Have you ever felt weighed down by societal expectations, unsure how to live a life filled with gratitude and joy? Meet Glen Van Pesky, the visionary founder of Gossamer Gear and author of "Take Less, Do More: Surprising Life Lessons in Generosity, Gratitude, and Curiosity from an Ultralight Backpacker." Join us as Glen shares his profound insights on embracing gratitude, recognizing when we have enough, and how stepping outside our comfort zones can lead to remarkable growth and healing. Please listen to Glen's four key lessons he learned while backpacking globally.
Order Glen's new book for all the men in your life. It is the perfect Father's Day gift. Here are two ways to order:
Amazon. If you email Glen directly at glen@glenvanpeski.com and let him know you ordered the book on Amazon (provide the order number, please), Glen will mail you a signed bookplate to personalize your book. It won’t be there for Father's Day, but it would be an excellent free add-on!
For a personalized signed copy, order directly* from Glen at glen@glenvanpeski.com. Glen accepts VENMO, so once he receives $25/per book ordered via VENMO, he will send a signed book, plus two mini-themed lip balms, in a custom mailer to the continental US address (or addresses) of your choice. *Include the address (or addresses) and name(s) to whom you want the book sent and personalized to in your email.
Learn more about Glen's book and writing: Glen Van Peski
Have you ever felt weighed down by societal expectations, unsure how to live a life filled with gratitude and joy? Meet Glen Van Pesky, the visionary founder of Gossamer Gear and author of "Take Less, Do More: Surprising Life Lessons in Generosity, Gratitude, and Curiosity from an Ultralight Backpacker." Join us as Glen shares his profound insights on embracing gratitude, recognizing when we have enough, and how stepping outside our comfort zones can lead to remarkable growth and healing. Please listen to Glen's four key lessons he learned while backpacking globally.
Order Glen's new book for all the men in your life. It is the perfect Father's Day gift. Here are two ways to order:
Amazon. If you email Glen directly at glen@glenvanpeski.com and let him know you ordered the book on Amazon (provide the order number, please), Glen will mail you a signed bookplate to personalize your book. It won’t be there for Father's Day, but it would be an excellent free add-on!
For a personalized signed copy, order directly* from Glen at glen@glenvanpeski.com. Glen accepts VENMO, so once he receives $25/per book ordered via VENMO, he will send a signed book, plus two mini-themed lip balms, in a custom mailer to the continental US address (or addresses) of your choice. *Include the address (or addresses) and name(s) to whom you want the book sent and personalized to in your email.
Learn more about Glen's book and writing: Glen Van Peski
Learn more about Young Living Therapeutic-Grade Essential Oils and the Aroma Freedom Technique: HEALINGFROMTRAUMA
Speaker 1:
Today's episode is brought to you by Heart Lift Central on Substack. I'd like to welcome our newest paid subscribers Jan, thank you, lisa. Oh man, thank you, kim, big thank you. You all are supporting the podcast and the writing and the resources that are being developed for Heart Lift International, my nonprofit. So thank you so much for your belief and your support, and we dedicate this episode to you, in part two of my conversation with Glenn Van Pesky, founder of Gossamer Gear and author of Take Less, do More.
Speaker 1:
Surprising Life Lessons in Generosity, gratitude and Curiosity. From an Ultralight Backpacker. He writes in Lesson 14, cultivate a Heart of Gratitude. Julie Andrews said the immortal words enough is as good as a feast. Said the immortal words enough is as good as a feast. To the children in her charge, jane and Michael Banks, in the 1964 Disney movie Mary Poppins. That phrase has always struck me as deeply wise and insightful, though the children in that movie had worries and aches of their own, not getting the attention they craved from their distracted parents. Primarily, their lives were blessed in many ways. Mary Poppins was right To have enough, and to know we have enough is to be blessed many times over. Like the children in that film, we must learn to consciously remind ourselves of our copious blessings, even when the rest of our life doesn't measure up in the way we want.
Speaker 1:
Hello and welcome to today's Heart Lift with Janelle. I'm, janelle, so happy to have you here. If it's your first time, stay around and get to know us. Today we are in part two of my conversation with Glenn Van Pesky that we typically do not get until our 60s, 70s, 80s. Yes, life experience just builds into a crescendo of wisdom if we lean into it, and Glenn has done that. There was so much in part one, so if you haven't listened, I encourage you to go back. I also encourage you to please join me over on Heart Lift Central sub stack. Just go to heartliftcentralcom. Everything you need to subscribe and to find out more is there.
Speaker 1:
Today's conversation we take up where we left off. Glenn and I are talking a lot about comfort zones oh my goodness. And as part of that I talk about climbing the Gemma Pass in Switzerland, when Rob and I went there 15 years ago now, and when I came home I wrote a whole study. Of course I did. I can't help myself on comfort zones, so I'll make that available to you in the show notes, but I wanted to read what a comfort zone is. So, if you keep that in your prefrontal cortex, the front of your mind as we talk, a behavioral state within which a person operates in an anxiety neutral condition, using a limited set of behaviors to deliver a steady level of performance, usually without a sense of risk. And, as you're going to hear today, we have to move outside of our comfort zones. I don't like it either, but once we do, we will experience an enlargement of our world. Okay, heartlifters, welcome back Glenn.
Speaker 2:
But they're different from have you read the Comfort Crisis.
Speaker 1:
No.
Speaker 2:
I will send you a copy. Oh, I have to do that I have so far, to date, given out 42 signed copies of the Comfort Crisis. To date, given out 42 signed copies of the Comfort Crisis. His basically nutshell is you know, as modern man, we've done too good a job of creating a comfortable environment and it's killing us. And you need to just what you were saying.
Speaker 1:
we need to take risks, we need to get outside our comfort zone, because that's how we grow and that's how we heal. That's what I'm reading and studying and researching so much about. And it is how we heal. That's why I go back to, I think, examine everything you carry.
Speaker 2:
Part of that can be the stories you tell yourself too. You probably haven't gotten that in the book yet.
Speaker 1:
That's lesson 14. It's down here. Can we please talk about that?
Speaker 2:
We're talking about the backpack you can't take off and you know expectations and examine what you're carrying. Some of what you're carrying, you know from your work, is the stories you're telling yourself that I'm a bad person because this happened to me, I was abused, or you know, or someone left me, or whatever the case may be there's, you start telling stories about yourself and that's, that's a big backpack that you can't take off, and that's bad. Yeah, that's a bad thing.
Speaker 1:
I like how you just cut to the chase. That's bad, that's bad and lean into it, heartlifters, and lean on it, because I think that's where I'm at is like the story I'm telling myself about productivity and ambition. And it's the story I've been telling myself in different ways for decades. And it's the story culture is telling us every single day, every minute. You were successful. I know, Glenn, that you understand this. You know we're in a productivity driven culture and I just think, if I can take off that heavy backpack and If I could really do it this time at age 64, I'm not sure what greatness is ahead of me. Like, I want to take that risk and I think that's what your book, when it came across my desk I mean just the cover alone you know I want to stand there, I want to be there, I want to be in the presence of those grand mountains. Like where, where is that one? Is it?
Speaker 2:
That's in Zermatt, Switzerland. That's the Matterhorn.
Speaker 1:
I knew it was because we we climbed the Gemma pass. My husband and I, with no water bottles and nothing Like.
Speaker 1:
We were so foolish, so foolish and I know it's, but you lived, I did, I almost died, died, I swear it's what. Only 7 700 feet up in there, I don't know, it's not that high, but once you get up there they have that restaurant. It's like heaven. It all of it was like an international. I I three, three or four things of swiss ice cream, but I really thought I was gonna to die. Um, I just couldn't do it.
Speaker 2:
But I did it and then you could see the other that's the other part of getting outside your comfort zone is you things you didn't think you could do, like you didn't think you could back back with a five pound base bag weight. But you do it. And then when the next challenge comes up or the next story comes through your head, you can think that, go well, actually, maybe I can do that.
Speaker 1:
You know, it's like I'm not that worried about that it was life-changing because the view number one, but it they said, on a clear day, you know, we would have been able to see the matterhorn and um five countries. Am I right? I, I'm right.
Speaker 2:
But it wasn't a clear day.
Speaker 1:
It wasn't a clear day.
Speaker 1:
That's right, yeah to hear this so clear from Glenn, please, today that whatever story that you're telling yourself, that is encumbering you, that is keeping you weighed down, it's just time. It's just time. Do you have any wisdom? I think it goes along with. Examine everything you carry. Okay, so if I don't know how to take this off of myself, if I don't have this wisdom yet, I wrote down a few things you've taught us in this book, but I wanted to see, perhaps, what you would say first, where do we start in the story we're telling ourselves? Maybe even from an ultralight backpacking perspective?
Speaker 2:
maybe even from an ultralight backpacking perspective. Well, I think most people. There are multiple stories that you can tell and they're both true. And you know I in the book I share two stories. They're both true. One's pretty darn discouraging and you know I'd probably be spending serious dollars with someone like you to try and work through that. But the other story is also 100% true and it's a glorious story, and so you know I don't focus on the bad story. Do you want to give us a little peek into maybe, what lesson that is? I had to. I had to reread this the other day. Oh yeah, here it is. It is in lesson 14. I mean it's it's short. I can read it if you want.
Speaker 1:
I would love for you to Please do no. No, I won't cut it out, Go ahead.
Speaker 2:
So much of how we feel about ourselves and our lives is dependent on our perspective. Which side of the equation are we giving the most attention to? Which wolf are we choosing to feed? Because, for me, happiness is not about the lack of hardship Every life includes hardship but about perseverance and where I choose to focus. Here's the truth. I can tell two very different stories about my life, and both are completely accurate. This is the hardship story. I was a nervous, anxious kid when my parents divorced in the middle of my fourth grade year. I was distraught. I cried so much that my parents had to move me into another room, so my crying wouldn't keep my brother and sister away.
Speaker 2:
We left sunny Southern California with our mom to drive across the entire country in the middle of winter and ended up in an apartment in Amherst, massachusetts. I had to start a new school where I knew no one. When I joined Boy Scouts I was sexually molested and then when my mom took me for psychological counseling, that psychologist also abused me. I was not popular at school, didn't have many friends. After high school I moved back to California where I married Francie. When she was pregnant with our second child I almost died in a plane crash that killed the pilot. Then Derek was born severely disabled and the cost for medical insurance on my fledging engineering company went from $600 a month to $8,000 a month. Then the economy tanked and my business went with it. I worked for a year with no pay and had to take out a second mortgage on the house to pay our staff until I was forced to finally shutter the business. Meanwhile, francie's depression, brought on by Derek's struggles, spiraled out of control, all while I was working 80-plus hours a week to keep the financial wheels on. Sounds pretty grim, doesn't it? And if I focus on that grimness, I will miss all the happiness that takes place in story number two, which is also true. This is the happiness story.
Speaker 2:
I was a nervous, anxious kid. I was raised by intelligent, loving and involved parents who installed good values and morals in me. When they divorced and my mother moved us across the country, she was able to continue caring full-time for us kids. We had amazing educational opportunities and lacked for nothing. Boy Scouts fostered in me a love of the outdoors that led to incredible successes later in life. In high school I was the tri-captain of the lacrosse team and president of the outing club. Before I organized a 4,200-mile bicycle trip across the United States with three friends, taking two years off school. I worked at an engineering firm and found my passion for civil engineering, which set me on my future career course. I graduated in four years summa cum laude and moved to San Diego with an amazing woman I met at my apartment complex and somehow convinced to marry me.
Speaker 2:
I worked for local firms before starting out on my own and always had enough work. I used not just my engineering skills but marketing skills to build my company. When the economy tanked, I was able to find jobs elsewhere for all my employees before shuttering the business and going to work for another firm. Wow, the birth of our disabled son, derek, brought me to Jesus a huge turning point and strength in my life.
Speaker 2:
Because of my involvement with Boy Scouts as a leader and giving back to my community, I started a backpacking company on the side that turned into a multi-million dollar business. Though I've never taken a salary from the company I formed. It gave me relationships all over the world with amazing people Guinness World Record holders, national Geographic explorers, renowned endurance athletes, a-list directors and actors, all of whom I count as friends. Today, francie and I have control over our time and money and enjoy amazing freedom. We live in a custom home in a location we chose, with scores of genuine friends as neighbors. What an amazing life. Both stories are absolutely true. They just depend on where I put the focus. Which one are you focusing on?
Speaker 1:
focus? Which one are you focusing on? That's what we would call a corrective narrative in counseling, in the world of counseling. So you wrote a corrective narrative and I I can't wait to share more about that and put a whole episode on just about that. Because did you just come up and do that on your own? Did a therapist encourage you to do that? Or just writing this book you did that, or it was a do or die. If I don't do this, because it's amazing, like you took my breath away I had not read that part that you had those things happen to you in childhood. That's childhood trauma with a capital T.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, and it's surprising to me because I've never really done any therapy. You know, I think my mom, I think we had a good upbringing. You know we were talking earlier about the importance of moms. My mom always told us we were special. I think she probably overdid it. I did. Yeah, you know it's like, okay, we're special, but you have some problems too. Yeah, we're unique.
Speaker 1:
Let's balance this out.
Speaker 2:
But yeah, everyone's special in their own way. So, I don't know. And I worried about things a lot when I was in junior high and high school. I worried about death, I worried about getting good grades. I mean, I've always been, you know, a hard worker, striver. I'm not the one to counsel you on your issues in that area, for sure, right.
Speaker 1:
Exactly. That's good Cause, that's me.
Speaker 2:
I, so I I don't know. I think part of it is is is put trying things pushing you outside your comfort zone, like I didn't like public speaking, but I thought. You know, if you can widen your skills, it makes you more valuable and less likely to be without work, and so I joined.
Speaker 1:
Toastmasters and I worked Brilliant, did you.
Speaker 2:
And it wasn't comfortable, but I did it.
Speaker 1:
That's so awesome.
Speaker 2:
It's made me a different person and you know, the outdoors was a scary place but I, you know I did that and I'm I'm still an introvert, but you know, which surprises people because of the Toastmasters, and you know.
Speaker 1:
You've just learned to scale. It's a skill.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, I've learned a skill. Yeah, it doesn't affect, it doesn't affect? It doesn't affect it, doesn't affect it doesn't change your being. Right. Given my choice, I'm happy I'm going to be quiet with the book. Yeah, definitely yeah.
Speaker 1:
Right, but you know it also makes you a great conversationalist and and and a million other really worthy virtues that make you a greater human being.
Speaker 2:
So meet people. A Francie's like a genius at this, like talking just last night or sunday after church. So I'm talking to this group of you know 10 ladies, the women who explore, and we're talking about gear, and francy's obviously heard it all multiple times so many times she's kind of wandering around the campground and and so she comes up, she says we.
Speaker 2:
She says, hey, this is my new friend, she wants to see your pack too. It's like your new friends, like you just got here. It's like yeah, but when her husband comes back, he wants to see it too.
Speaker 2:
She's like her. She's like her dad, her dad. You could drop them off anywhere and he'd have like newfound friends and she being married almost 44 years to her. It's some of being married almost 44 years to her it's somewhat rubbed off on me, you know, I'll tell her like oh yeah, so-and-so is coming up for happy hour. She goes who are they? She says I met him in the alley. She goes who is this man? I do not know him, yeah.
Speaker 1:
Exactly. Okay, we're going to get back to the alley, because I think I know you love talking with people who have something to say but who have nothing to prove. I mean golden nugget 87. I mean there are so many. My question there is how do I become a person who has nothing to prove? I'm just curious, why do you write that? Why do you say that?
Speaker 2:
Well, I think when people have something to prove that you know they have to, they have to tell you how important they are and what they've done in their lives and things like that, and sometimes you know they need to tell you what their kids are doing and sometimes they forget to be interested in what you're doing.
Speaker 2:
yeah, yeah, grandkids just it, just it, just goes on yeah, and we all know people like that and and sometimes as an introvert, I'm not as good as I could be. I like go away from conversations like I didn't, I didn't ask. Yeah, you know, I missed, I didn't, I didn't do a good job of that, but no um, I have what I call the list, which is usually a couple times a year.
Speaker 2:
I plan backpacking trips, get the permits ahead of time and then send out an invite to the list. You know, a blind copy I love that saying, hey, I got. I mean, that's how I ended up taking Matthew McConaughey. He's not on my list, he's on a friend's list.
Speaker 1:
Let's just drop that.
Speaker 2:
I know he's a friend of a friend, yeah, and I say you know, here's a trip, first ones to reply you know you get to go on the trip, and so it's people, typically people that don't know anyone but me. I'm the common denominator and so they meet other interesting people, but it's always people I'm looking for, people that have led interesting lives, which I find, if I'm paying attention, is pretty much everyone.
Speaker 1:
Everyone.
Speaker 2:
Yes, yeah, yes, I met three this morning at a mammogram.
Speaker 1:
So there you go, yeah, and the x-ray technician goes do you know them? Because I said, no, I've never met him. And she's like, okay, she knew I brought all this stuff. I'm like do you know she travels from richmond, like, and drops 40 loads a day? And you know she's like, how do you know she travels from Richmond, like, and drops 40 loads a day? And you know she's like, how do you know that? And so I asked her. Anyway, yes, it just starts with a question.
Speaker 2:
You just, you just strike up conversations, which is curious.
Speaker 1:
She's working really hard and I was like yes, that's what my husband says that I don't know how you think of these questions. It would take me years.
Speaker 2:
Yeah.
Speaker 1:
Okay, got it Okay.
Speaker 2:
But yeah so. So I'm looking for people that have had interesting lives, but it doesn't have to be about them. They're interested, they're kind of that curious, it's like what's going on with you. What are you about? You know, you make your own harpsichords, like, how does that work? It's like, oh my gosh, you know, or whatever it is. Yes, or tell me your story.
Speaker 1:
I had a pastor. Just I just never forgot it. I love him and I love that he would always just start a conversation, wherever he was. Tell me your story. Oh, no or tell me the story of that tattoo, or tell me the story and I've never forgotten that I use it all the time. Tell me your story.
Speaker 1:
Yeah, do you do this every day? That's how the day start. Do you do this every day like this huge cart of you know the, the gowns women put on for their mammograms, schlepping them in and schlepping them out, and I thought she does this every day. She does this every day. This is her job, her life. I'm so curious. Okay, yeah, so one piece of her life, but she's like just a piece.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, incredible complex person beyond the little piece that we're seeing. Yeah, and that's one of the great other things about wilderness is, you know you were at a mammogram appointment, so you get 10 minutes to connect with this person, which?
Speaker 1:
was awesome.
Speaker 2:
But imagine if you're on a trip for a week where you're walking all day, every day.
Speaker 1:
I've done it. You've got time?
Speaker 2:
for when you're walking along, you'll ask someone something and they'll say oh, it's a long story. It's like well, we're not doing anything but walking for the next eight hours Exactly, yeah, no it's awesome and you know our life especially for hard-charging achievers.
Speaker 1:
That's therapy right there.
Speaker 2:
Don't have that time, that's healing. To connect with people and get to know them.
Speaker 1:
yeah, and we were talking about how healing that's healing. That's very important when we say examine everything you carry. If we drop a lot of things we're carrying, we have more time. And I always say, you know, even this morning when I got back it was super early. My it was at my mammogram was at seven. So I thought, okay, well, I'm going to take a walk, you know, quarter to eight, and I just sauntered, like I was just like not power walking, which doctors years ago said we want you not to power walk, just relax, you know, and give you a nervous system of right. And so I'm just sauntering along, you know, and it was just so beautiful. People kept passing me and I went. I would have never done this even a year ago. I'm so committed to my steps.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, and you know, another thing is and this is in the comfort crisis book I'm going to send you. I think I I push that book so much that if you look at my book on Amazon it says frequently bought together, take less, do more in the comfort crisis.
Speaker 1:
That's what we're going to talk about your book. Well, I mailed it to someone who's going to be on their podcast.
Speaker 2:
I'm going to mail you this book, but don't read it until after you read it.
Speaker 1:
No, I don't want to talk about his book. He can talk about his own book, michael Easter.
Speaker 2:
Yes, but one of the great things, like when I was, you know, building a business, like I would not be in the car or walking something. I mean back then it was cassette tapes on negotiation or business or All the time. You know being a better husband or father or something you know being a more godly follower or whatever. And now it is such a luxury to just walk.
Speaker 1:
Yeah.
Speaker 2:
Without listening to anything.
Speaker 1:
That's really beautiful.
Speaker 2:
And just, oh, that was my point. I didn't take. Just see what comes up, I didn't listen to a podcast.
Speaker 1:
That was my point. I just listened to the birds.
Speaker 2:
Yeah.
Speaker 1:
Oh gosh, this is so amazing. All right, thank you, my new friend, you, I will leave with. The greatest thing I also read was to leave the place you've been in. You have to leave it better than you found it. But I added leave the space you've been in better than you found it. And something that's very important to me is when you enter a room, when you cross the threshold, you know what are you bringing into that room and how are you changing that space. Are you leaving that space better than the way you found it? And I think that if we just try to live that one principle out the whole entire rest of our life, then we've had a good conversation. You have definitely made this space better than when I sat down and it is a privilege and an honor to have had you here, glenn. I know that my community is going to be so grateful. Thank you so much from the bottom of my heart.
Speaker 2:
It's been my pleasure. I feel like I have a new friend and I can't wait to take you ultralight backpacking.
Speaker 1:
I'm going to do it, I am so I mean, I'm going to do it, I am so I mean, my kids listen to this. They're going to go. Uh-huh, let's see, you know. But secondly, you live near the Pacific Crest and I shared with you beforehand that my oldest daughter wrote this beautiful series of stories for the Calm app, and it has. It's a fictional story about a girl named Kai who goes on the Pacific Crest Trail. And here you are. So here once again, we're talking about all of these little things, little steps that happen. So I feel like I've already walked it, because I've listened to that story a thousand times, because I don't have the gift of going to sleep easily like you do, but I'm going to take you up on it because I know it would make my husband so happy. So we will talk. Thank you, glenn. Thank you.
Speaker 2:
You too.
Speaker 1:
Heartlifter. What a conversation. I hope that glenn's words have invited you to step outside of your comfort zone, these anxiety neutral conditions, so that we build around ourselves. They don't require any level of risk, but when we have the courage and the curiosity to do so, we add so much joy to our lives and experience a real expansion of meaningfulness, which I write a whole lot about in Stronger Every Day. I am so hungry to hear your thoughts.
Speaker 1:
Please meet me over on Heart Lift Central, our Substack online community home. As I have said, you can just go to heartliftcentralcom. Go to the top. You'll see the link to subscribe. There is a free and a paid subscription. The paid subscription affords me to do all of the work of publishing this podcast and writing resources that help home and family be the safest, most secure place to be, and I wanted to make sure that you have the proper information to order a signed copy of Glenn's book. Email him, glenn, at glennvanpeskycom, give him your mailing address. He'll tell you how to pay him for the book or books, and he will immediately send out because he did it for me a copy of his signed book. And then hop over to Amazon or Glenn's website, glennvanpeskycom. Print off a picture of the cover of the book. I just folded that up and put it in a box with a bow on it and voila, you have a beautiful, meaningful, life-changing gift for your loved ones. As I said, makes a perfect Father's Day gift, but also a great graduation gift. It just makes a great gift, a great conversation piece and also is really great for your small group.
Speaker 1:
I'm going to leave you with four things that Glenn learned from hiking all over the world. One never carry unnecessary baggage. Two remain curious, adventurous and open. Three always know a good water source. I love this one because we know living water, don't we? Yes, we do, john 4. And four, take less, do more and, as always, always the piece de la resistance leave it better than you found it. And, I add, leave a space that you're in better than you found it. There's our challenge. I can't wait to hear from you.