The Peak of Concentration

Nathan Paulin grew up in a small village in the French Alps. He spent time running and skiing in the mountains until age 17 when his brother introduced him to slacklining. After his first steps on the wobbly webbing, he fell in love with it. He became a professional highliner, walking lines across mountains, valleys, cities, and theaters around the world; his longest walk was 1.4 miles or 2,200 meters, 100 meters above the ground, in Mont Saint-Michel, France. Triumphs like this are only accomplished with a remarkable degree of concentration, sensation, and emotion, which Paulin has learned to leverage on and off the line.

How do you feel on the wire?

I’ve found a kind of meditation. I have some trouble with focus—my attention can fly from thing to thing very easily. Being on the line is the best way for me to feel focused. If I’m not concentrating, I’m going to fall. I have a lot of ideas, one after another, but on the line it feels simple. My mind slows down. I’ve learned to transfer this feeling, so now I don’t need to be slacklining to be focused.

I feel connected to everything around me when I’m on the line—the wind, the rain, the view, every sensation. I have to increase my sensitivity to walk on this swaying, thin line, so I feel everything I feel on the ground but more intensely. That’s why I love to do it in different places, from the Eiffel Tower to the mountains.

In 2016, I was in China, above a glacier 4,000 meters high. I was in the middle of a cloud, and everything around me was white, really white, and drones were buzzing around and filming me. With the buzz of the drones, I had to concentrate extremely hard. My grandma had died 10 days before, and in this cloud, I hallucinated that she was smiling at me. The vision wasn’t vivid or perfectly shaped, but it helped me a lot. I think it happened because it was the best way for me to overcome the situation. And now when I think back, I get to remember my grandma.