No Map. No Guide. No Limits.

Compared to the thousands recently killed in the cities and towns of Nepal, the 18 climbers and Sherpas lost on Mt. Everest in an avalanche caused by the first of recent earthquakes there is a small number. But it still rates as the worst annual death toll so far on the mountain, topping even last year’s record of 16 Sherpas lost in an avalanche that, like this one, shut down the climbing season for the year.

Statistically speaking, however, Everest has actually gotten much safer in the past 15 years. In a 2014 article he wrote for the New Yorker, Jon Krakauer (of Into Thin Air acclaim) stated that from the first British expedition to the mountain, in 1921, until 1996, there were 630 summits and 144 deaths, or an average of one death for every four successful summits. From 1996 – 2014, he said, there were 6.241 summits and 104 deaths, or an average of one death for every 60 successful summits. (Or one death for every 88 successful summits, if you don’t count the Sherpas, who endure far greater risks than the “client” climbers and professional guides.)

Krakauer is a very reliable source. But hard facts on this subject are surprisingly difficult to nail down. A website called everesthistory.com, which offers a list of successful summits from 1953-1996 … by name, exact date, expedition name, nationality and route by which the summit was reached … lists 956 successful summits during that time. And in 2013, a Time magazine article estimated the total number of people who had summited Mt. Everest to be closer to 3,500 than Krakauer’s 6.241 estimate.

So I have no idea exactly how many people have summited Mt. Everest to date, or what the precise death-to-summit ratio is. But by any measure, that ratio has gotten much better. Some reasons for the decrease in risk include the fact that guiding companies now have ropes and ladders set for climbers along the routes, and each season leaders try to set routes with less likelihood of an avalanche. Climbers now use supplemental oxygen far more than they used to, and many also prophylactically take a drug called dexamethasone to ward off altitude sickness and high-altitude edemas. Weather forecasts are more accessible and accurate than they used to be. And many climbing companies now encourage their clients to acclimatize on safer routes and mountains first, so they don’t have to make as many danger-laden trips across the Khumbu Icefall above base camp on Everest. [click to continue…]

The Explorer’s Club, now a prestigious New York institution, was founded in 1904 with the mission of advancing “field research and the ideal that it is vital to preserve the instinct to explore.” The club is famous for its luminary members’ “firsts” (although many of those people were made honorary members after the fact): first to climb Mt. Everest, reach the poles, reach the depths of the ocean, reach the moon.

But after the club’s annual awards banquet a couple of weeks ago, a Science Times article suggested that perhaps the club was past its prime. “Today’s explorers face a daunting prospect,” the reporter explained. “Our maps are fully drawn, and there is not much left for [explorers] to do.” He also noted that “the growth of new technology poses problems for one of the club’s most cherished precepts — that exploration means adventure in the field, carried out by visionary risk-takers.”

It certainly raises an interesting question. What does exploration consist of? And how important are the physical and risk-taking components in classifying something as exploration?

My Merriam Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary gives several definitions for the verb “explore”:

1. To investigate, study, or analyze
2. To become familiar with by testing or experimenting
3. To travel over new territory for adventure or discovery
4. To examine minutely for diagnostic purposes
5. To make or conduct a systematic search

Nothing in any of those definitions requires physical activity to be part of the equation, (although I guess that depends how you choose to interpret “territory” in definition #3). There’s also no explicit mention of risk.

In truth, however, investigating, examining, traveling in, or searching anything unknown or uncertain always has an inescapable element of risk, because you don’t know what you’re going to discover, or how it’s going to turn out. You risk something if you’re exploring. The question is what you risk. In some cases, you only risk wasting your time. Or you risk an investment of money and resources into an effort that fails, or fails to discover what it set out to find. You might risk failure, loss of status, reputation, or money. You might risk ridicule, disappointment, or other humiliating outcomes. Or you might risk physical injury or death. [click to continue…]

I‘m big on lessons. Anyone who’s read any of my writing knows that. For all the adventure writing I’ve done, over the past 25 years (including my “Flying Lessons” aviation column), the adventure itself was rarely the point. Typically, even when I’m telling an adventure story, I’m using the story to illustrate some bigger lesson or insight about life, humans, living or society at large.

Getting caught in deteriorating weather conditions while flying my airplane over the mountains of North Carolina, for example, was not, in and of itself, rewarding. Or any shade of fun. Its value lay solely in what it taught me about the danger the emotion of fear poses, and how to overcome it.

But there are times where the reward of an adventure isn’t some great piece of wisdom or insight, but the sheer richness of the adventure experience itself. As a friend of mine likes to say, “There are some experiences that are only available to those who are willing to have them.” (For a long time, I even had that particular saying posted up on the wall above my computer.)

I found myself thinking about this again, recently, when I traveled to Australia to check off one of the big “bucket list” items I still have on my adventure list: diving the Great Barrier Reef. Sport-level scuba diving isn’t nearly as complicated (or risk-laden) as flying, or high-altitude mountain climbing, BASE jumping, or other adventure opportunities that exist in the world. But even if you don’t go more than 90 feet below the surface, it’s still an adventure. Stuff happens. On one of my Barrier Reef dives, for example, my air tank came loose from its fittings some 60 feet below the surface. Fortunately, I had a dive buddy at hand (my husband) who was able to secure it again so we could continue. But securing an air tank underwater is still an abnormal checklist kind of event. Which is to say, any time we venture into realms where we cannot survive without artificial support (space, the sky, the ocean…), it’s an adventure. There’s an element of risk, and unknown challenges with potentially significant consequences, that we agree to take on when we leave the comfort zone of our natural habitat. [click to continue…]

A few days after the sudden death of New York Times columnist David Carr (referenced in my last post), the paper ran a final column, pulled from comments and curriculum notes Carr made in a class he was teaching at Boston University. The class, titled “Press Play,” focused on “making and distributing content in the present future we are living through.”

Technology is always a double-edged sword. For all the possibilities the new media offers us in terms of expression and access, the pressure to write shorter, “buzzier” and less deeply-considered pieces for quick regurgitation is huge, compared with what it was even 15 years ago. So kudos to Carr for trying to embrace all those new possibilities while still preserving a sense and thirst for quality thinking and writing in his students. But what really struck me, in reading the piece, was how much he stressed the concept of “voice” to his students.

The importance of each of our authentic inner voices is something I write about often here, of course. Voice, passion, mission and an embrace of adventure are the elements I believe are most central to having both a rewarding and robust life and having real impact on the world. Evidently Carr subscribed to at least some of the same philosophy.

Carr’s students talked about how he’d ask them about their personal experiences, and then say, “Who you are and what you have been through should give you a prism on life that belongs to you only … These are things you have that no one else does, and you should channel that.”

That is, in a nutshell, the concept of voice: the expression of your most authentic, unique self. Other people may be smarter, richer, more talented, better looking, or more successful, but no one else has your experiences, your history, your talents, your particular values, passions, and way of viewing the world … or the product of all that, which is your voice. And bringing that voice into our work and life is the strongest and most valuable gift each of us has to give the world. What’s more, being guided by that voice in your work and the world gives you a kind of unshakable strength that allows you to have a powerful impact in what you do. [click to continue…]

Ed note: I wrote this post the day David Carr’s analysis of Brian Williams and Jon Stewart’s contrasting approaches and situations (referenced in the post) came out. Shockingly, David Carr collapsed that night in the New York Times newsroom and died. The piece he wrote, and I referenced here, was his very last. I’m posting this piece as I wrote it, but I will follow up with more, not just on the reminder Carr’s untimely death offers about the importance of grabbing hold of life with gusto, but of Carr’s philosophy that evidently lay behind pieces like the one I found worth discussing here.

One of the central themes you will hear explored and repeated on this site is the importance and power of finding your own unique, authentic voice and then bringing that voice into the world. Of being your authentic self, instead of what you think the world will find appealing. There is a divine satisfaction that comes from being an integrated, authentic person. But there is also a power that comes with that; a power that is unshakable and persuasive because it is rooted in the very core of who you are. You can be knocked off of any pedestal the external world puts you on. But you can’t be knocked off of your own foundation. And that strength comes through, even if others can’t quite put their finger on why they find you so persuasive, trustworthy, or solid.

Living from the “inside out,” as I sometimes put it, is vastly different than a defensive, insecure, or closed-minded person sticking stubbornly to their view of the world. It requires being at peace with who you are, instead of constantly working to protect an image, or angrily defending against perceived slights or criticisms from others. And it requires distancing yourself, at least on some basic level, from caring too much about the external rewards of money, acceptance, power, or status that others have the power to confer. So many people have trouble achieving it.

But as if to illustrate this point, television watchers (and computer streamers) found themselves with an almost-too-perfect-to-make-up example (and cautionary tale) of the consequences of these “inside out” and “outside in” approaches last week, juxtaposed in an uncanny coincidence of timing.

Brian Williams, the NBC anchor and king of the network evening news, was suspended for six months without pay, and may even find his career permanently damaged or truncated, because of the discovery that he made up–and publicly disseminated–a story about being in a helicopter shot down in Iraq. The truth was, he was in a different helicopter and arrived on the scene later. Once that came out, network executives also began to question how he’d characterized his reporting of other events, including Hurricane Katrina, in appearances he’d made outside his newscasts.

On the same day as Williams’ suspension was made public, Jon Stewart, the host of the comedy news program The Daily Show, announced that he was leaving the show after 17 years, of his own accord, because it was time to move on and do something different. That, and because he thought it might be nice to spend some more time with his family. Ironically, despite the show’s foundations in comedy, Jon Stewart and The Daily Show had become one of the most trusted sources for news, especially among young adults.

Other media outlets and writers have already written and produced side-by-side comparisons of the two “kings” and the stark difference in their departures and fortunes. But the relevance of their stories here is not the stark contrast in their fortunes, but in their contrasting motivations, and the consequences those differences led to. David Carr, a columnist at The New York Times, wrote an interesting comparison of both Williams and Stewart that touched on this point. [click to continue…]

In the wake of last week’s jaw-dropping Super Bowl finish, for which Seattle Seahawks coach Pete Carroll is still being criticized for a critical play call that cost Seattle a probable victory, a few thoughts on decision-making under pressure–relevant to any adventurer, entrepreneur or, yes, even business leader.

For anyone who didn’t watch the Super Bowl (really, Super Bowl Sunday is a great time to do just about anything else, including going to Disneyland, skiing, or even shopping at Home Depot, because the crowds are all off watching the game) … a quick summary:

The Seattle Seahawks were down by four points with 26 seconds to go in the game, with only one time out left. But they’d pushed their way (by luck as much by brawn) to the New England Patriots’ one-yard line. It was second down, and they needed a touchdown to win. Now, one of Seattle’s star players is a guy named Marshawn Lynch, so famous for his ability to push forward through defensive lines that he has the nickname “Beast Mode.” So most of those watching expected Seattle to give the ball to Lynch and have him try to beast his way into the end zone.

But an important side note for anyone reading this who doesn’t follow football at all: in a running play, the game clock does not stop, even after the play is whistled dead. In a pass play, if the pass is incomplete, the clock stops, and only starts again on the next snap of the ball. So if Lynch had run the ball and NOT gotten into the end zone, 8-10 seconds could have elapsed just in the play itself, let alone setting up for the next play. So to stop the clock and keep from running out of time, Seattle would have had to use its last time out. With only 15 seconds and no time outs left, Seattle might have had only one more chance to score.

If, however, Seattle chose to throw a pass on that second down, and the pass was incomplete, the clock would stop. They’d then have two more downs to use, (with a time out left to stop the clock between them), so they’d get three chances at the end zone, instead of possibly only two. Also playing into that equation is the fact that if you do exactly what an opponent expects you to do, your chances of succeeding at that plan, even with a beast in your line-up, go down. All of that was going undoubtedly going through the minds of Pete Carroll and his offensive coordinator, Darrell Bevell, in those final seconds. They wanted to use all the time and plays available to them. They wanted New England to have no time left on the clock to come back with. And they wanted to score.

Seattle’s fateful decision was to go with a pass on second down, and have Lynch run it on third or fourth down, if necessary. Unfortunately, the pass was intercepted at the goal line by New England cornerback Malcolm Butler, giving the Patriots the victory and setting up Carroll, Bevell, and quarterback Russell Wilson for a torrent of hindsight criticism.

Hindsight is always 20-20, of course. Listening to the NFL real-time audio recording of those final moments, you hear Carroll calling out, “They’re going goal line! They’re going goal line!” as he recognizes the Patriots’ run-stop defensive formation. On the other side of the field, you hear the Patriots’ defensive coaches scrambling to adjust to Carroll, screaming to the players, “3 corners! 3 corners!” “Malcolm, GO!” as they send in Butler (their third cornerback) as a last-minute substitution. And even watching the replays of that fateful interception, it’s far from a given that Butler is going to end up with the ball. He actually appears to arrive at the reception point a nanosecond behind the Seattle receiver, but manages to hit the receiver hard enough to get in front of him and wrestle the ball away.

Football coaches can (and no doubt will) ruminate for years to come on the lessons of that last play call in terms of football. But what about the rest of us? One of the challenges of charting your own course, whether it’s in a physical exploit or in an entrepreneurial, leadership, or personal adventure, is figuring out how to make good decisions, since there isn’t a nice, neat policy or procedure to follow. So it’s instructive to pay attention to how other leaders and adventurers solve their decision-making equations. [click to continue…]

I had planned to write this post next anyway, even before the events of the past week, which gave me new evidence of its truth. After all, I’d had a clipping (yes, I still get print newspapers, and I still “clip” articles that spark ideas for discussion topics in my mind) about the importance of shutting down and taking time off in my “topics” folder since last summer. And when better to talk about the importance of taking time off than in the middle of a cold winter, when ads for warm, sunlit places abound? So when I left for a 10-day trip to Southern California two weekends ago, I tucked that clipping, along with six or seven others, into a thick folder of work to do while on the road there.

I had planned to make it a working trip, you see. God forbid that I should take time off myself, even if I was going to suggest that others do exactly that. But the work pile is always so high, and getting uninterrupted time to chip away at it is harder than it used to be. But being a writer, I can always manage to do work on the road, even if the trip is ostensibly for a different purpose.

My mind and the weather, however, had something else in mind. First of all, who would have figured that summer weather would park itself over Los Angeles, even as the east coast got slammed with multiple snowstorms? January is supposed to be the rainy season in LA. I know. I’ve lived there. But all those glorious warm days of clear sunshine made it hard to stay inside on my computer. And as luck would have it, I had to spend two days, without anything on the schedule, in the neighborhood of a couple of good friends (one of whom is actually my aunt). And really, could I stay in LA and not take the time to visit my only niece, who’s a college student in San Diego, only two hours away?

The truth was, no matter what the work pile looked like, my mind and soul were screaming for a break, with as much insistent prodding as a hungry stomach that hasn’t eaten in 16 hours. The lure of just not responding to emails, of not doing my work, of just sitting in that glorious sunshine and doing nothing … had the gravitational pull of a black hole. And so, I finally just gave up and gave in.

I went jogging on a greenbelt lined by palm trees and succulent flower beds. I had really good conversations over lunches and dinners with my husband and friends. I went to a lecture at UCLA. I explored the caves of La Jolla and wandered down the beach at Coronado with my niece. I swam laps and worked out at a Southern California gym that had so many niceties that its members seemed to make it their second home. And I sat outside, drank in the sunshine and warmth, and allowed my brain to shut down completely. I’d actually brought a novel to read (a luxury in and of itself), but even that seemed too much effort, much of the time.

I was reminded of Anne Morrow Lindbergh’s discussion of her annual trips to Captiva Island on the Gulf Coast of Florida. She went there each year to write, away from her five children and busy family life. And yet, she said, whenever she first got there, she found herself unable to do anything for a number of days. She’d bring paper and pencil and books to the beach, but would find herself just gazing at the water and walking the shoreline looking at seashells, the books and pencils and paper untouched in her bag. I’m sure Mrs. Lindbergh felt a tad guilty about being so unproductive, just as I did. But that “unproductive” time spent looking at seashells also led to her most successful book, Gift from the Sea. And therein lies the point. [click to continue…]

The dawning of a new year! Aside from a good opportunity to throw a great party, it’s a good opportunity to press the “restart” button (more on this in my next post), and at least make an attempt to do some things better, or differently, in the future, than we did in the past.

Resolutions are easy, of course. Actual change is far more difficult. But keeping certain ideas or perspectives in mind can help as we try to retrain our bodies or minds to a new pattern. So in that spirit, I encourage anyone reading this to take the time to read an essay published in The New York Times last summer about what we ought to be pursuing, if we really want to be happy. The essay was written by Arthur C. Brooks–a man whose writing and conclusions I often have issues with, because of how he selects data to support his points, among other things. However, I thought this essay steered clear of that. (Evidence that common ground can be found even with people who don’t necessarily share other pieces of our beliefs or worldviews, or even writing approaches.) This particular essay delved instead, like the economist Daniel Kahneman did in his book Stumbling Upon Happiness, into the gap between what we think will make us happy, and what actually does.

I often write about the link between being “in the moment” and feeling really alive. And how one of the reasons 3-year-olds can exhibit such glee is because they are not yet burdened, in most cases, with worry about the future. They can be happy because they’re not striving for status, power, fame or bank accounts. Three year olds live in themselves, in the present. So it shouldn’t come as a surprise that all the striving we adults do … even the striving for happiness, and the things we think will make us so … often keeps us from actually being happy, in the moment we’re in at any given time.

I think, sometimes, that part of the problem is our fantasy expectation that it’s possible to feel “happy” all the time. We imagine that if only we lived in Hawaii, or were really rich, or were married to George Clooney or Gisele Bundchen, we’d be “there.” Happy all the time. That’s not realistic. My mom once sent me an article reporting that shallow people actually got closer to that Nirvana than people who thought deeply about things, because the less you worry about anything, the “happier” you will be. To which I would say, that depends on how you define happy. If you define it as “untroubled,” that’s probably true. But leading a life that never delves beneath the surface is also less likely to give you have a life rich in meaning and purpose, which–as I discussed in my last two posts–is important for happiness, as well. There’s a difference between pleasure and happiness, and hedonistic happiness and eudemonic happiness–which is to say, working to feed the homeless might not be as fun as lying on a beach drinking margaritas, but it might give you a longer-lasting sense of satisfaction and life meaning. Ditto for having kids. [click to continue…]

On the heels of my last post about the importance of believing that your job matters, both in terms of mental fatigue and creativity, here comes a study from the University College of London (UCL) with yet another reason to look for work that you find meaningful:

Researchers from UCL, Princeton University and Stony Brook University studied 9,500 English people with an average of of 65, over the course of eight and a half years, to see what impact their level of “eudemonic wellbeing” had on their longevity. Eudemonic wellbeing, as defined by the researchers, is “your sense of control, feeling that what you do is worthwhile, and your sense of purpose in life.”

The subjects were surveyed to determine where on the scale of “eudemonic wellbeing” they fell, and the results were then adjusted for age, sex, socio-economic status, physical health, depression, smoking, physical activity and alcohol intake, to try to rule out other factors that could affect both wellbeing and longevity. With all those factors adjusted for, the study subjects who rated in the highest 25% of eudemonic wellbeing had a mortality risk 30% lower than those with the lowest wellbeing. Which is to say, the people who felt a strong sense of purpose, and who felt as if what they did mattered and that they had control over their lives lived, on average, two years longer than those with low scores in those areas. [click to continue…]