Get lost in the woods

Lessons from the 1st month of leading the Tribal Book Club

A month of ‘Walden’

I’ve been out of the academy for a few years now, and one thing I’ve struggled to recapture on the outside is a consistent reading habit.

I used to read books for hours and hours a day. It was my job. Good thing too because I LOVE reading books (you’d think a person who aspires to be a professor should!).

Just like with fitness, I tried a dozen different times to get back into a routine where I would be reading books I enjoyed, but doing so with an academic lens, looking to interpret, synthesize, and explore new ideas and information.

On my own I kept failing. But over the past month I’ve found success by leading members of my endurance training team, Tribal Training, through a book club.

Lesson: If you struggle alone, find a team who can help you become accountable to a better version of yourself

I want to share two things with everyone today.

One is an enhancement to my process that’s allowed me to find consistency with a new (yet old) habit.

One is a thematic takeaway from the text and a clarion call to everyone to embrace the challenge of nature and go get lost in the woods.

Together lead to an important understanding and call to action.

Teaching is the Best Form of Learning

I put out the idea to form a book club inside our training team after a few of the athletes I coach in a more direct capacity indicated their interest in both reading this book and having me lead a club inside the team.

I threw out the idea and 17 athletes showed support for the idea. Now I was on the hot seat to deliver. Good, I wanted the external accountability to help me cement reading as a non-negotiable part of my daily habit stack.

This forced me to think about how to introduce, and guide, this group through one of the densest philosophy books they will ever read. I began writing a series of prompts to help my teammates navigate the text and find meaning in the oftentimes difficult prose.

As I was creating these reflective and analytical prompts, one stuck out to me as being a potential way for me to overcome one of my own big limitations to getting reading as a habit to ‘stick.’

“What was your favorite sentence from this week’s reading portion.”

Stripping away the need to ‘get it all’ and focusing attention down to just a single sentence seemed like an important way to free me from myself. One of the reasons I haven’t been able to make reading stick is my big brained self gets in the way.

I have to take too many notes, make too many ‘wise’ observations, too many synthesized connection, and don’t get me started on connecting one text with another. I kept losing the ‘forest for the trees’ by going far too slow and getting myself bogged down.

By forcing myself into a leadership position, I uncovered a process to teach myself how to overcome a big limiting pattern: overanalysis leading to paralysis

The past month I’ve only taken notes by quoting individual sentences that grab me.

Lesson: Becoming a teacher of others teaches you something important about yourself

Now GO!

“It is a surprising and memorable, as well as valuable experience, to be lost in the woods anytime” - Thoreau

Of all the deep themes oozing out of Walden one is most vivid for me: the necessity of escape into the challenge of nature to find one’s true self

I’ve written articles over the past few months of how I need to escape the new suburban environment I live in to find inner peace and remind myself of my deepest values. (Read ‘How to Savage up a Tame Environment HERE)

In the modern world, we too often let comfort deny us the exhilaration of the challenge. My coach

Zach Homol

and I talked about the need to take camping trips with our families as ways to bond us closer through the challenge of nature.

The signal is strong. The call is real. The necessity is clear.

LESSON: Too many distractions keep you from embracing the right challenge

Adventure awaits out in the natural environment. Embrace the need to get lost.

Takeaways

I’ve given three lessons so far in this article, quick recap

• If you struggle alone, find a team who can help you become accountable to a better version of yourself

• Becoming a teacher of others teaches you something important about yourself

• Too many distractions keep you from embracing the right challenge

As a fitness and life coach I see too often people blocked up in life. Aimed at the wrong spot to find meaning in their lives. Struggling to figure out the right combination of actions and ideals to live healthy in body, mind, and spirit.

Reading Walden the past month has helped me better understand not just the ideals of self reliance and embrace of challenge but the value of the right type of accountability to other people when taking on a big challenge.

In fitness, if you have struggled by yourself for too long in finding consistency, passion, and enjoyment in exercise you should aim towards a group or team that’s living the life you desire. Join them.

If you’re struggling to lead yourself look to lead others. The accountability you gain when others depend on you has the ability to unlock new lessons to lead yourself.

And of course, take on a big challenge in nature to bring it all together. To find yourself away from the distractions and conveniences of modern living.

One month of leading a book club has been a great lesson in so many ways.

Excited to continue reading, leading, growing, and challenging myself and sharing what I learn along the way.

Happy Training Friends!