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It feels great to be back in Saint Augustine...even if it is only for a week. I love this sleepy little town. I am the studio with Dustin going through footage from The Thumbs Up Project. He is editing film from his trip to Mexico with Dane. It looks amazing as usual.
I have been feeling a little extra gusto in my life the last couple weeks, which is totally unrelated to my job working for Get Motivated Seminars. My great friend Andy Luce and I have been encouraging each other to "step it up" in many aspects of life. It is crucial to have friends like that. As much as it is possible, surround yourself with people who are pushing you forward, not pulling you backwards.
An Andy Luce original.
P.S. The new mewithoutYou album, "it's all crazy! it's all false! it's all a dream! it's alright" came out today. You should go buy it.
I ordered an iPhone.
Dang it.
I am excited to have so much information at my beck and call, yet hesitant for the very same reason.
I think that blog posts without pictures can be rather boring. This post will not have any pictures, so if you want to stop reading now I will understand and will not be offended.
For those of you who read posts without pictures, this post is a general update on what is going on in my life. If you don't care about what is going on in my life, then you can stop reading now too.
Now, the first phase of "The Thumbs Up Project" has come to an end. It was a good and successful journey, just successful in different ways than I had pictured in my preconceived ideas, which is often times how success works. We did not pick up many hitchhikers. Two and a half to be exact. However, we met tons of fascinating, inspiring, weird, and talented people with many interesting stories. The Thumbs Up Project will be a work in progress. I am going to have do some hitchhiking of my own for phase two.
I am currently hanging out in beautiful Cardiff-by-the-Sea, CA. Surfing everyday with Russell Browndogger and staying with my buddy Chris Christenson. I want to move here. I love this part of California.
But...I have to leave on Tuesday. Flying to Maine. I've never been to Maine. I am working for a cheesy motivational seminar, but will get to hang out with some great people and hopefully do some fun Maine things, like eat lobster.
I am going fishing in Alaska again. I didn't think that I was going to, but was made an offer that I could not refuse. I only have to go from June 15 - July 15. A month of gnarliness. Yes, that is a word.
If you care about me enough to have read all of this, thanks and I love you.
I appreciate life more today than I did a few days ago.
Two years ago Winston and I attempted to climb a 2000 foot rock face called "Solar Slab" in the Red Rock Canyon, just west of Las Vegas. The mountain denied us the summit and sent us rappelling down in darkness...without headlamps.
We have been talking about that piece of rock ever since. How we wanted to go back and take it down.
The Slab fell before us yesterday, but not without a fight. We started our climb at the crack of 10. We moved fast, but were held up by a father and son team climbing ahead of us. The mountain pelted us with violent winds once we reached the exposed upper 1500 feet. We reached the summit but our joy was put on hold. The winds continued to grow stronger, sustaining 25-30 knots with gusts well over gale force. Dark clouds lingered, snow began to fall, and night was fast approaching.
The rappel anchors (hardware drilled into the rock) at the top were impossible to find. We had to down climb a 5.6 crack to search for the anchors at the top of the 11th pitch. Super sketchy. We considered bivouacking on the mountain, but it was getting COLD.
Joy filled my heart when Winston located the anchors. Hope! For the next five hours or so we battled the wind, cold, and snow as we rappelled pitch after pitch. It seemed never ending. We checked and re-checked everything we did, knowing that our senses were dulled due to dehydration, hunger, frustration, and cold.
The ground never felt so good.
We arrived back at the truck at 3 a.m., only to find shattered glass where the passengers side window used to be. Seriously? Both of our laptops and our camera gear was sitting in the cab.
Somebody had been doing donuts in the gravel lot and sprayed Eleanor, busting out two windows on her starboard side, but leaving all our belongings. We taped up the windows and passed out. We would deal with them in the morning.
My sleeping bag never felt so good.
Take the words "I can't" our of your vocabulary.
When thoughts of overwhelming doubt threaten to storm your mind you must beat them back with Spartan force and intensity.
Don't give them an inch.
If you put your mind to something, and then work and work and work at it, there is nothing that you cannot do.
Don't even begin to let money stop you. That is an excuse.
If you don't create what you want to create, or do what you want to do, or travel where you want to go, it's not because you can't....it is because you don't.
An Andy Luce original.
