[Music]
[Applause]
before I say anything else I really just
want to acknowledge how incredibly
fortunate I’ve been for more than a
decade I’ve had the rare privilege of
moving through the mountains climbing
and skiing guiding others there and I
wouldn’t trade those experiences for
anything there’s been sunrise and sunset
from a sleeping bag
bathing in an alpine lake it’s a little
chilly living in a car
digging camp in the rain being above the
clouds feeling small in huge spaces
feeling triumphant climbing rocks
climbing ice climbing rock and snow
climbing with skis scheme big steep
lines stomaching sharing the camaraderie
of a team that you trust my favorite
part didn’t take a nap when it’s all
over
I’ll be honest I think the mountains are
rad totally awesome and and I hope in
some small way I’ve convinced you the
same thing but the mountains aren’t
without risk see in my line of work I
frequently get asked how I can do things
like backcountry skiing or alpine
climbing when they’re so dangerous but I
think the heart of that question is
really operating in a risky environment
under conditions of uncertainty but that
describes life in general right should
you start that business should you get
married should you run for office well
eating those chili cheese fries wreck
your afternoon
we all have decisions like this to face
and those four decisions come up a lot
from me so I’d like to explore a few
examples see we’re at the top of the
line should you drop in and ski it I
mean it looks pretty rad right but
there’s a lot to consider
what’s my skiing ability how steep is
the terrain
what’s the snowpack doing how likely is
an avalanche what’s the weather doing
right and there’s probably some pretty
obvious explicit physical risks that
you’re thinking about in your mind tear
may be things like falling hypothermia
heat stroke sunburn falling off a cliff
rocks falling off that cliff onto you
the ever-present risk of violent snowy
death by asphyxiation in an avalanche
right a typical day in the office for me
and you may be thinking that’s totally
crazy and it has nothing to do with your
life but I guarantee you it does because
you take risk every day to you just
might think of it not think of it that
way it’s a little more implicit right if
you live in the United States there’s a
good chance you’ve driven in the car
before and when you get in that car you
might think I’m gonna get some groceries
I’m gonna go to work but you’re not
necessarily thinking about that you
might die in a fiery car crash the day
because the person in the car next see
was texting right but we engage with
risk every day all day and that’s okay
now of course we also need to consider
the bigger picture this is Ben Lomond a
peak you might recognize being right
here in Ogden Utah in fact you can see
it outside and that line we’re looking
at skis down the south face of this peak
it ascends 4,000 vertical feet
there’s variable snowpack there’s
patches of ice there’s cliffs there’s
trees there’s avalanches there are a lot
of hazards to identify and to mitigate
and those hazards if you don’t address
them it can cost you life and limb and
that can make you justifiably afraid and
that is a good thing see fear is a
useful force in these situations because
fear is how I know right here in my gut
and I’m about to take a risk right fear
makes me ask good questions like what if
the business fails what if I get injured
right what if those chili cheese fries
really do wreck my afternoon but we
can’t be paralyzed by fear right if we
were paralyzed by fear we never get
anything done at some point if you want
the reward you have to take the risk and
the bigger the risk the
the reward now when you think about risk
you probably fall into one of two
categories either you’re the type of
person is like really gung-ho and
psyched and likes to go for it and
adventurous or maybe the type person
who’s a little more reserved and
cautious and careful I like to sit back
and see how things play out
both are perfectly valid but if you’re
the type of legs to go for it and I’m
right there with you you may have looser
II superiority bias which means that you
have more confidence than you have
competence in other words you don’t know
what you don’t know see we’re gonna go
see this line you think you’re gonna
look like this but in reality you look
like this now if you’re the cautious
type that comes with its own problems
right because if you never take the risk
in the first place you miss all the
opportunities if you never take the
chance how are you gonna get the rewards
so I think there’s room in our lives for
practice risk-taking in whatever it is
you want to do but not just like any
kind of practice we need deliberate
practice until abra practice is
different from regular practice in two
important ways the first is that it
intentionally pushes your limits you
stretch your comfort zone every time
that you practice because you have a
specific goal that you want to reach and
the second is that you need accurate
feedback you need to be practicing the
right things so how much practice do you
need well Malcolm Gladwell published a
book called outliers that popularize the
notion that you need 10,000 hours of
practice to become an expert there’s
some debate about how true that is
but I think that 10,000 hour rule is a
good benchmark so if you’re doing it as
a full-time job that should take you
about five years but if it’s something
unique as a hobby on the side a few
hours a week what have you then it could
take you 20 years or more you’re gonna
have to be disciplined and consistent
for this to work here’s an example of
that kind of practice in the mountains
right hang out this is my friend Nathan
he’s sliding on a snow slope and he’s
gonna use his ice axe to stop himself
from going any further now we call that
process self arresting when you first
learned this process it’s very
deliberate you have to think about it a
lot so you guys first have to like get
your body reorient it’s that you’re like
belly-first on the snow and you have to
assume it’s kind of crouched position
like feet down but back then you got to
put your ice axe in the right spot you
got to leverage into and apply some
pressure and if
you got to turn your head to the side so
you don’t accidentally stab yourself in
the face all of that takes time and
effort and energy and while you’re doing
all those things you’re sliding down a
snow slope right you’re picking up speed
and if you pick up enough speed you
don’t get a stop at all and when that
happens you go careening down the slope
and hit whatever is at the bottom with
bone-shattering forests and because we
have very fragile squishy bodies as
people you don’t really tend to enjoy
that experience now in this case
Nathan will be fine there’s nothing hit
at the bottom this however as you can
imagine is a pretty terrible place to
learn this skill right because there’s
thousands of feet of vertical drop
behind Josh there there’s cliffs
underneath em that you can’t see in the
photo and there’s big provisos the giant
cracks in the glacier down below bad
place to learn before you get to this
place you need to have this skill
totally dialed super practiced so back
to Nathan as he slides down and climbs
back up over time this school become
automatic he won’t have to think about
it
he’ll just boom self-arrest he stops he
can keep on climbing
of course we practiced the skill we need
to make sure they were practicing the
right things right practice them do us
any good we’ve practiced the wrong
things to achieve that we need feedback
and we get feedback from kind learning
environments like whitewater kayaking
now when you screw up whitewater
kayaking you learn that you’ve done so
in ways that are cold and wet and dark
and loud and violent and kind of scary
and surprisingly absent of the oxygen
that you’re so accustomed to breathing
and that provides clear and immediate
feedback that you messed up and you
should probably do something different
next time back and you’re skiing on the
other hand it’s a little more devious
right these angular snow crystals here
they indicate that the slope could
avalanche but just because those snow
crystals are present in the snowpack
doesn’t mean that it will avalanche and
you can see where that’s tricky
see because you could ski escape dozens
of times thinking you done everything
right but actually had a series of close
calls and you don’t learn that until it
finally avalanches and if you haven’t
learned the lesson yet you’re likely in
that avalanche the price for this lesson
might be your life that’s really harsh
and in those cases experiential
education is not the way to go we need
to get feedback into other ways we talk
to experts in the field we review the
data we analyze accident
and we get feedback from our partners I
was climbing this line recently up the
rock and you step off the overhanging
rock under the suspended dagger of ice
and that move from the rocks to the ice
that can be kind of tricky so I called
onto my partner Hema climbing ice for 18
years I was like hey what are your
thoughts it’s like I got nothing man
you’re on your own
I’ve only ever seen people do stuff like
that in pictures but it looks rad 18
years right experience is not the same
thing as expertise I’d also be remiss if
I fail to mention the rule of luck and
all this the fact I’m giving this talk
is evidence of survivorship bias you’re
not hearing these words from the people
who got hurt or quit or went broke or
died while they were climbing or skiing
or mountain guiding right
those things are risky there’s an
irreducible amount of uncertainty
inherent in mountain travel as there is
in all of life we have to accept that
right sometimes you do everything right
and the outcome is still poor because
there’s risk involved see I topped out
this climb and then I caught a big chunk
of ice with my face now if I screwed up
my face deserves to look like that and I
need to accept those consequences right
I need to humbly learn the lessons
involved but find everything right and
my face still looks like that
well that’s what it means take risks
sometimes you lose and you have to be
okay with that
so do you drop in what are the
consequences how likely are they have
you put in the practice do you have the
skills what are the rewards
only you know the answers those
questions but at the end a it’s really
really straightforward without risk
there is no reward but in this case the
rewards were totally sweet thank you
[Applause]
[Music]
[Applause]
before I say anything else I really just
want to acknowledge how incredibly
fortunate I’ve been for more than a
decade I’ve had the rare privilege of
moving through the mountains climbing
and skiing guiding others there and I
wouldn’t trade those experiences for
anything there’s been sunrise and sunset
from a sleeping bag
bathing in an alpine lake it’s a little
chilly living in a car
digging camp in the rain being above the
clouds feeling small in huge spaces
feeling triumphant climbing rocks
climbing ice climbing rock and snow
climbing with skis scheme big steep
lines stomaching sharing the camaraderie
of a team that you trust my favorite
part didn’t take a nap when it’s all
over
I’ll be honest I think the mountains are
rad totally awesome and and I hope in
some small way I’ve convinced you the
same thing but the mountains aren’t
without risk see in my line of work I
frequently get asked how I can do things
like backcountry skiing or alpine
climbing when they’re so dangerous but I
think the heart of that question is
really operating in a risky environment
under conditions of uncertainty but that
describes life in general right should
you start that business should you get
married should you run for office well
eating those chili cheese fries wreck
your afternoon
we all have decisions like this to face
and those four decisions come up a lot
from me so I’d like to explore a few
examples see we’re at the top of the
line should you drop in and ski it I
mean it looks pretty rad right but
there’s a lot to consider
what’s my skiing ability how steep is
the terrain
what’s the snowpack doing how likely is
an avalanche what’s the weather doing
right and there’s probably some pretty
obvious explicit physical risks that
you’re thinking about in your mind tear
may be things like falling hypothermia
heat stroke sunburn falling off a cliff
rocks falling off that cliff onto you
the ever-present risk of violent snowy
death by asphyxiation in an avalanche
right a typical day in the office for me
and you may be thinking that’s totally
crazy and it has nothing to do with your
life but I guarantee you it does because
you take risk every day to you just
might think of it not think of it that
way it’s a little more implicit right if
you live in the United States there’s a
good chance you’ve driven in the car
before and when you get in that car you
might think I’m gonna get some groceries
I’m gonna go to work but you’re not
necessarily thinking about that you
might die in a fiery car crash the day
because the person in the car next see
was texting right but we engage with
risk every day all day and that’s okay
now of course we also need to consider
the bigger picture this is Ben Lomond a
peak you might recognize being right
here in Ogden Utah in fact you can see
it outside and that line we’re looking
at skis down the south face of this peak
it ascends 4,000 vertical feet
there’s variable snowpack there’s
patches of ice there’s cliffs there’s
trees there’s avalanches there are a lot
of hazards to identify and to mitigate
and those hazards if you don’t address
them it can cost you life and limb and
that can make you justifiably afraid and
that is a good thing see fear is a
useful force in these situations because
fear is how I know right here in my gut
and I’m about to take a risk right fear
makes me ask good questions like what if
the business fails what if I get injured
right what if those chili cheese fries
really do wreck my afternoon but we
can’t be paralyzed by fear right if we
were paralyzed by fear we never get
anything done at some point if you want
the reward you have to take the risk and
the bigger the risk the
the reward now when you think about risk
you probably fall into one of two
categories either you’re the type of
person is like really gung-ho and
psyched and likes to go for it and
adventurous or maybe the type person
who’s a little more reserved and
cautious and careful I like to sit back
and see how things play out
both are perfectly valid but if you’re
the type of legs to go for it and I’m
right there with you you may have looser
II superiority bias which means that you
have more confidence than you have
competence in other words you don’t know
what you don’t know see we’re gonna go
see this line you think you’re gonna
look like this but in reality you look
like this now if you’re the cautious
type that comes with its own problems
right because if you never take the risk
in the first place you miss all the
opportunities if you never take the
chance how are you gonna get the rewards
so I think there’s room in our lives for
practice risk-taking in whatever it is
you want to do but not just like any
kind of practice we need deliberate
practice until abra practice is
different from regular practice in two
important ways the first is that it
intentionally pushes your limits you
stretch your comfort zone every time
that you practice because you have a
specific goal that you want to reach and
the second is that you need accurate
feedback you need to be practicing the
right things so how much practice do you
need well Malcolm Gladwell published a
book called outliers that popularize the
notion that you need 10,000 hours of
practice to become an expert there’s
some debate about how true that is
but I think that 10,000 hour rule is a
good benchmark so if you’re doing it as
a full-time job that should take you
about five years but if it’s something
unique as a hobby on the side a few
hours a week what have you then it could
take you 20 years or more you’re gonna
have to be disciplined and consistent
for this to work here’s an example of
that kind of practice in the mountains
right hang out this is my friend Nathan
he’s sliding on a snow slope and he’s
gonna use his ice axe to stop himself
from going any further now we call that
process self arresting when you first
learned this process it’s very
deliberate you have to think about it a
lot so you guys first have to like get
your body reorient it’s that you’re like
belly-first on the snow and you have to
assume it’s kind of crouched position
like feet down but back then you got to
put your ice axe in the right spot you
got to leverage into and apply some
pressure and if
you got to turn your head to the side so
you don’t accidentally stab yourself in
the face all of that takes time and
effort and energy and while you’re doing
all those things you’re sliding down a
snow slope right you’re picking up speed
and if you pick up enough speed you
don’t get a stop at all and when that
happens you go careening down the slope
and hit whatever is at the bottom with
bone-shattering forests and because we
have very fragile squishy bodies as
people you don’t really tend to enjoy
that experience now in this case
Nathan will be fine there’s nothing hit
at the bottom this however as you can
imagine is a pretty terrible place to
learn this skill right because there’s
thousands of feet of vertical drop
behind Josh there there’s cliffs
underneath em that you can’t see in the
photo and there’s big provisos the giant
cracks in the glacier down below bad
place to learn before you get to this
place you need to have this skill
totally dialed super practiced so back
to Nathan as he slides down and climbs
back up over time this school become
automatic he won’t have to think about
it
he’ll just boom self-arrest he stops he
can keep on climbing
of course we practiced the skill we need
to make sure they were practicing the
right things right practice them do us
any good we’ve practiced the wrong
things to achieve that we need feedback
and we get feedback from kind learning
environments like whitewater kayaking
now when you screw up whitewater
kayaking you learn that you’ve done so
in ways that are cold and wet and dark
and loud and violent and kind of scary
and surprisingly absent of the oxygen
that you’re so accustomed to breathing
and that provides clear and immediate
feedback that you messed up and you
should probably do something different
next time back and you’re skiing on the
other hand it’s a little more devious
right these angular snow crystals here
they indicate that the slope could
avalanche but just because those snow
crystals are present in the snowpack
doesn’t mean that it will avalanche and
you can see where that’s tricky
see because you could ski escape dozens
of times thinking you done everything
right but actually had a series of close
calls and you don’t learn that until it
finally avalanches and if you haven’t
learned the lesson yet you’re likely in
that avalanche the price for this lesson
might be your life that’s really harsh
and in those cases experiential
education is not the way to go we need
to get feedback into other ways we talk
to experts in the field we review the
data we analyze accident
and we get feedback from our partners I
was climbing this line recently up the
rock and you step off the overhanging
rock under the suspended dagger of ice
and that move from the rocks to the ice
that can be kind of tricky so I called
onto my partner Hema climbing ice for 18
years I was like hey what are your
thoughts it’s like I got nothing man
you’re on your own
I’ve only ever seen people do stuff like
that in pictures but it looks rad 18
years right experience is not the same
thing as expertise I’d also be remiss if
I fail to mention the rule of luck and
all this the fact I’m giving this talk
is evidence of survivorship bias you’re
not hearing these words from the people
who got hurt or quit or went broke or
died while they were climbing or skiing
or mountain guiding right
those things are risky there’s an
irreducible amount of uncertainty
inherent in mountain travel as there is
in all of life we have to accept that
right sometimes you do everything right
and the outcome is still poor because
there’s risk involved see I topped out
this climb and then I caught a big chunk
of ice with my face now if I screwed up
my face deserves to look like that and I
need to accept those consequences right
I need to humbly learn the lessons
involved but find everything right and
my face still looks like that
well that’s what it means take risks
sometimes you lose and you have to be
okay with that
so do you drop in what are the
consequences how likely are they have
you put in the practice do you have the
skills what are the rewards
only you know the answers those
questions but at the end a it’s really
really straightforward without risk
there is no reward but in this case the
rewards were totally sweet thank you
[Applause]
[Music]
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