Climbing Mountains

Weekly wisdom to level up your creative life in 3 minutes, for free.

A SHORT STORY

There's an old Haitian saying: "Beyond mountains, there are mountains."

I thought about this wisdom a lot last Saturday when I decided to tackle a Spartan Beast in Vermont—a half marathon up a 5,000 ft mountain with obstacle courses in between. It was also how I chose to mark my 40th birthday.

It all began a few months back during a conversation with my friend Randi after one of our early morning workouts. She asked, "What are your plans for your 40th birthday?" "I'm not sure," I replied. "I'm not into big parties, but I want to do something tough, something that would really make me struggle."

Three hours later, she texted me the Spartan race details, and we convinced our dear friend Brian to join us. The preparation began.

Brian and Randi were perfect companions—we'd co-founded and worked together on various businesses over the past decade. They were the kind of people I'd willingly crawl through the mud with, both figuratively and, as it turned out, literally during the race.

The race lasted six grueling hours, giving me plenty of time to think as I climbed the mountain.

Mostly, I thought about how one’s struggle is always a source of growth. Or as the Zen tradition teaches: “The struggle of your life is your paradise.”

Looking back on my 30s, I felt gratitude for all the tough experiences: losing my mother, playing Hamlet, creating multiple businesses, and more.

I realized that the answers I searched for weren’t found while lounging on a beach; they emerged when I faced adversity—when I tackled something truly hard. Whether it was navigating a painful breakup, waking up at 4:30 AM, or dealing with the loss of a loved one.

Through that time on the mountain, I also realized that the moments that were the hardest in my life were filled with wonder, mystery, and possibility.

It was the things I didn’t know that lifted me up, pushed me forward, rather than the things I did know.

And, most importantly, I realized that beyond this mountain, there is always another.

What mountain are you climbing today? Is it the right one? And if it is, what lessons are you learning along the way?

A CREATIVE TOOL

This fall, I am organizing a one day summit on art and innovation in collaboration with Kenyan NFT Club and Alliance Francaise in Nairobi.

During one of our recent zoom calls, Sherie (an incredible artist I know from Kenya) used a tool called Read, which created an AI generated transcript, summary, and list of action items directly from our meeting. It was also emailed to us directly after the call.

So incredibly helpful!

A PIECE OF ART

“In Blackwater Woods” by Mary Oliver

originally published in American Primitive

Look, the trees
are turning
their own bodies
into pillars

of light,
are giving off the rich
fragrance of cinnamon
and fulfillment,

the long tapers
of cattails
are bursting and floating away over
the blue shoulders

of the ponds,
and every pond,
no matter what its
name is, is

nameless now.
Every year
everything
I have ever learned

in my lifetime
leads back to this: the fires
and the black river of loss
whose other side

is salvation,
whose meaning
none of us will ever know.
To live in this world

you must be able
to do three things:
to love what is mortal;
to hold it

against your bones knowing
your own life depends on it;
and, when the time comes to let it go,
to let it go.

Grateful,

Michael