cause-based initiative that my 3-boys (Brothers Anderson, under “98-Good Deeds”), are helping to breathe life into. It has been shaped by lived experience, long clinical observation, and a deep respect for how humans learn, adapt, recover, and overcome through intentional, purpose-based action.   

Photo: IceBath on the farm, circa 2021-ish

My own understanding of Alternative Highs has come through privileged observation in a unique combination of professional practice, including from people who demonstrated what it truly means to rebuild, and live life to its fullest.  One of the earliest teachers in this journey was a then 40+ yo woman who survived a catastrophic motor vehicle accident that claimed her mother’s life. She herself suffered skull, brain and body injury that left her in a three-week coma. Remarkably, she figure skated again, pursued running long distances and became a school teacher - the most privileged of all vocations. Decades after the accident, she entered my clinical world with the residual effects of trauma, including post-traumatic stress, dissociation, and a nervous system locked in fight-or-flight. Over an almost ten-year period, I observed as she found her FLOW.

Through her unique learned insight and persistence, she demonstrated to me that late neuroplastic recovery is very possible, through targeted promotion of brain healing and coordinated restoration of the connection between brain and body.

More than forty years after her injury, she demonstrated and reclaimed higher function, mindful presence, and agency, through deliberate work with both her nervous system and her physical body. Now a retired teacher of the deaf and blind, she brought a profound understanding of adaptation, learning, and resilience.

Her lived knowledge reshaped my clinical thinking and became a foundation for the work that followed in my clinical practice. It is an anchor to my own pursuit of knowledge, through responsible research and data capture on alternative brain healing approaches, neuroplasticity and the audacious pursuit of higher performing brains.   

That foundation informed my later clinical work with a second individual, who lived through brain and spinal cord injury as result of an auto accident, alongside addiction and mental health challenges he described to manage pain and despair. His recent recovery, several years after discharge from a large neurotrauma centre with 2-titanium rods to stabilize his shattered spine, unfolded through exposure to an alternative approach to support brain and spinal cord level healing, and an enduring commitment to himself, physical fitness, structure, and intentional daily living. Over time, disciplined action restored clarity, strength, and purpose, demonstrating how consistent movement and effort can reshape both the brain and personal identity. He now stands, walks and rides bikes as a living example of what sustainable rebuilding can look like.  He has described the grind to be daily, and without holiday. He is an inspiration to many in our clinic network, and broadly.

Photo: Dustin Gawne, Grinding

Alongside these stories is another quiet background voice, from someone I have long considered a “little brother”, who was a precocious Leader-in-Training during my term as his Supervisor and YMCA Sailing Camp Leader.  A mismatch for formal high school, he was once advised by a lifelong educator (my late father), “to never let schooling get in the way of his education”. He received that advice to heart and took his own education on the road, mountains, rivers, and across the world’s oceans.

Photo: Steve Moir, Credit: his loving and trusted companion-adventurer, Casey Raine

Through a life shaped by experience rather than classrooms, he pursued knowledge  without boundaries and in the wild. A certified world class wilderness guide, he has lived his life navigating open seas, safely leading treks to the heights of the world’s mountains, and has guided adventurers through remote and demanding environments. His education was forged through responsibility, risk, humility, and respect for nature. He embodies the Ultimate Alternative High: an elevation of Self earned through mindful presence, sustained effort, and connection to something larger than oneself.   

Photo: My “little brother” goofing off in South Africa

Alternative Highs exists at the intersection of lived experiences, including through recovery, reconnection, rebuilding, and finding oneself by getting lost in whatever adventure is available to those seeking to get naturally high.

An alternative high life, promotes natural, sustainable forms of elevation through physical challenge, positive routines, curiosity, and purposeful living. These principles are not rigid, and are open to anyone’s interpretation. In our small window, this lifestyle is grounded in decades of experience and expressed through lives shaped by resilience, discipline, and exploration.

Photo: Dustin Gawne leading Carson & Brighton Anderson. Probably skipping school.

Alternative Highs is a movement. It is open. It is an idea. It is a way of living, tested in living colour, in clinic, proven in recovery, sometimes messy and carried into the world through adventure. What is your Alternative High?

Do you or someone you know, have an Alternative High story? We’d love to hear about it.

Brothers Anderson for example, is a small effort that started informally around the time of the global pandemic to support Alternative Highs, at its inception. It has since become a formal pledge by 3-Canadian brothers, under the name “98-Good Deeds”, which is their commitment to complete 98 “good deeds”, before the last of them no longer wears the #98 on their hockey jersey, and all-3, complete their schooling. The deeds will all be registered under the Voluntary Service area of The Duke of Edinburgh Award https://www.dukeofed.org where commitments to Voluntary Service, Skills, Physical Recreation, and Adventure Journey are monitored and supported through DoE Leaders.  Alternative Highs is a 98-Good Deeds Project, to which Brothers Anderson have continued to support through transition to school, in their own lives. They have demonstrated that small gestures of kindness, sustained effort and support, along with the relentless pursuit of something bigger than oneself - can absolutely have profound and meaningful impact. In their case, like so many of our Youth, the many volunteer Coaches, Teachers and people who make their rural Community an amazing place to grow, provided the framework and model on how to support others.