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One concept from the book that I’m really excited about is the importance of lived experience in shaping leaders.  That is, we must go beyond an intellectual understanding of an experience and be fully immersed to really understand what it feels like.

This is something that I struggle with during those times when I’m not out adventuring. I read lots of books and listen to lots of podcast and think strategically about business. This is highly intellectual activity and actively takes me away from feeling my feelings – which is half the equation of life.

Virtual reality, storytelling, books, YouTube, etc get you close to an experience, but they also keep you from actually going on an adventure and experiencing the phenomenon for yourself.

What specific feelings do you get when you are out among the redwoods or climbing a volcano? What is it like when you are splashing holy water on your face or trying to figure out how to bribe a militant rebel?  You get the full range of emotions, the real lived experiences

When you are out in the deep dark forest, the trees are working their magic on your entire being. You get the physiological benefits of calm, clarity, and immune boosting, as well as enhanced creativity. It’s like a hack for connecting with something bigger than yourself.

When you drop into a new country with a new language, culture, and money, you get the lived experience of being a total noob and having to figure out everything again for the first time.

You are rewiring your brain and experiencing emotions that you can only get through these lived experiences.

This will allow you as a leader to draw on this bank of experiences to make better decisions, be less surprised by new encounters, be comfortable with the full range of emotions, and be in tune with the larger systems at play (e.g.,
ecological, social, biological).