Juan Pablo Quiñonez is a mestizo Latino who has been ruminating on the predicaments of modernity for over a decade. His writing aims to bridge ancestral and Indigenous perspectives, psychology, spirituality, resilience, systems thinking, science, and deep ecology, exploring where we are and our roles in facilitating what emerges. He was born and raised in Guadalajara, Mexico. As a teenager, he completed basic training in the French Foreign Legion but left shortly after he received his parachutist badge. He studied at MRU in Canada, where he met his wife, Jennifer Ford. After graduating, they paddled into the boreal forest, where they spent six months foraging in isolation to supplement their minimal rations. Juan Pablo has spent a hundred days in the forest foraging in the solitude of the boreal winter. In 2021, he won the ninth season of the reality TV series Alone after surviving solo for seventy-eight days in the subarctic lands of Labrador during the fall, where he underwent a multi-week water fast.

In addition to being an amateur collapse researcher, he is also a wilderness survival expert specializing in the boreal forest and has written the survival book Thrive. Drawing on research, life experiences, and insights, he urges us to challenge our assumptions and cultivate an openness to what is happening around us. Juan Pablo encourages us to stand on a deeper, more solid foundation, enhancing our ability to perceive uncomfortable thoughts and sensations without losing ourselves. He calls us to embrace the paradoxes, complexities, and magnitude of our predicaments. He believes that the right insights will empower us to respond in our own ways with wisdom and courage, and they will guide us in letting go of what's unhelpful, so that a more beautiful world can emerge. Juan Pablo lives in the boreal forest in Canada.