Speaker 1: In order to weather storms, not only in the Arctic,
Speaker 1: but in life, you have to put yourself in the storm.
Speaker 2: I literally hike two miles to come arrow this.
Speaker 1: Doctor, and it's the best meal you've ever had in
Speaker 1: your life. I am freezing cold the entire time. I
Speaker 1: hiked more than I'd ever hiked in my life, and
Speaker 1: I was like, that was awesome.
Speaker 3: Through your curiosities and our engagements and your questions, it
Speaker 3: just was going to allow me to dive deeper into
Speaker 3: the things that I pulled most.
Speaker 1: Dear to my heart, Welcome to two percent. I'm your host,
Speaker 1: Michael Easter. I am really thrilled about this podcast. We
Speaker 1: are now on episode two. We're off and rolling today.
Speaker 1: We have an amazing episode. But before we get in,
Speaker 1: if you are unfamiliar with me, you might have seen
Speaker 1: me on The Joe Rogan Experience, or the Hubanman Lab
Speaker 1: podcast or various TV shows. My background, I'm a health
Speaker 1: and adventure journalist. I've been doing this for twenty years.
Speaker 1: I started at Men's Health. I was a professor for
Speaker 1: seven years, and then I ended up writing the books
Speaker 1: The Comfort Crisis and Scarcity Brain, which became best sellers,
Speaker 1: and The Thrust of my work is it improving your life.
Speaker 1: It often takes doing hard things. So this is what
Speaker 1: this podcast is about. Now. Our name comes from a
Speaker 1: study that found that two percent of people take the
Speaker 1: stairs when there's also an escalator available, only two percent.
Speaker 1: I would argue one hundred percent of people knew that
Speaker 1: taking the stairs would be better for their long term
Speaker 1: health and well being, Yet ninety eight percent of people
Speaker 1: choose to do the easier, more effortless things. So what
Speaker 1: we're trying to do is we're trying to build a
Speaker 1: tribe of two percenters that are willing to take on
Speaker 1: challenges big and small in their life to improve in
Speaker 1: the long run. Today we're talking to Donnie Vincent. Donnie
Speaker 1: is a backcountry bow hunter and filmmaker who travels into
Speaker 1: the world's most remote extreme areas for months at a time,
Speaker 1: and he makes these movies and I like to describe
Speaker 1: them as being a lot like the Planet Earth series,
Speaker 1: except they happen to have hunting. And he's really changing
Speaker 1: the face of hunting and how it is perceived. He's
Speaker 1: thinking about ethics, he's thinking about the life cycle and
Speaker 1: where our food comes from. He's thinking about conservation, he's
Speaker 1: thinking about what extended time in wild places doing hard
Speaker 1: things does for the human body, mind, and spirit. Now.
Speaker 1: I first met Donnie when I was an editor at
Speaker 1: Men's Health magazine. I ended up profiling him for the magazine.
Speaker 1: We become very fast friends, and then he ends up
Speaker 1: calling me like months later. He goes, Michael, I'm going
Speaker 1: up to the Arctic on an extreme and dangerous hunt
Speaker 1: for more than a month. Do you want to come along.
Speaker 1: We're going to see grizzly bears and climb ancient mountains,
Speaker 1: and it is going to be the most epic adventure
Speaker 1: a human being has ever go on. So I said yes,
Speaker 1: and then I find myself up in the Arctic. We
Speaker 1: have this amazing, incredible adventure that tested me in every
Speaker 1: single way. But I will tell you this, I came
Speaker 1: out the other side a better person, and Donnie was
Speaker 1: a key guide in getting me to realize the value
Speaker 1: of challenge. During that stint up in the Arctic, we
Speaker 1: had all these moments up there, like when a storm
Speaker 1: would roll in. We had this one time we were
Speaker 1: camped on a hillside and this crazy windstorm rolls in
Speaker 1: and it almost totally destroys our camp. And I was
Speaker 1: freaking out because if you lose your tent in the Arctic,
Speaker 1: you are screwed, Like you are absolutely screwed. But Donnie
Speaker 1: just went into like, yeah, solve the problem mode. He
Speaker 1: was calm, he got everything fixed. It was just like
Speaker 1: watching him made me realize, Oh, in order to weather storms,
Speaker 1: not only in the Arctic, but in life, you have
Speaker 1: to put yourself in the storm because that is where
Speaker 1: you figure out how to live, how to improve, and
Speaker 1: how to be a better person. So that's what we're
Speaker 1: going to talk to Donnie about. So with that all said,
Speaker 1: let's welcome Donnie, Donna Vincent. Welcome to two percent.
Speaker 3: Dude, this is I mean, I'm beyond honored to sit
Speaker 3: down and talk with you. Obviously we're friends, but this
Speaker 3: is different different.
Speaker 1: What was your reaction to getting an email from an
Speaker 1: editor at Men's Health.
Speaker 3: Yeah, somebody just asked me this the other day that
Speaker 3: had just read The Comfort Crisis and they asked how
Speaker 3: you found me, and I said, I actually don't know
Speaker 3: if you were asking around and my name popped up.
Speaker 3: But first of all, I get asked almost daily by
Speaker 3: someone if they can join me on a hunt, whether
Speaker 3: that be you know, a military guy, a kid, a parent, whatever,
Speaker 3: But yeah, I don't know, just the professionalism in which
Speaker 3: you went about it, and even in your email, there
Speaker 3: was an instant seriousness to it that you were your
Speaker 3: curiosity was real.
Speaker 2: You weren't trying to get a free hunt out of it.
Speaker 3: Not that not that anyone else is either, but your
Speaker 3: you're curious was real. It was honest.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and that was in Nevada. That would have been
Speaker 1: what twenty nineteen, that was in El Kunt.
Speaker 3: Yeah, twenty eighteen, twenty nineteen, something like that.
Speaker 1: Yeah, So for this men's hell story, we go hunting
Speaker 1: in Nevada. And I will say this, I was coming
Speaker 1: from Las Vegas and it was hot as hell in
Speaker 1: Vegas and we get up to about eleven thousand feet.
Speaker 1: I am freezing cold the entire time. I was hungry
Speaker 1: the entire time. I hiked more than I'd ever hiked
Speaker 1: in my wife, and it was absolutely rough. But I
Speaker 1: came home and I was like, that was awesome, And
Speaker 1: it gave me the seed of an idea of asking, well,
Speaker 1: why was that such a valuable experience, which eventually led
Speaker 1: me to pitching The Comfort Crisis to a publisher. They
Speaker 1: said yes, But then I had to make the big
Speaker 1: ask of asking you, hey, man, can I go on
Speaker 1: one of these crazy month long hunts you go on?
Speaker 1: So I asked you and you said yes. Why did
Speaker 1: you say yes?
Speaker 3: But honestly, Michael, the questions you were asking me in
Speaker 3: nova that I struggle to answer because I remember specifically
Speaker 3: one morning we were sitting up and it was kind
Speaker 3: of chilly out and you're asking me. I've told this
Speaker 3: story before, but you're like, hey, are you cold? And
Speaker 3: I said, yeah, I'm cold, and you said, well, you
Speaker 3: don't look cold. And you said that you were cold,
Speaker 3: but you said that you yourself were cold and you look
Speaker 3: like you were cold. I was also cold, and you said,
Speaker 3: but how come you don't look cold? And I was just, well,
Speaker 3: it's just I'm I know, you know, the sun's coming up,
Speaker 3: We're gonna warm up.
Speaker 2: I have extra clothes, whatever it is.
Speaker 3: But then you started asking me questions about hunting and
Speaker 3: things that I thought were going to be a slam
Speaker 3: dunk to answer, you know, like why do you hunt?
Speaker 3: And why do you think we hunt? And these were
Speaker 3: questions that I really struggled to answer with you, and
Speaker 3: you know, and I could anecdotally hit elements of it
Speaker 3: that I enjoyed watching the sun come up, or you know,
Speaker 3: listening to animals or watching animals. I could strike on
Speaker 3: these little points but really not dive into the seriousness
Speaker 3: and what it means. And then when we parted ways
Speaker 3: and you brought the project of the humpt Crisis to me,
Speaker 3: I just took it as this is this is a
Speaker 3: project that is going to this It's going to allow
Speaker 3: me to learn more about myself and more about being
Speaker 3: a hunter, and more through through your curiosities and our
Speaker 3: engagements and your questions and things that you find uncomfortable
Speaker 3: and comfortable. And it just was going to allow me
Speaker 3: to dive deeper into the things that I hold most
Speaker 3: dear to my heart.
Speaker 1: What do you remember most from our hunts in Alaska?
Speaker 3: I mean, I remember a lot of things, but I
Speaker 3: remember I mean, honestly, probably the thing that is more
Speaker 3: most striking to me was how uncomfortable you were to
Speaker 3: take your first animal, which meant the world to me
Speaker 3: because it's really uncomfortable for me to take an animal,
Speaker 3: and rarely do I see that in another And I'm
Speaker 3: not saying that other guys don't feel that. I think
Speaker 3: they do. I think a lot of us bury it,
Speaker 3: hide it, you know, whether it be on camera to
Speaker 3: our buddies or whatever. But you didn't have the position
Speaker 3: or the wherewithal to bury it or hide it. You
Speaker 3: just fricking it was out. And I appreciated it very much.
Speaker 3: The uncomfortability that you went through, and also the uncertainty.
Speaker 3: I remember the tarmac with the airplanes. I remember you
Speaker 3: realizing that I wasn't joking. We are flying out in little,
Speaker 3: tiny airplanes with pilots that are very skilled, but holding
Speaker 3: no control over the weather or what is going to happen.
Speaker 3: And so those are those are very defining moments for me.
Speaker 3: When you took your animal and then the flight out.
Speaker 1: Yeah, totally. I mean I remember so much of that
Speaker 1: trip and think about it all the time. But to
Speaker 1: your point about taking an animal, let me just say,
Speaker 1: if you're listening and you have any qualms with hunting,
Speaker 1: we're going to get into Donnie's worldview about hunting, which
Speaker 1: I think is really nuanced and important. But I'll say this,
Speaker 1: after I took that animal, I definitely went through I
Speaker 1: was totally sad. I was angry at you guys for
Speaker 1: a minute. I was. I mean, it was just all
Speaker 1: these emotional swings. But eventually, after going through that, I
Speaker 1: think I started to understand, Oh, this is why Donnie
Speaker 1: does what he does. And had you not because I
Speaker 1: remember your position on that was you don't have to hunt.
Speaker 1: I'm not going to make you hunt. At the same time,
Speaker 1: I think you would understand this greater topic that you're
Speaker 1: writing about if you were to hunt, And so for me,
Speaker 1: I trusted you on that, and immediately after I go,
Speaker 1: why did I trust this son of a bitch, Like,
Speaker 1: I think, this is the worst thing I've ever done
Speaker 1: in my life. I'm never coming back from this. But
Speaker 1: then afterwards I got it, and that just totally changed
Speaker 1: me in a lot of ways.
Speaker 3: Yeah, you could live. You could have calm just like
Speaker 3: you did in the vat.
Speaker 2: You could have.
Speaker 3: Calme and written the story and written the book about
Speaker 3: the things that we were doing from the outside of
Speaker 3: the fire, if you will. But if you wanted to
Speaker 3: truly dive into an experience and have those emotions well up,
Speaker 3: you you were going to have to take an animal's life.
Speaker 3: And I specifically remember your sadness, I specifically remember your anger.
Speaker 2: I also remember.
Speaker 3: When we were caribou their faces even when they're alive,
Speaker 3: when they were close to you, when you see their
Speaker 3: eyes and their big, huge bulbous nostrils, they are a
Speaker 3: very sweet looking animal there. People always like to use
Speaker 3: this word. It has no position in wilderness and wildlife,
Speaker 3: but people like to say they're in it.
Speaker 2: They have an innocence about them.
Speaker 3: They look like a creature that could do no harm.
Speaker 3: They look like a curious animal. They almost have eyes.
Speaker 3: They have looks like your dog might look at you.
Speaker 3: But I remember when you took that animal's life, and
Speaker 3: you took a fine bowl, an old bowl. That's what
Speaker 3: we do, that's how we try and do it. We
Speaker 3: try to remove animals from the herd that are gonna
Speaker 3: have very little impact on the herd. And I remember
Speaker 3: when you took that bowl. The quietness that the Arctic brings,
Speaker 3: other than a little bit of wind is it's very,
Speaker 3: very haunting you. There's nothing as far as you can
Speaker 3: see other than pure wilderness, some mountains, some trees, rivers,
Speaker 3: but there's nothing as far as you can see. There's
Speaker 3: a true aloneness that you feel there other than the
Speaker 3: people that you share that time with. And then your
Speaker 3: bowl was laying there, you know, there's a melancholy piece
Speaker 3: to this. And then I remember when we started skinning
Speaker 3: your bowl and you started to see, you know, dare
Speaker 3: I say, meat products that you also have seen in
Speaker 3: the grocery store.
Speaker 2: I remember you were like.
Speaker 3: Oh, now that the skin's off, Now that we're breaking
Speaker 3: the animal down, it's starting to look like steaks. And
Speaker 3: then I saw you kind of go oh. And I
Speaker 3: still to this day if I kill a moose or
Speaker 3: a black bear and you walk up on it, there's
Speaker 3: a sadness to it. And you start breaking the animal down,
Speaker 3: you start doing the work. You start earning these calories
Speaker 3: that you're going to have this winter or over the
Speaker 3: summer or whatever it is. You start getting the blood
Speaker 3: on your hands and feeling the weight in your backpack,
Speaker 3: and it starts to transition into a workload that is,
Speaker 3: you know, quite an investment and a respect that you
Speaker 3: have for wild places.
Speaker 1: Yeah. I think that's a good segue and to talk
Speaker 1: about kind of your overall worldview on hunting, because hunting
Speaker 1: is obviously controversial among a lot of people. Yeah, so
Speaker 1: how do you think about that and how do you
Speaker 1: have conversations with people who may be anti hunting. Maybe
Speaker 1: vegetarian or vegan. What do those look like? And how
Speaker 1: do you sort of shape that.
Speaker 3: It's in a manner of what you carry yourself in.
Speaker 3: It isn't smoking mirrors that there isn't this position of
Speaker 3: you have to dance around the subject matter or come
Speaker 3: up with clever sentences or clever statements to sell what
Speaker 3: you're doing. It is who we were as a people,
Speaker 3: and ecosystems do very very well to be hunted.
Speaker 2: Most do anyway.
Speaker 3: And obviously human beings have encroached into a lot of
Speaker 3: wild areas and we've pressured a lot of game in
Speaker 3: different areas where some animals are going extinct, and then
Speaker 3: some other animals that do very well in near human beings,
Speaker 3: like the white tailed deer are exploding and neither numbers
Speaker 3: taken down by hunters or else. There's just an immense
Speaker 3: amount of car collisions and things like that. If you
Speaker 3: want to carry yourself in a manner that is going
Speaker 3: to engage good conversation with non hunters or anti hunters,
Speaker 3: or vegetarians, vegans, whatever it is. People love when things
Speaker 3: are black and white, but nothing actually is black and white.
Speaker 3: We live in the gray position, and so we better
Speaker 3: carry ourselves and be open for thoughtful questions around saying
Speaker 3: because you might get asked the question Michael that actually
Speaker 3: changes your thought process and might actually make you think
Speaker 3: about a process that you're doing that you may maybe
Speaker 3: shouldn't be.
Speaker 2: When I think.
Speaker 3: Hunting right now, particularly everything on social media is grandiose.
Speaker 3: People that call themselves hunters right now, and some of
Speaker 3: the things that they do are very difficult to justify
Speaker 3: and very difficult to kind of contemplate because it isn't
Speaker 3: man versus beast, it isn't man versus wild. This is
Speaker 3: an immersion of who we are. And there's a big
Speaker 3: difference between conquering a land and shooting a limit, and
Speaker 3: then there is kind of becoming one with predator and
Speaker 3: prey and really enveloping yourself in the natural world.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and you've made the point. You know, if a
Speaker 1: person eats me, typically the buy in is to go
Speaker 1: to the grocery store and buy me that's you know,
Speaker 1: prepackaged looks all nice, but they don't really know where
Speaker 1: it came from, what the animal live like, all these
Speaker 1: other important things. Don't really have a selection over that.
Speaker 1: And you've pointed out, well, I actually know those things
Speaker 1: you know, I know how old this animal was. I
Speaker 1: know was it close to the end of its life?
Speaker 1: Where did it come from? How did it live? And
Speaker 1: so you said that we're kind of inserting yourself, and
Speaker 1: you're able to insert yourself and kind of I think
Speaker 1: make decisions that fundamentally change. How do you think about
Speaker 1: where your food come from? Comes from? In a world
Speaker 1: where most people, including myself, most things I hate, I
Speaker 1: have no idea. M M.
Speaker 3: Yeah. I think we as a people, and I mean
Speaker 3: myself is included. Like if I need something today, if
Speaker 3: I need to, if I'm might have broccoli for dinner,
Speaker 3: and you know I don't have a garden going right now.
Speaker 3: If I need broccoli for dinner, I'm going to go
Speaker 3: buy that broccoli. And I'm going to go to the
Speaker 3: grocer store and I'm going to try to get the
Speaker 3: best quality items that I can. But the reality is,
Speaker 3: you know, we don't live a lifestyle. Some people do
Speaker 3: that are truly off grade, But we don't live a
Speaker 3: lifestyle that lends itself to getting everything in this manner.
Speaker 3: But I think it's much more who you are as
Speaker 3: a person, how you live your life. And I think
Speaker 3: the more we hunt, the more we gather, the more
Speaker 3: we grow, the more we envelope ourselves in wild places
Speaker 3: and are getting outside and experiencing the wild world. And
Speaker 3: some of the things that you discovered in the comfort
Speaker 3: crisis when you went back, when you took some of
Speaker 3: our experiences to different researchers, and they and they backed
Speaker 3: up the things that I guess I was talking about
Speaker 3: and that you were experiencing as well, with how that
Speaker 3: affects our psyche and our happiness and our feeling fulfilled
Speaker 3: that you know, I just think it's where we live best.
Speaker 3: But man the infrastructure right now, Like you go to
Speaker 3: New York City, right, you live in downtown New York City.
Speaker 3: I don't even to me, that seems like a hell
Speaker 3: hole for me to live in Manhattan would be a prison.
Speaker 1: I don't think you would do well there. I really
Speaker 1: don't think. What do you beyond because we've been focusing
Speaker 1: on kind of food and meat, What do you think
Speaker 1: hunting gives people, well, particularly you, beyond just the meat?
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, it's it's time outside, right, it's sunrises,
Speaker 3: it's sunsets, it's the physicality. Much to like the technical
Speaker 3: book that you have just come up with now, about
Speaker 3: rocking or walking with weight like that is there's a
Speaker 3: euphoria that comes with going into the wilderness, whether it
Speaker 3: be hunting, fishing, you're looking for mushrooms, whatever it is.
Speaker 3: There's a euphoria that comes from peacefully and quietly moving
Speaker 3: about a space and becoming an observer.
Speaker 2: You're a frontline observer.
Speaker 3: You are picking apart everything from the birds, the fall
Speaker 3: of the fish, the weather, and just that feeling as
Speaker 3: a human being that quiet is.
Speaker 2: It's unreal.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and I think that the one of the important
Speaker 1: things that happens because you brought up hunting foraging. It's
Speaker 1: a search, right, and so humans evolved as hunters and gatherers.
Speaker 1: Every single day we knew we needed food to survive.
Speaker 1: We had no idea where it was going to be,
Speaker 1: so we had to insert ourselves in nature. And granted
Speaker 1: we lived in nature one hundred percent of the time,
Speaker 1: now we spend ninety three percent of our time indoors.
Speaker 1: We had to go out and search, and that search
Speaker 1: had to be inherently rewarding for human beings, or else
Speaker 1: we wouldn't have continued to do it day in and
Speaker 1: day out. So I still and I think one of
Speaker 1: the issues that we face today. Is that the same
Speaker 1: mechanics of the search for food, for hunting and gathering,
Speaker 1: they've been put in casino gambling slot machines. It's same
Speaker 1: way social media works all these different things, and that
Speaker 1: captures our attention the same way that those outdoor searches do,
Speaker 1: but in a way that doesn't give us all these
Speaker 1: important things like sunshine, like movement, like exposures of nature,
Speaker 1: like physical trials, like having to overcome things, and so
Speaker 1: that's been it's almost a hijacking of this ancient system,
Speaker 1: and it doesn't always help us.
Speaker 3: I totally agree and even at things that we're doing right.
Speaker 3: I have friends that, for instance, if I'm going to
Speaker 3: go fishing, I might get a small boat and paddle
Speaker 3: down the Mississippi River and cast my lures to you know,
Speaker 3: current seams and cast behind logs and behind rocks, and
Speaker 3: cast to places that I know or small mouth bass
Speaker 3: or walleyes or muskies where they're hiding for them to
Speaker 3: attack their prey. I might go about fishing that way.
Speaker 3: And then I have other friends that have a boat
Speaker 3: absolutely encapsulated electronics with transducers facing out from every app
Speaker 3: and it paints them a beautiful picture of this boulder,
Speaker 3: this tree, there's actually a fish laying right behind the
Speaker 3: second branch. It doesn't necessarily make them easier to catch,
Speaker 3: although you see zact where it is. But I'll guarantee
Speaker 3: you that experience is diminished. Everything in our lives is
Speaker 3: brought up as a shortcut, like you said.
Speaker 2: And I mean, imagine, I've done this before.
Speaker 3: I've been I've been so insanely dehydrated in the mountains
Speaker 3: because I've run out of water and I'm in an
Speaker 3: area where there aren't any streams and I'm not going
Speaker 3: to have any water until I dropped five thousand feet
Speaker 3: and then I have to find water. And I've went
Speaker 3: through that search and then found cold water, and to
Speaker 3: this day it was one of the most euphoric experiences
Speaker 3: of my life.
Speaker 2: And I've done the same thing now.
Speaker 3: I've never truly been starving, but I've went three or
Speaker 3: four days without food until a pilot came and picked
Speaker 3: me up. Or I went three or four days without
Speaker 3: food until I arrow it a dock and then was
Speaker 3: able to eat a doc or something like that, And
Speaker 3: that is I mean, it's difficult for me to convey
Speaker 3: the excitement that you get like holding a dead green
Speaker 3: wing teal snowing outside. I just I literally hiked two
Speaker 3: miles to come arrow this dock because I could see
Speaker 3: it on a pond two miles away, and I dropped
Speaker 3: on here to arrow this duck because I'm I'm gonna
Speaker 3: you know, I had to arrow this dock. Then I
Speaker 3: just stripped onto my underwear. So last week of September,
Speaker 3: I just swim out into a pond that's nearly frozen,
Speaker 3: grab this dead doc, swim back, dry off as much
Speaker 3: as I could, get dressed, hike back up, pluck the doc.
Speaker 3: Cook it. But I mean, there's no greater experience.
Speaker 1: And it's the best meal you've ever had in your life.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, it's unreal. It's and I wish we all
Speaker 3: still live that way. I really do like and I
Speaker 3: have no bane against farmers. But when agriculture started, we
Speaker 3: started having more babies, we started staying in one place.
Speaker 3: We started you know, our excrement was now in one place.
Speaker 3: And that was that.
Speaker 2: That started a ball rolling that we'll never be able
Speaker 2: to recover from.
Speaker 3: The Earth will reco from it, because you know, we'll
Speaker 3: go through some sort of you know event here that
Speaker 3: will probably greatly diminish, if not wipe human beings out.
Speaker 3: You know, whether that be in our lifetime or fifty lifetimes,
Speaker 3: who knows.
Speaker 1: So one thing is that you know when you when
Speaker 1: you tell stories about your hunts, it sounds so far
Speaker 1: away for the average person. And I remember when I
Speaker 1: first kind of became interested in hunting, and it was
Speaker 1: probably from you and your work. Before I sent that
Speaker 1: email to ask you if I could join you on
Speaker 1: that hunt in Nevada, I remember looking at how do
Speaker 1: I start? And it became I was like, oh my god,
Speaker 1: there are so many things you have to do to
Speaker 1: get started. It's not like basketball, where if I go,
Speaker 1: you know, I want to play basketball, So I go
Speaker 1: to Walmart, I buy a ball, and then I just
Speaker 1: go to the court and I start throwing it at
Speaker 1: the rim. What I think is interesting, though, is most
Speaker 1: of my friends from high school that hunted, they grew
Speaker 1: up in hunting families, and so I think people would think, oh,
Speaker 1: you must have come from this long line of hunt
Speaker 1: but you didn't. So how did you even get drawn
Speaker 1: into hunting and start to live this way?
Speaker 3: And that's a really good question, and it's one that
Speaker 3: I can't entirely answer, because when I was little, it
Speaker 3: was all I thought about. And I don't know if
Speaker 3: that came from my DNA or if that came from
Speaker 3: my dad's book collection, because my dad loved wildlife and
Speaker 3: he had all these different wildlife books. And I lost
Speaker 3: my dad this a little over a year ago, and
Speaker 3: there were questions. I have so many questions for my
Speaker 3: dad now that he's gone. But at his funeral, I
Speaker 3: was talking to one of his very best friends and
Speaker 3: he was talking about this adventurous life that I live,
Speaker 3: and he said, boy, are you your father's son? And
Speaker 3: I didn't get a chance that day, but I really
Speaker 3: wanted to ask him because I didn't see my dad
Speaker 3: as an adventurous man at all, and so I want
Speaker 3: to ask him. Obviously, he's referencing something in my dad's youth,
Speaker 3: and so I don't know what it is that you know,
Speaker 3: this gentleman was speaking of. But my dad had a
Speaker 3: really cool collection of old books, old hunting books and
Speaker 3: books on military tactics and wilderness survival and fishing and
Speaker 3: all these different how to books and had he had
Speaker 3: small game books, books that taught you how to hunt squirrels, rabbits,
Speaker 3: and crows back then to you know, books on hunting,
Speaker 3: grizzly bears and moose, and I just dove into all
Speaker 3: these things. And I can sit here and say I
Speaker 3: then wanted to be a hunter or a big game
Speaker 3: hunter or whatever. But really what I wanted, Michael, I
Speaker 3: think more than anything is that I wanted to live
Speaker 3: a rural life. I wanted to live in a cabin.
Speaker 3: I wanted to have to kill a moose for my
Speaker 3: winter meat. And it's I haven't gotten all the way there,
Speaker 3: but that is what I wanted. That is that those
Speaker 3: are that's the life that I wanted to live. That's
Speaker 3: those are the things that I find most charming, splitting
Speaker 3: wood and having heat your house with firewood, and going
Speaker 3: out and fishing and going out hunting, because there's there
Speaker 3: is this euphoria of doing it on your own and
Speaker 3: supplying for yourself.
Speaker 1: Yeah. So how did you start? Because I know in
Speaker 1: college you researched wildlife biology, that's what you studied, right,
Speaker 1: and then you ended up doing some research on tigers
Speaker 1: in Southeast Asia, right.
Speaker 2: Yeah, the in Nepaul and Bangladesh.
Speaker 1: What'd you learn from that?
Speaker 3: Those are scary places? That is one thing that I learned.
Speaker 3: I remember just going to the airport, and you've experienced
Speaker 3: some of this stuff yourself now, but going through machine
Speaker 3: gun checkpoints and going through checkpoints where everyone's pointing a
Speaker 3: gun at you and they think your passport is fake.
Speaker 3: And when I was younger, I thought they really thought
Speaker 3: my passport was fake. And now as I've gotten older,
Speaker 3: I realized they just want to bribe so they can
Speaker 3: get through to the next machine gun checkpoint where he's
Speaker 3: also going to tell you your passport is fake. And
Speaker 3: then you know, being those being in that research and
Speaker 3: kind of understanding and seeing like, for one, where when
Speaker 3: I was in Bangladesh, there's no hunting allowed in that country,
Speaker 3: But the gentleman that I was working for, he said, hey,
Speaker 3: careful kind of what you talk about when we're working
Speaker 3: with the other biologists, he said, you know, because he
Speaker 3: knew I did a lot of hunting, or that I
Speaker 3: loved hunting, lived hunt, I guess. But he also said,
Speaker 3: you're probably gonna get a lot of respect from the
Speaker 3: biologists here because even though they don't hunt in the
Speaker 3: country any longer. The ancestors that were the pillars of
Speaker 3: their communities, the leaders that were of their tribes were
Speaker 3: the better hunters in their tribes, So the hunters would
Speaker 3: go to the top of the community and probably because
Speaker 3: they could provide the most and kind of make decisions
Speaker 3: on where people need to go for hunting and gathering.
Speaker 2: And so he's like, you're probably gonna get a lot
Speaker 2: of respect from them.
Speaker 3: But just be you know, roll into it slowly because
Speaker 3: more so in a lot of those countries are dealing
Speaker 3: with so much poaching that they're you know, it's not
Speaker 3: that they're anti hunting, they're anti poaching, which is course.
Speaker 2: Was a very different thing.
Speaker 3: And I wanted to study wildlife biology because I wanted
Speaker 3: to be in wild systems and I wanted to contribute
Speaker 3: and help wildlife. And as weird it is for some
Speaker 3: of your viewers or listeners that don't understand hunting, that's
Speaker 3: also one of the biggest reasons why it hunts, because
Speaker 3: I want to be a frontline observer. I want to understand, Hey,
Speaker 3: how come there's a bunch less ducks, and why are
Speaker 3: we losing so much habitat and you know, all these
Speaker 3: different elements that are really really important because as we
Speaker 3: lose our soils, Like people might think I'm concerned about
Speaker 3: the white tailed deer or the black bear or something.
Speaker 3: But really what's concerning is our soils and our waters, insects,
Speaker 3: our grasses, things like that, because if we had those,
Speaker 3: if we still had you know, ten million buffalo on
Speaker 3: the planes, like, we would be so far better off
Speaker 3: than what we have right now. I'm having endless row
Speaker 3: crops of corn and soybeans.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think that's I understand why we have all
Speaker 1: these things. It's about efficiency. It's the fact that people
Speaker 1: could start to have a lot of children and then
Speaker 1: you go, well, a lot of these people are starving.
Speaker 1: What if we use some science to give people more
Speaker 1: food and keep them from starving, and then that propagates.
Speaker 1: But I do think you're right that we lose something
Speaker 1: in that process. It's like everything, right, It's like progress
Speaker 1: has trade offs, and sometimes those trade offs are good
Speaker 1: and sometimes they're bad. Yeah, And then so then you
Speaker 1: end up doing research. Was it on the Tulisach River?
Speaker 1: Is that right?
Speaker 3: Yes? In Alaska?
Speaker 1: And that was doing and that was doing Samon counts.
Speaker 1: So you get I loved this story. You get sent
Speaker 1: out for how long were out there? Like five months?
Speaker 1: And there was a bunch of you that started, and
Speaker 1: I think you were the last person standing. So tell
Speaker 1: us about that experience and what did you learn from
Speaker 1: all that time alone outside.
Speaker 3: Yeah, when I interviewed with my boss, it is really
Speaker 3: funny because I was nervous. I know, these jobs have
Speaker 3: a lot of competition to get and so I really
Speaker 3: wanted to be in the wilderness for the summer, you know,
Speaker 3: spring summer, early to fall in and so I started.
Speaker 3: I was studying up on all my biology because I
Speaker 3: was like, what is he going to ask me in
Speaker 3: the interview?
Speaker 2: How is this going to go?
Speaker 3: And I better have my you know, my ducktn room
Speaker 3: And he said, basically, my interview was we're going to
Speaker 3: drop you off from the wilderness. What's the what's the
Speaker 3: chance that I'm going to have to come and pick
Speaker 3: you up? And I said zero? And he said are
Speaker 3: you sure? And I said, yeah, I'm not coming out
Speaker 3: like you're not. I'm not going to get homesick. You're
Speaker 3: not going to have to come get me. He's like, well,
Speaker 3: that's that was the biggest thing that they were looking for.
Speaker 3: And to your point, because a lot of the people
Speaker 3: that go and do this work, they end up a
Speaker 3: week in two weeks in, three weeks in, they're they're
Speaker 3: they're out, like they want to get picked up, they
Speaker 3: want to go home, they want to drink a beer
Speaker 3: with their buddies, and they want to get back to
Speaker 3: that kind of that infrastructure, that kind of noise that
Speaker 3: we feel very comfortable with. But I thrived in this,
Speaker 3: you know position like this is. You know, they provided
Speaker 3: me with a tent and a sleeping bag. We had food,
Speaker 3: We had a research tent like I had even though
Speaker 3: to the average person, I was roughing it. To me,
Speaker 3: I had everything that anyone could ever want, and I
Speaker 3: loved it. I love being around the wildlife. I love
Speaker 3: the quiet. There were times, you know, there's about four weeks,
Speaker 3: six eight weeks where the bugs are you know, biblical like,
Speaker 3: they will wipe you out.
Speaker 2: Like it's probably early June to early August.
Speaker 3: It's significant, and so you just have to get your
Speaker 3: mind right. You're gonna have clouds of mosquitos, You're going
Speaker 3: to have you know, there's going to be you know,
Speaker 3: things that you're gonna have to face throughout your day.
Speaker 3: But seeing you know, I remember, like day three that
Speaker 3: I was there, I was talking to this up a
Speaker 3: kid and I was like, hey, man, I have to
Speaker 3: go take a nap because we'd been working twenty four
Speaker 3: hours a day for a couple of days. It's like,
Speaker 3: I got to go lay down. He's like, okay. His
Speaker 3: name's Peter Gregory. He's an awesome, awesome kid. And I said,
Speaker 3: but if you've seen anything cool, come wake me up.
Speaker 3: And he's like okay. And so I went laid down
Speaker 3: and he came over to the tent. I was laying
Speaker 3: down for maybe thirty minutes, and he's like, eh, darnie,
Speaker 3: there's a big bear.
Speaker 2: Was like, Peter, don't mess with me.
Speaker 3: Man, Like we're just starting out working together, Like, tell
Speaker 3: him be honest. He's like, I'm serious, biggish bear I've
Speaker 3: ever seen in my life. So I was here and
Speaker 3: so I got out and the bugs weren't out yet.
Speaker 3: I remember I unzipped my tent and I stood out
Speaker 3: there with Peter, and I could see this huge tundra flat,
Speaker 3: which you know what that looks like now, I felt
Speaker 3: like I could see twenty miles and I could see
Speaker 3: the Killbuck Mountains, which Purple Mountain majesty like literally looks
Speaker 3: absolutely perfect. And then here's this bohemoth one thousand pound
Speaker 3: plus brown bear just walking right past my tent, his
Speaker 3: furs really long from over the winter, and it's blowing
Speaker 3: in the wind, and he just walked as peacefully by it.
Speaker 3: It looked like every oil painting I've ever seen that
Speaker 3: has stopped me in my tracks. And that's just being
Speaker 3: there and doing that stuff, and seeing the fish and
Speaker 3: holding the salmon and understanding the ecosystem and watching that
Speaker 3: river system. We'd get there early enough, there'd be no
Speaker 3: fish in the river besides residence species Dolly Bardon, grayling,
Speaker 3: northern pike. But then all of a sudden, one day
Speaker 3: you could hear the fish in the river. The river
Speaker 3: would go, it'd be very few egos, very few gulls.
Speaker 2: Very few wolves, and grizzly bears very few.
Speaker 3: And then one day the fish would show up and
Speaker 3: the whole ecosystem would come to life with all the
Speaker 3: animals that I just listed. And I mean to see
Speaker 3: that and experience that, and to know that that happens
Speaker 3: every year in the wilderness, whether we're there or not,
Speaker 3: I mean, that is that's everything to me.
Speaker 1: I feel like that's this greater metaphor for a lot
Speaker 1: of ways that we improve and that is to say,
Speaker 1: you can't quit until the magic happens. And it's like,
Speaker 1: I'm sure with the people who tapped out, because if
Speaker 1: I remember right, something like ninety percent of people don't
Speaker 1: finish the full five months.
Speaker 3: That's right.
Speaker 1: And I think anytime you're doing something that has challenges,
Speaker 1: you hit this point where you just go, I've had enough.
Speaker 1: I got to get the hell out of here. Like
Speaker 1: you just start to freak out. But if you can
Speaker 1: just kind of wait it out and just wait and see,
Speaker 1: then you kind of get this second moment where that
Speaker 1: sort of phase and you go, oh, this is why
Speaker 1: I'm here. Yeah, But if you don't go through that
Speaker 1: doubt and the struggle, you're never going to get that
Speaker 1: big important realization.
Speaker 3: I think that's really well said, and I think we
Speaker 3: experienced that a lot in life and even the things
Speaker 3: that I mean even exercise, right, Like, you get to
Speaker 3: a point with exercise and you're like, this absolutely sucks.
Speaker 3: But then you get over this hump where it's almost
Speaker 3: like that ball or wheels starts rolling down the other
Speaker 3: side of the hill and you're like, holy cow, I
Speaker 3: made it. And now embracing this suck is that much
Speaker 3: easier and now you have this perspective that you didn't
Speaker 3: have on the on the front side.
Speaker 2: I think that's yeah, I think that's very well said.
Speaker 1: So you starts as a hunter, you do this work
Speaker 1: in Alaska, and then at a certain point you start
Speaker 1: filming your hunts. And the way that I described your
Speaker 1: hunts in the in your films in the Comfort Crisis
Speaker 1: is I like to say, there are a lot like
Speaker 1: Planet Earth, except they have hunting in them in the
Speaker 1: sense that I think if people are aware of any
Speaker 1: hunting films or documentary they've seen on the Outdoor Channel,
Speaker 1: they're not good. It's just some people who are kind
Speaker 1: of we need to get the buck with the biggest
Speaker 1: antlers and grip and grins, and yours are very thoughtful
Speaker 1: and very much embedded in nature, and nature becomes kind
Speaker 1: of the key character in this. So how did you
Speaker 1: even start doing the documentaries and what made you want
Speaker 1: to do something different? What was it about that that
Speaker 1: you're like, I want it, this is how I'm going
Speaker 1: to do it.
Speaker 3: Yep.
Speaker 2: So, so it's a long story that I'll give you
Speaker 2: the cliff notes.
Speaker 3: And so I was working as a biologist and I
Speaker 3: was also going on hunts because it was just all
Speaker 3: I ever wanted to do. And when I was on
Speaker 3: these hunts, I started bringing a handicam and a camera
Speaker 3: because I wanted to come home and talk to my
Speaker 3: mom and dad and say like, look at this grizzly
Speaker 3: that walked to my camp, and look at this caribou
Speaker 3: that I saw, and look at the northern lights, and
Speaker 3: here are the things. It's kind of like bringing my
Speaker 3: adventures home, tell family and friends. And then through hunting,
Speaker 3: I would bump into people in airports, I would bump
Speaker 3: into people in hunting camps or maybe a lodge, and
Speaker 3: they know, we'd just start talking and say what do
Speaker 3: you doing?
Speaker 2: I'm a biologist And then I'd say what do you do?
Speaker 3: And they'd say, Oh, I have a TV show on
Speaker 3: the Outdoor Channel, or you know, I'm editor of this
Speaker 3: hunting magazine or whatever it is, and variably, and so
Speaker 3: I started to meet people, and then people started taking
Speaker 3: interest in the hunts that I was doing and started
Speaker 3: asking me like, Hey, would you write a magazine article perhaps,
Speaker 3: or could we photograph you for.
Speaker 2: A magazine article?
Speaker 3: And and then can you show me some of this
Speaker 3: footage that you have because I would love to use
Speaker 3: it for my TV show, and I would just give
Speaker 3: him my footage and and so one thing kind of
Speaker 3: led to another, and I did a project with a photographer.
Speaker 3: I did a sheep hunt in in the Yukon in
Speaker 3: this Peterson's Hunting magazine, I believe it was wanted to
Speaker 3: shoot photos, wanted to do a photo essay of this
Speaker 3: particular hunt. So the photographer contacted me and he's like, hey,
Speaker 3: I met him through some other work and he said,
Speaker 3: I would love to tag along with you on this hunt.
Speaker 3: I'll pay my own way, take all your photos, and
Speaker 3: then you know, you'll have access to all the photos,
Speaker 3: and and and then I'll he'll have his project. We
Speaker 3: went and did that, and then that opened a lot
Speaker 3: of eyes in the industry.
Speaker 2: People wanted.
Speaker 3: You know, I started popping up on covers of magazines
Speaker 3: and in magazine ads. That actually became a problem because
Speaker 3: I started walking through department stores and I'd see my
Speaker 3: face on like men's underwear, and you know, I didn't
Speaker 3: I didn't understand that there was a market here that
Speaker 3: was going on. I didn't realize the commercialization of this.
Speaker 3: And so long story short, I started working with a
Speaker 3: particular company and I said.
Speaker 2: I approached them and I said, hey, I.
Speaker 3: Would like to maybe get into more professional filming and
Speaker 3: do some more storytelling.
Speaker 2: And they said okay.
Speaker 3: They said, well, we have another guy that also wants
Speaker 3: is kind of hitting us up for some dollars to
Speaker 3: do this project over here. Perhaps we can introduce you too,
Speaker 3: and we can double our dollars down in one place,
Speaker 3: and you guys can work together and work on a
Speaker 3: very similar project. Sound like you guys want to work similarly,
Speaker 3: And so I went. I went and started doing that project.
Speaker 3: And that gentleman had he had some a photographer that
Speaker 3: worked for him, and then the editor that worked for him.
Speaker 3: And I met these guys and they're wildly talented and
Speaker 3: we started working on this project together. Well, that guy
Speaker 3: that I got linked up with was not a not
Speaker 3: a good man. He wasn't good to just not a
Speaker 3: good man. He wasn't He didn't do things legally, he
Speaker 3: didn't treat his employees.
Speaker 2: Well.
Speaker 3: He's very talented with a with a still camera, which
Speaker 3: is why he had gotten as far as he had gotten.
Speaker 2: But and so I just decided, this.
Speaker 3: Is really cool filming wildlife in this manner and kind
Speaker 3: of going down this storytelling road with a bit more
Speaker 3: of a professional eye. And I thought maybe we could
Speaker 3: do this on our own. And so I approached the
Speaker 3: two guys that worked for him and I said, hey,
Speaker 3: I'm going to start my own company. And within I
Speaker 3: mean a sentence, they said, you know, hey, we want
Speaker 3: to leave and go with you and start this company.
Speaker 3: And that in the one guy's name is Kyle Nikolaite,
Speaker 3: he was, he's not my business partner. He is not
Speaker 3: a man that gives compliments. He does not have the
Speaker 3: ability to pay someone a compliment. He only is a
Speaker 3: truth sayer, that's it. And so, like we were riding
Speaker 3: a truck one day and he said, you're a really
Speaker 3: good storyteller. You have a very honest approach to your storytelling,
Speaker 3: and you have a heartfelt sorrow or position that you hold.
Speaker 3: You're very very thoughtful in your design and architecture of
Speaker 3: how you tell a story. And he said, if you're
Speaker 3: willing to do that on camera, I think people would
Speaker 3: respond to it in a very positive way, and I
Speaker 3: think you could make films that people would watch.
Speaker 2: And so he is a very gifted editor. And then
Speaker 2: William Altman, as you.
Speaker 1: Know Sawyer's Little Man, William's in the Comfort Crisis for
Speaker 1: those of you who have read the book.
Speaker 3: Yes, and so he is an extraordinarily different human being.
Speaker 3: And I have another sort of William Altman named Forrest
Speaker 3: Row Now that works for us, and he is very
Speaker 3: similar to William. He's twenty two years old or twenty
Speaker 3: three now. But all he wants to do is all
Speaker 3: he wants to do is be outside, and all he
Speaker 3: wants to do is be outside in the right manner, if.
Speaker 2: That makes sense, you know, William.
Speaker 3: And so we started a company and we started making films,
Speaker 3: and then that led to us telling stories for other companies,
Speaker 3: and we started doing commercial work. And we said no
Speaker 3: to commercial work for years and years because we didn't
Speaker 3: want to really necessarily commercialize who we were. And then
Speaker 3: in true sense of kind of what you just referred to,
Speaker 3: we started telling stories for other companies and it started
Speaker 3: to be terribly rewarding to take our talent set to
Speaker 3: get to know someone like you. Let's say you wanted
Speaker 3: to film a piece around the Comfort Crisis, and to
Speaker 3: tell your story through what it is that we do.
Speaker 3: And we really started to grow as a company and
Speaker 3: doing commercial work and then also our documentaries.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and you guys just released this new documentary, The
Speaker 1: Way Back. This is a great one because I really
Speaker 1: feel like it hatchers who you are and it tells
Speaker 1: the story of this caribou hunt you did, but with
Speaker 1: this sort of thread of how you done that same
Speaker 1: hunt with your father who you mentioned passed away. How
Speaker 1: did that all come together? Did you go into that
Speaker 1: knowing that was what the story was, or did that
Speaker 1: arise organically or how did it all happen.
Speaker 3: That popped up organically and in the true essence of
Speaker 3: the word. And so I started hunting as things kind
Speaker 3: of line up in my life. I started hunting with
Speaker 3: this particular pilot out of Port Olsworth, Alaska, and I
Speaker 3: started moose hunting with him and caribou hunting with him.
Speaker 3: And he's a very difficult place to hunt caribou. And
Speaker 3: he's like, I think you would really like this place
Speaker 3: where we hunt caribou. He's like, there's very few animals there.
Speaker 3: It's a huge area. You're not going to see very
Speaker 3: many animals at all. But there are some very old
Speaker 3: and large bulls there that need to be taken because
Speaker 3: as the population basically doesn't have as the biologist put it,
Speaker 3: they didn't want to care, but to start eating themselves,
Speaker 3: not a house and home. And so this is down
Speaker 3: in the Alaska Peninsula. It's a lot of weather, very
Speaker 3: dangerous hunt and very difficult. So he's like, I think
Speaker 3: you'd love it. So I started doing that and I
Speaker 3: did the first year and it was awesome. You kind
Speaker 3: of see a reflection of that in the in the hunt,
Speaker 3: and it was such a cool place to be. And
Speaker 3: we had really nice weather that year, which was remarkable,
Speaker 3: and we found some really handsome old bowls, and we
Speaker 3: worked really hard to get to be successful, and so
Speaker 3: it was awesome. And I remember I was texting my
Speaker 3: dad because my mom my mom had had a stroke,
Speaker 3: and so I was text with my dad and I
Speaker 3: was like, Hey, how's everything going at home? And it's
Speaker 3: like good, and he's kind of telling me the ups
Speaker 3: and down and I was getting ready to fly home.
Speaker 3: This is kind of fun. But I was getting ready
Speaker 3: to fly home, and I probably had like four or
Speaker 3: five days left. And then I was sitting down and
Speaker 3: an interview and I felt the ground shake beneath me,
Speaker 3: and I was like, oh, that was a pretty big earthquake.
Speaker 3: And I've been an earthquakes before, but I was like
Speaker 3: that one, like really like.
Speaker 2: Really move the earth.
Speaker 3: And so I contacted one of the pilots, being my
Speaker 3: in reach, and I was like, man, did you guys
Speaker 3: feel that earthquake at camp? And he's like, wasn't an earthquake?
Speaker 3: A volcano erupted. He's like, so you felt the volcano
Speaker 3: erupt And I was like, oh, that's cool, and he's
Speaker 3: like it is cool. He's like, but no airplanes are
Speaker 3: going to be able to fly now for like ten
Speaker 3: days because volcanic ash destroys airplane engines and so you
Speaker 3: know you're gonna have to sit tight and you know
Speaker 3: whatever else, and which was I thought was cool. So
Speaker 3: I was texting my dad about all that stuff, and
Speaker 3: he loved My dad always thought like he'd always asked
Speaker 3: me like, hey, man, where are you going? What are
Speaker 3: you up to? Or if I text him, he'd be
Speaker 3: like where where are you because he wouldn't even really
Speaker 3: know where I was. And then and then he always
Speaker 3: you know, wanted me to get home safe, and he's like,
Speaker 3: you know, you can't keep doing this work and not
Speaker 3: come up short, you know, And so we always talk
Speaker 3: about I know that, and so fast forward, and I
Speaker 3: ended up suddenly losing my dad and my mom within
Speaker 3: ten weeks. And so then my life just continues like
Speaker 3: all of ours do. And you know, you obviously exist
Speaker 3: with great sorrow. And I didn't always have a great
Speaker 3: relationship with my dad, and he was very much like
Speaker 3: some of your humble beginnings in the comfort crisis. My dad,
Speaker 3: I knew my dad with I had a relationship with alcohol.
Speaker 3: That's what I knew when I was growing up was
Speaker 3: my dad and beer, and and he was a you know,
Speaker 3: he was a great drunk, if you will, Like he
Speaker 3: just drank and you know, there wasn't fighting or anything,
Speaker 3: and he just that was his thing.
Speaker 2: But he didn't have a lot of time for me.
Speaker 3: And I grew up in a household with a brother
Speaker 3: and sister that were you know, they they weren't, they
Speaker 3: were troubled, and so my parents were very very focused
Speaker 3: on my brother and sisters. So anyway, so when my
Speaker 3: dad and my mom passed, it affected me much more
Speaker 3: than I thought it would, because I instantly thought of
Speaker 3: a million questions that I wanted to ask my dad,
Speaker 3: things that I couldn't conjure up when he was alive, Right,
Speaker 3: I'd take him deer hunting and we'd sit in the
Speaker 3: truck and we talk about the weather or if the
Speaker 3: crops were out, and it would always make me kind
Speaker 3: of giggle. He'd always tap his fingers on the windowsill
Speaker 3: of my truck and he'd be like, oh, a lot
Speaker 3: of corn is still standing, you know.
Speaker 2: And you know, we talk about the weather. And my
Speaker 2: dad had an interesting life. He was in the navy.
Speaker 3: And now I'm curious when his friend said, oh, you
Speaker 3: are your father's son, Now I'm really curious about like,
Speaker 3: was he fishing a lot more than he ever told
Speaker 3: me about? Was he My dad wasn't a talker, so
Speaker 3: he didn't tell stories. And so fast forward, my life continues,
Speaker 3: and we're going in on this project on the Peninsula
Speaker 3: again because I wanted to another I wanted to get
Speaker 3: out there and see more of that country. And Yeah,
Speaker 3: there was just a complexity in my emotions and the
Speaker 3: things that I was doing that I didn't anticipate from that.
Speaker 3: And so yeah, and I wanted to put a film
Speaker 3: together and kind of talk about some of that stuff,
Speaker 3: because I mean, it's as raw and as you know, revealing,
Speaker 3: as vulnerable as I guess as a person can be.
Speaker 1: Yeah, well, I thought it was just I thought it
Speaker 1: was excellent. And I thought also that it really highlighted
Speaker 1: how you stand out in the hunting world in a
Speaker 1: way that you'll talk about those things. I think you're
Speaker 1: a lot more I would say intellectual hunter. I would
Speaker 1: even say spiritual hunter. I would be interested in two things.
Speaker 1: How have those views evolved? Have you always had them?
Speaker 1: Have they changed over time? And then also how have
Speaker 1: you been received in the quote unquote traditional hunting world.
Speaker 3: When I was young, I thought I had to behave
Speaker 3: a certain way that I was kind of seeing on
Speaker 3: TV or I was seeing like with Buddies of Mind,
Speaker 3: where like if we kill the deer, you know, we
Speaker 3: would hoot and holler and I would be excited. You know,
Speaker 3: if I if I shot a buck and I was
Speaker 3: hooting and hollering, it wasn't fake if I was really excited.
Speaker 3: And like Bodies of Mind, when we first started hunting,
Speaker 3: you know, we would come up empty handed ninety nine
Speaker 3: percent of the time. So when we finally got a deer,
Speaker 3: like we'd hug and you know, like holy cown, even
Speaker 3: though we just lived it. We'd tell each other the
Speaker 3: story again and like he came down this ridge, and
Speaker 3: you know, we'd do all this stuff, but once you
Speaker 3: were over that emotional dump, you know, you'd look at
Speaker 3: this animal and I would, and you see the blood
Speaker 3: coming out of his wounds, and you'd understand that, oh,
Speaker 3: my arrow passed through his heart or my bullet passed
Speaker 3: through his lungs and he ran, and I would see.
Speaker 3: I'd put myself in this perspective of I'd watch and
Speaker 3: tip over, and I knew that he's losing his life
Speaker 3: right now, and so I would think about that, and
Speaker 3: what if that was me? What if I was the
Speaker 3: one that had been shot. I'm over there trying to
Speaker 3: take my next breath, but my lungs are filling and
Speaker 3: and and I would just have this connection of understanding,
Speaker 3: or at least I would think about, you know, what
Speaker 3: did this deer go through? And now that he's laying there,
Speaker 3: and I'm going to start skinning him, you know, I'm
Speaker 3: looking at his eyes and his nose, and you know,
Speaker 3: and right away, I you know, i'd start cleaning the
Speaker 3: blood up, and I start brushing the dirt off his
Speaker 3: face and putting his tongue back in his mouth. And
Speaker 3: his tongue had fallen out and things that I felt
Speaker 3: were appropriate.
Speaker 2: And so I've just always had this.
Speaker 3: Ultimate respect of don't take the animal's life until you're
Speaker 3: entirely ready, or this is the animal, or this is
Speaker 3: the moment, this is what you're going to do. And
Speaker 3: then once you do that, there's this there's a proper
Speaker 3: steps that you need to take to utilize this animal
Speaker 3: into you know, to be kind of in this wild system.
Speaker 3: And so while I've always felt that great connection, it
Speaker 3: took me a while to understand and to be honest
Speaker 3: with you, you were also a big piece of my
Speaker 3: growth because talking to you about this stuff for the
Speaker 3: Men's Health magazine it was something that I'd never done before.
Speaker 3: And in talking and teaching it to you, or in
Speaker 3: talking about it openly with you, I found areas of
Speaker 3: my brain and things that I talked about, you know,
Speaker 3: kind of where you you'd asked me a question, I'd
Speaker 3: say sentence, and I go, yeah, yeah, that's how I feel.
Speaker 3: But I haven't had to conjure that sentence up to
Speaker 3: anyone else because nobody else had asked me that question.
Speaker 2: And so then I started to understand.
Speaker 3: And then once I read the Comfort Crisis, and I
Speaker 3: started to see all these metrics that you went put
Speaker 3: to the things that I was experiencing, and then all
Speaker 3: so even actually with the scarcity brain and kind of
Speaker 3: seeing like I kind of giggled when I read the
Speaker 3: scarcity Brain, because it's very easy to look at somebody
Speaker 3: and be like, dude, you're getting hoodwinked with a slot machine.
Speaker 3: But then I also looked at it as my own life,
Speaker 3: and I was like, man, I'm getting hoodwinked with a
Speaker 3: white tail deer because every November, every November, it's all
Speaker 3: I can think about, and every springtime I wanted, you know,
Speaker 3: I want to go on and tap trees right now
Speaker 3: for maple syrup, and I have firewood to cut, and
Speaker 3: then I'm gonna have fish that I'm gonna go chase.
Speaker 3: And so it's kind of the same thing a little bit.
Speaker 3: I mean, there's no bells and whistles, but I get
Speaker 3: maple syrup comes out of the tree once I boil
Speaker 3: it down. It's kind of the same thing you get in.
Speaker 3: And so I didn't always have this soulful, heartful connection
Speaker 3: to where I can articulate it, but I always took
Speaker 3: that time, even around my buddies, I didn't talk to
Speaker 3: them about it. But I always took that time to
Speaker 3: put myself in the deer's shoes, if you will, or
Speaker 3: to put myself in the dut shoes, and to do
Speaker 3: these things. And I'd killed a couple of animals when
Speaker 3: I was younger, like I shot a blue jay once,
Speaker 3: I shot a black caped CHICKENI once these are non
Speaker 3: game species that I just cause and effect. I had
Speaker 3: a gun. I was a little kid or a younger kid.
Speaker 3: I saw a bird and I shot it fell and
Speaker 3: those were immediate for me, immediate no nos and sorrows.
Speaker 3: And I remember I shot the chickadee and instantly I
Speaker 3: was like, oh my, I just took a sanda's life
Speaker 3: for absolutely no reason. And then I kind of let
Speaker 3: someone talk me into shooting the blue jay. And then
Speaker 3: I learned then that I was like, doesn't matter what
Speaker 3: anyone else wants, it matters what I want. And then
Speaker 3: even when we first started, you know, working with you,
Speaker 3: and then when we wrote our first film in twenty twelve,
Speaker 3: I wrote this voice over for the film and I
Speaker 3: handed it to Kyle nick Lay and he read it
Speaker 3: and he's like, this is terrible. He's like, you have
Speaker 3: to rewrite all of this. He's like, I've never ever
Speaker 3: heard you talk like this, but I wrote it in
Speaker 3: a manner that I thought we were going to entertain people.
Speaker 3: And he he educated me much like you did in
Speaker 3: some essence where he's like, you have to make these
Speaker 3: films as though no one's going to watch them.
Speaker 2: You have to make these films so they are so
Speaker 2: true to who you are that.
Speaker 3: It doesn't matter if anyone else watches it, because if
Speaker 3: you make it for you then and you're being completely honest,
Speaker 3: then you'll never have to chase any sort of fashion
Speaker 3: or or you know, a different type of decision or or.
Speaker 2: Or you know, inspirations or whatever.
Speaker 1: Dude, you were always Isn't that such a good metaphor
Speaker 1: for art and how to live? Yes, it's like, why
Speaker 1: copy everyone else?
Speaker 2: Just do your own for you.
Speaker 1: If people like it, great, If they don't, you still
Speaker 1: you still got something internally rewarding from it.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and if you chased the things people liked, which
Speaker 3: change all the time, you're always going to be one
Speaker 3: percent behind or ten percent behind where the people are going.
Speaker 3: You're always it's and you're not doing anything that's true
Speaker 3: to yourself. So it's literally you're it's an empty bucket.
Speaker 1: Well, then you have to become your your copying what
Speaker 1: has become the trend? Whereas I would argue with your case,
Speaker 1: you have started a trend of hunting documentaries that are
Speaker 1: different than what was before, Like you're kind of the pioneer.
Speaker 1: You're seeing a lot more documentaries that are shot like
Speaker 1: Planet Earth if you will, that are asking big questions.
Speaker 1: What when you first released your first documentaries, what was
Speaker 1: the reaction in the hunting community.
Speaker 2: I thought we were going to get murdered, if I'm
Speaker 2: being honest.
Speaker 1: I thought the guys interested to have guns yep.
Speaker 3: And I thought the guys are gonna there that it's
Speaker 3: going to be horrible, And it wasn't. People came out
Speaker 3: of the woodwork and said, I've thought about for years.
Speaker 3: I've never articulated to my buddies. I've had these same sorrows.
Speaker 3: I've had the same seriousness. Other guys came, I mean,
Speaker 3: I'll be honest with you. A couple of guys came
Speaker 3: to me and said, this is, you know, ridiculous. It's
Speaker 3: just hunting. It's just a deer, you know. But very
Speaker 3: very little of that, Michael much more was people then
Speaker 3: wanted me, wanted their kids to watch our stuff. And
Speaker 3: then you know hunting instructors wanted their pupils to watch
Speaker 3: our stuff, and you know guys that were going to
Speaker 3: get their hunter safety cards. And it was a lot
Speaker 3: of stuff like that. I met a young lady last
Speaker 3: week at a convention. I met her dad and she
Speaker 3: started a company called Cookies for Conservation and so where
Speaker 3: she started baking cookies in their kitchen, she would go
Speaker 3: out and selling. This was something that she wanted to do.
Speaker 3: She was thirteen or fourteen and she started selling all
Speaker 3: these cookies. She gives one hundred percent of the proceeds.
Speaker 3: I'm sure she buys cookie dough and stuff with her,
Speaker 3: but she gives on a hundred percent of her proceeds
Speaker 3: to wildlife habitat and generating wildlife habitat. And he's like
Speaker 3: that you are the one that inspired her to do
Speaker 3: this stuff. So yeah, and I got I got another guy.
Speaker 3: He's like, hey, can I take a picture with you.
Speaker 3: He's like, my kids are gonna flip out. He's like
Speaker 3: you are and this is so weird. But he's like,
Speaker 3: your our kids reward for if like they crush their
Speaker 3: metrics during the week of school and sports or whatever.
Speaker 3: They get to watch Donnie Vincent films on the weekend,
Speaker 3: and it's just like, yeah, so it's.
Speaker 2: Stuff like that that, and I've.
Speaker 3: Received very little negative, you know, feedback some of it.
Speaker 3: You know, some guys don't want to listen to the
Speaker 3: long drawn out answers or writing or kind of the
Speaker 3: reflective nature of it.
Speaker 2: They don't want to do that.
Speaker 3: And then of course, you know, some people are just
Speaker 3: you know, they're just against what what I'm doing all together.
Speaker 3: But it's very few, very few.
Speaker 1: What's interesting is I think that even vegans see some
Speaker 1: value and what you're doing. Oh like, you're not getting
Speaker 1: all these letters from vegans that are negative, many are positive.
Speaker 2: Many many are positive. And then they are curious.
Speaker 3: They'll say, Okay, for instance, I'll tell you one I
Speaker 3: did this shoot years ago. We did this shoot with
Speaker 3: a company called zeal Optics. They make sunglasses and snow
Speaker 3: goggles and stuff. And they invited they invited us out
Speaker 3: to this big photo shoot and where they're doing a
Speaker 3: new catalog and I was one of their athletes. And
Speaker 3: so it was me and all these red Bull dudes
Speaker 3: and girls, all these super talented people. And so the
Speaker 3: first night we all got in this house and everyone's
Speaker 3: in the Red Bull gear and I'm just sitting there
Speaker 3: like I've seen you in a magazine. I've seen you
Speaker 3: in a magazine. I'm you know, I'm sitting there and
Speaker 3: the guy's like, okay, first thing first, we're going to
Speaker 3: go around a room. Say your name, you're disciplined what
Speaker 3: you do, and you know while you're here. And so
Speaker 3: all these people are going around like I'm a professional snowboarder,
Speaker 3: I'm a professionel down hill, mountain bike or all this stuff.
Speaker 2: And there's a guy named Mike Dowdy.
Speaker 3: He's i think the best wakeboarder in the world out
Speaker 3: of Florida. Been a Red Bull guy forever. And he's
Speaker 3: laying on the couch and he has his Red Bull
Speaker 3: baseball cap over his eyes, which, if anyone knows anything.
Speaker 2: About Red Bull, you can't even buy a Red Bull
Speaker 2: baseball cap. So if you see somebody with a.
Speaker 3: Red Bull baseball cap, like, they're probably have gods of talent.
Speaker 3: So anyway, he's laying there with his baseball cap on
Speaker 3: his eyes, and it's going all the way around and
Speaker 3: it comes to me and I'm like, my name's Donny Vincent.
Speaker 3: I'm an adventure bowl hunter and they're all kind of
Speaker 3: looking at me, and he lifts his cap up and
Speaker 3: he looks over and he says, what did you just say?
Speaker 3: And I said, my name's Donny Been someone adventure bow
Speaker 3: hunter filmmaker. And he just sat there and he's like,
Speaker 3: coolst fricking thing I've ever heard in my life.
Speaker 2: And he put his hat back over his face. And
Speaker 2: so all of those people, most of.
Speaker 3: Those people, a lot of those people were, you know,
Speaker 3: against hunting or had questions about hunting, or were vegans
Speaker 3: or vegetarians or whatever. And the next morning I was
Speaker 3: up early getting a cup of coffee and one of
Speaker 3: the dudes was a professional surfer and he's like, man,
Speaker 3: I've never eaten meat in my entire life. He goes,
Speaker 3: both my parents eat meat because I've never eaten meat
Speaker 3: in my entire life. But he said I and he
Speaker 3: kind of looked around. He's like, but I've always wanted
Speaker 3: to be a bow hunter. And he's like, what is
Speaker 3: that all about? And I goes from our ancestry, man,
Speaker 3: I said, you you know, and he's like, I feel
Speaker 3: this connection in the waves he talked about feeling the
Speaker 3: energy of the earth and the waves, and he's talking
Speaker 3: about seeing fish and all this stuff, and I was
Speaker 3: just like, that's He's like, where's that coming from? And
Speaker 3: I said, that's from us being hunters and gathers. Your
Speaker 3: ancestors hunted and gathered and would skin buffalo and eat
Speaker 3: meat and would forage. And I said that was a
Speaker 3: very successful way for us to live and a very
Speaker 3: rewarding way for us to grow muscle in our minds
Speaker 3: and to learn our thumb and great fire. And so
Speaker 3: I said, that's probably where it comes from.
Speaker 2: And I've had other vegans and vegetarians.
Speaker 3: In fact, I probably received more positivity from that community
Speaker 3: of people than I have from hunters, if you will.
Speaker 3: And they have questions and then they want to say
Speaker 3: They'll say, I don't want to be a hunter, but
Speaker 3: my wife and I would like to start shooting rabbits
Speaker 3: that we have on our land and eating rabbits. And
Speaker 3: I say, okay, So I kind of give them. They
Speaker 3: I'd say, okay, do you want to do it with
Speaker 3: a bowl or with a gun? We want to do
Speaker 3: with a gun. At first, I'm not skilled with the ball. Okay,
Speaker 3: buy this gun, and we talked about it, and then they
Speaker 3: send me pictures of like him and his wife in
Speaker 3: the kitchen, skinned out rabbits, carrots, cut off, all this stuff.
Speaker 3: And then they'd send me and it's funny because they
Speaker 3: would say to me, I don't want to be a hunter,
Speaker 3: but this is what I want to do. And then
Speaker 3: you know, obviously I'm sitting there on the backside going
Speaker 3: they'll look now, but you're a hunter. Doesn't mean you
Speaker 3: have to go out and try to shoot the biggest
Speaker 3: deer on the land, or go out and shoot a
Speaker 3: giant caribou that you're going to mount and hang on
Speaker 3: the wall, or you know some of the things that
Speaker 3: we do around our films or whatever.
Speaker 2: And and like with you, I remember.
Speaker 3: When I mailed you and your beautiful wife a box
Speaker 3: of elk meat from the elk that I killed in Nevada.
Speaker 3: I remember right away you mentioned me back and you're like,
Speaker 3: I think this is the finest mean I've ever eaten.
Speaker 3: I think that's what You're awesome.
Speaker 1: And even she liked it, and she's not a big
Speaker 1: meat eater. She was worried at first, and she was,
Speaker 1: this is actually great.
Speaker 3: It's awesome. And then you going and getting your caribou
Speaker 3: and having your caribou meat and your caribou hide, and
Speaker 3: you know, and and uh, yes, it's been a it's
Speaker 3: been a lot of inquisitive people. And I get a
Speaker 3: lot of people that write me that will say, hey,
Speaker 3: I totally disagree with you killing this mountain lion, but
Speaker 3: can you walk me through the how you did it
Speaker 3: and and why you did it? And I walk them
Speaker 3: through it, and they'll say, you know, Okay, I didn't
Speaker 3: like it, but I totally appreciate your explanation and the
Speaker 3: why you did it and how you did it and
Speaker 3: all these different things. And I like those conversations. I
Speaker 3: think it's really important. Like I said, we live in
Speaker 3: that gray area.
Speaker 1: So a lot of people who are listening to this
Speaker 1: right now, they may not want to hunt, they may
Speaker 1: have no interest, But how can they take some of
Speaker 1: the lessons from your hunts and find ways to apply
Speaker 1: them to get a lot of the same benefits. And
Speaker 1: I'm going to give you an example here. So after
Speaker 1: our hunt, I started spending a lot more time in
Speaker 1: the wilderness, and I just did this forty five day
Speaker 1: backcountry hike across southern Utah I wasn't hunting. I was
Speaker 1: walking every day. But I will say I experienced a
Speaker 1: lot of the same benefits that I did when I
Speaker 1: was reporting the comfort crisis with you up in Alaska
Speaker 1: for more than a month. How do you think that
Speaker 1: if people don't want to hunt, how do you think
Speaker 1: they get some of the benefits you do? And to
Speaker 1: sort of set this off, I'm going to read you
Speaker 1: a quote of yours. To experience fantastic things, you have
Speaker 1: to put yourself in fantastic places. What can that tell us?
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think it's funny. I said that. I said
Speaker 3: that sentence when we're on the top of a mountain
Speaker 3: in the Arctic Circle. We're in the Mackenzie Mountains of
Speaker 3: the Northwest Territories. And when I said that to one
Speaker 3: of my crew and I was like, you want to
Speaker 3: experience fantastic things, you have to put yourself in fantastic places.
Speaker 3: But really, I've come to realize that that fantastic place
Speaker 3: that you have to be in is in your mind,
Speaker 3: because the reality is you and I could go out
Speaker 3: in my I'm in a log cabin on ten acres
Speaker 3: of woods here in Wisconsin, and you and I could
Speaker 3: go out and set a tent right now on my
Speaker 3: ten acres and get a couple of bows out, or
Speaker 3: a couple of twenty twos out. We could go and
Speaker 3: hunt my population of gray squirrels that I have here
Speaker 3: amongst all my oak and maple trees and kill three
Speaker 3: or four or five gray squirrels, skin them out, bring
Speaker 3: them back to our tent, start a fire and cook
Speaker 3: them in a frying pan over our wood stove and
Speaker 3: the TP, and sit down and have this podcast. Dare
Speaker 3: I say this, You're in Las Vegas right now, right Mike,
Speaker 3: when I'm in Wisconsin. We're doing this over our computers.
Speaker 3: If you said, hey, I want to experience something while
Speaker 3: we do this, and I said, okay, well fly out here.
Speaker 3: We'll hike around my ten acres, we'll kill a couple
Speaker 3: of squirrels, we'll sit down on the TP, we'll start
Speaker 3: a fire, and we'll cook the squirrels over the fire,
Speaker 3: and we'll have this conversation the TP. Our experience would
Speaker 3: be tenfold what it is over a couple of computers.
Speaker 2: And so I realized you don't have.
Speaker 3: To go to the Arctic Circle on hunt carryboar adulship
Speaker 3: or gris le bears You can do this in your
Speaker 3: own backyard.
Speaker 2: You can do this in a state forest. You can
Speaker 2: do this.
Speaker 3: It's a presence and a mindfulness that is the fantastic
Speaker 3: place for you to be in. And even if you
Speaker 3: don't want to hunt, you know you can become a fisherman.
Speaker 3: If you don't want to fish, then you can just
Speaker 3: explore and the walk about that you just did the
Speaker 3: forty five day walk about. Go and do that. Watch
Speaker 3: the sun come up, watch the sun go down, Understand
Speaker 3: when the rain is coming, when the wind is coming.
Speaker 3: Put yourself through some hardships, and you will come out
Speaker 3: on the other side a happier, more fulfilled, healthier person.
Speaker 3: It's without a doubt you can't. You can't come out
Speaker 3: the other side if you live in your essence of
Speaker 3: what's the first rule of a masogi, don't die right.
Speaker 1: Make it really hard. The second rule is don't die.
Speaker 3: Second rule, don't die. Beyond that, you will come out
Speaker 3: a better person. Yeah, that's that's for sure.
Speaker 1: I'll say. For me, the time in the wilderness has
Speaker 1: always been my greatest teacher because it strips away control
Speaker 1: and I feel like modern life, a lot of the
Speaker 1: technology we have is to put us in control of
Speaker 1: every variable. We've got calendar scheduling everything out, we've got
Speaker 1: technology that can deliver food, we've got xys. Everything is
Speaker 1: predictable and in control, and when you get outside that
Speaker 1: all gets stripped away. You might get lost. You can't
Speaker 1: predict what the terrain is going to be like, you
Speaker 1: can't predict what the weather is going to be like,
Speaker 1: shit is going to go totally off the rails. But
Speaker 1: you got to figure it out. And it's in that
Speaker 1: process of having certainty and control stripped away where you
Speaker 1: have to figure it out, that people begin to realize
Speaker 1: something that I think we've lost, and that's that you
Speaker 1: can just figure things out and do things and become competent.
Speaker 1: And then for me, that tracks back into everyday life
Speaker 1: where I get an email I don't want to deal with.
Speaker 1: I go, you know, you just survived a lightning storm
Speaker 1: mount in the desert. I think you can be okay,
Speaker 1: go into this meeting you don't want to go to.
Speaker 1: And that just changed that fundamentally changes your relationship to
Speaker 1: your everyday life.
Speaker 3: For me at least, I totally agree. And I think
Speaker 3: like when you were with us in the Arctic, I
Speaker 3: could see it on your face.
Speaker 2: You were bored. There's portions of.
Speaker 1: That time where you're like, so damn bored.
Speaker 2: Now what do we do? You know?
Speaker 3: Because when you're out there, are there animals or aren't animals?
Speaker 3: It's our animals. How do we get into position to
Speaker 3: look at them better? How do we get into position
Speaker 3: to maybe take one and take it back to camp?
Speaker 2: Is it raining? Do you have to put your rain
Speaker 2: gear on? Or is it not raining?
Speaker 3: Are you cold? Do you have to put your down on?
Speaker 3: Or are you cold and it's rain you need to
Speaker 3: put your down And you start going through these things like, oh, hey,
Speaker 3: we need it's we have no idea what day it is,
Speaker 3: but we know we need water, and we know we're
Speaker 3: running low on food, and we know we are probably
Speaker 3: going to have to hike to the next drainage because
Speaker 3: the caribou don't seem to be coming through here any longer.
Speaker 2: But those purities for me.
Speaker 3: Having a tent, having to maybe have a wood fire
Speaker 3: and carry all your supplies in the backpack and have
Speaker 3: to deal with, you know, one hundred mile an hour
Speaker 3: wind or an eighty mile an hour wind, or being
Speaker 3: bluff charged by grizzly bear and having a grizzly that
Speaker 3: is now starting to harass your camp because he realizes, like,
Speaker 3: if I harass these guys enough, I'm gonna be able
Speaker 3: to steal all their food and maybe even you know,
Speaker 3: like kill one of them or whatever. And you know,
Speaker 3: you start to like break all these things down. But
Speaker 3: there's an essence, the simpleness of it that is such
Speaker 3: a pure way of living life. And but when you
Speaker 3: come from the rat race, like if I took somebody,
Speaker 3: and I've loved to do this sometime, but if you
Speaker 3: took somebody that had to totally like take a guy
Speaker 3: that goes clubbing every night or something like that in
Speaker 3: New York City and just take him out there and
Speaker 3: then just be like, yeah, this is, first of all,
Speaker 3: we're going to hike ten miles today, and you are
Speaker 3: going to hate yourself. There's gonna be blisters all over
Speaker 3: your legs and your thighs are gonna chafe, and you're
Speaker 3: however strong you think you are in the gym, and
Speaker 3: this is going to wear you out.
Speaker 1: It's not gonna work, Yep, not gonna work.
Speaker 3: And then you're gonna sit there and have to reflect.
Speaker 3: And I just think that stuff is I often think
Speaker 3: what if we didn't What if things just continued in
Speaker 3: the hunter and gather society? You know, who would we
Speaker 3: be as a people? What would the world look like?
Speaker 1: Very interesting final pal questions. What's your most important pieces
Speaker 1: of gear?
Speaker 2: I mean, the reality is it's your mindset.
Speaker 1: And that comes through getting out there. And I feel
Speaker 1: like that's an equation of time and not quitting. Like
Speaker 1: we talked about in the beginning, you need to go
Speaker 1: out prepared enough. You need to know that there's going
Speaker 1: to be a lot of hurdles, but you just got
Speaker 1: to take them one at a time, and in the
Speaker 1: process of hurdling, you get better at hurdling.
Speaker 3: Yeah, because I've even seen people do you know, like
Speaker 3: we might have gear in the essence of, you know,
Speaker 3: really nice rain gear so we can go further in
Speaker 3: the rain.
Speaker 2: We might have really.
Speaker 3: Nice down gears, we can exist further into the cold.
Speaker 3: But if you look at the guys that were one
Speaker 3: hundred years ago and they were dealing with animal skins
Speaker 3: and wolves, and even look at some of the Eskimos
Speaker 3: now and some the tribes that are way up on
Speaker 3: the ice cap and stuff, like, they do amazing things
Speaker 3: with just seal skins and polar bear skins and things
Speaker 3: like that.
Speaker 2: And really the gear.
Speaker 3: Is it's a hack if you will, and you even
Speaker 3: look at the stuff that we use. Another company made it.
Speaker 3: So it's this shortcut that we're complaining about. It's the
Speaker 3: same shortcut because if I had to go out and
Speaker 3: get a seal to make my mucklucks or get a
Speaker 3: seal to then make my part cut. Now we're talking
Speaker 3: like that's you know, that is a very real essence.
Speaker 3: But everything in life comes with it's kind of give
Speaker 3: and take. But I would say your mindset and positivity.
Speaker 3: I think people greatly underestimate our lack of time on
Speaker 3: the face of the earth. I think people greatly underestimate
Speaker 3: a positive attitude. And I think people greatly underestimate how
Speaker 3: interesting you are to the rest of us. If you
Speaker 3: were just going to be yourself, no matter what that is,
Speaker 3: I people, we will find you. You be you, and
Speaker 3: we will find you terribly interesting.
Speaker 1: That feels like a hell of a note to end
Speaker 1: on DONI my man, this was awesome. I really appreciate
Speaker 1: you coming.
Speaker 2: On same same anytime.
Speaker 1: Final question, what's our what's our next adventure? I feel
Speaker 1: like we're due for one.
Speaker 3: Yeah, we're due for one. We need to figure we
Speaker 3: you and I need to talk. I'd love to go
Speaker 3: on a walk about with you where we're actually hunting
Speaker 3: or doing something along those lines, or even maybe a
Speaker 3: sort of Canadian canoe trip where we canoe up into
Speaker 3: a wilderness and have to pordage and paddle and shovel
Speaker 3: water for a bunch of days and go catch some
Speaker 3: fish and and I think there'd be a lot of
Speaker 3: fun to just go and kind of sit back again
Speaker 3: reflect And I'd like to hear I've read all of
Speaker 3: your books, but i'd like to hear about them again
Speaker 3: from your mouth and and hear your ideas and the
Speaker 3: things that you're experiencing and and i'd really enjoy that.
Speaker 1: I'd love that. Man, let's plan on it. Thanks for
Speaker 1: coming on, man, Thank you, Thank you for having me.
Speaker 3: Michael, there you have it.
Speaker 1: Thanks so much to Donny Vincent for coming out of
Speaker 1: the wilderness for more than an hour to have an
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