The reader's edition
Ghost Rider: Travels on the Healing Road: the summary
Neil Peart was the drummer and lyricist of the Canadian rock band Rush. In August 1997 his 19-year-old daughter, Selena, died in a car accident, and about ten months later his wife, Jacqueline, died of cancer. Soon after, he got on his BMW motorcycle at his home in Quebec and rode for some 14 months and around 55,000 miles across North America, north toward Alaska and south into Mexico. Ghost Rider is the record of that ride, told through his travel journal and the letters he wrote to friends on the way. It makes no argument and offers no method; it is a slow, honest account of grief, solitude and motion, and of the small part of himself he tried to keep alive. It ends with him finding love again and marrying the photographer Carrie Nuttall. Read a chapter at a time, with a printable action book at the end.
- Neil Peart
- 2002
- 4 chapters
- 5 min read
- 9 takeaways
This is HourLife's reading of Ghost Rider: Travels on the Healing Road, in our own words. It is not a substitute for the book.
Chapter 01
Before you start
The book in a minute
Tap a paragraph to highlight it. Turn pages with the arrows, the arrow keys, or a swipe.
Neil Peart was the drummer and lyricist of the Canadian rock band Rush. In August 1997 his 19-year-old daughter, Selena, died in a car accident, and about ten months later his wife, Jacqueline, died of cancer. Soon after, he got on his BMW motorcycle at his home in Quebec and rode for some 14 months and around 55,000 miles across North America, north toward Alaska and south into Mexico. Ghost Rider is the record of that ride, told through his travel journal and the letters he wrote to friends on the way. It makes no argument and offers no method; it is a slow, honest account of grief, solitude and motion, and of the small part of himself he tried to keep alive. It ends with him finding love again and marrying the photographer Carrie Nuttall.
Below are the 9 ideas HourLife readers vote up most, each in our words with a note on what it asks of you, and then the steps that put them to work.
Chapter 02
What readers keep
The takeaways
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1
HourLife takeaway
When you cannot think your way out of grief, you can sometimes ride your way through it.
Peart set out with no plan beyond moving. The road gave each day a shape he could manage: a route, a tank of fuel, a meal and a bed for the night. Motion did not fix anything, but it gave him something to do with a day while time did its slow work.
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2
HourLife takeaway
The part of you that survives a great loss is small, and it needs looking after.
Peart names it his little baby soul: the fragile self that was left after everything else had gone numb. The book is in large part about tending it. He keeps it going with small comforts and kindness rather than big decisions.
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3
HourLife takeaway
Feeling like a ghost of yourself is part of grief, not proof that you are broken.
The title is how Peart saw himself on the road: a rider going through the motions, not quite present in his own life. Naming that feeling let him live alongside it instead of fighting it. A name for the numbness can make it less frightening.
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4
HourLife takeaway
Solitude can help you heal, as long as you keep one line open to other people.
Peart rode alone for most of the trip, yet much of the book is letters to friends. Being alone gave him room to feel what he felt. Writing to people kept him tied to a life he could one day go back to.
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5
HourLife takeaway
When everything big has been taken, small pleasures are not trivial.
A good meal, a quiet room, a long view at the end of a hard day: the journal keeps coming back to small things like these. They are not distractions from grief. They are what keeps a person going through it.
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6
HourLife takeaway
Writing it down turns a blur of days into a road you can look back along.
Peart kept a journal through the trip, and the book grew out of it. On the page, days that felt the same become a route with places and weather. Looking back, you can see you have moved even when it never felt like it.
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7
HourLife takeaway
Grief does not run in a straight line, and a bad day after a good one is not a step back.
The journal does not climb steadily from dark to light. Clear days and heavy ones come in no fixed order. The road keeps going either way, and so does the healing.
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8
HourLife takeaway
You do not have to choose between honouring the dead and choosing to live.
The book ends with Peart falling in love with Carrie Nuttall and marrying her, and he later went back to making music. Living again did not mean forgetting his wife and daughter. It meant carrying them into a life that kept going.
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9
HourLife takeaway
Healing takes months and years, not a timetable you can set.
The ride alone lasted over a year, and the return to ordinary life took longer still. Peart did not decide when he would be better. He kept moving until, slowly, he was.
Chapter 03
Put it to work
Your action book
Do the setup steps once, then keep the habits going. The setup changes your week; the habits keep it changed after the first good one.
The download puts this whole reading and a printable action book in one PDF: the setup checklist, then a page of real calendar days for each habit, starting on the day you choose.
Set up once
Write down who to call on a bad night
Put two names and a crisis line on a card or in your phone's notes: a friend, a family member, and your local emergency number. Do it on a calm day so it is there when you need it.
Pick a notebook for the road
Choose one notebook or one note on your phone that is only for this. Keep it where you will see it at the end of the day.
Plan one day of motion
Pick a route you can do this week: a long walk, a bike ride, a drive or a train to somewhere you have not been. Write down where you will start and where you will stop for food.
Name two people to write to
Choose two people you trust and tell them you may send the odd letter or long message with no need to reply. Knowing someone will read it makes it easier to write.
List your small comforts
Write ten small things that still feel good, even a little: a hot drink, a song, a bath, a view, a dog's company. Keep the list next to your notebook.
Keep it up
Log three lines each evening
Before bed, write one thing you moved through, one thing that hurt and one small thing that was good. Three short lines are enough.
Move once a day
Go outside and move for at least twenty minutes: walk, ride or swim. Pick a direction and go, without a goal.
Send one letter a week
Once a week, write to one of your two people about where you have been, inside and out. It does not need to be cheerful or finished.
Chapter 04
The last word
Before you go
Pick one step from the action book and do it today. An idea from a book starts to count once it changes what one ordinary day looks like.
When nothing makes sense, keep moving, write it down, and feed the small part of you that is still alive.
That is the end of our reading. Where to go from here, or go back to the full Ghost Rider: Travels on the Healing Road page.
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