The Man Who Walked Across Antarctica - Colin O’Brady

1. 0:00 – 0:28

   Intro

   1. COColin O'Brady0:00

      When I was walking across Antarctica on my solo crossing, the first day I started crying, man. I started crying because I could barely pull my sled. I had a thousand miles to go and I couldn't even, like, literally cross the first quarter mile, and when you're crying, it's minus 30, minus 40 degrees outside. Antarctica doesn't take it easy on you. Just freezes the tears to your face. You feel like a real pathetic loser.

   2. CWChris Williamson0:21

      (wind blowing) Colleen O'Brady, welcome to the show.

   3. COColin O'Brady0:23

      Great to be here with you, Chris. Thanks for having me.

   4. CWChris Williamson0:26

      How connected did you feel

2. 0:28 – 5:09

   Discovery of Shackleton’s Ship

   1. CWChris Williamson0:28

      to the discovery of Shackleton's ship, Endurance, when they found it a few months ago?

   2. COColin O'Brady0:33

      Oh, man, it was, uh, that was like, uh, it's like a kid on Christmas, waking up to that news. I remember, uh, I got the New York Times alert and then my phone started blowing up 'cause so many people know how, um, you know, fondly I, I think of, uh, Antarctica, but specifically Shackleton. Shackleton has been, um, a, a hero among heroes i- in my mind and consciousness. Um, I, you know, the, Endurance is his story of, of that survival. It's one of my all-time favorite books. I've read, you know, like, obscure texts of his journals (laughs) and things like that. So, um, I honestly, I will say this though, I, I'm not generally a huge skeptic, but when they said they were going on this expedition to find that, I was like, "How could they possibly find?" (laughs) Like, they're, how are they gonna find this, you know? Like, I've, I've, I've rowed a boat across Drake Passage, I've been in these waters, I've been in there and I'm like, I'm like, uh, "No." But honestly, I was happy to be proven wrong 'cause it was unbelievable to see those photos, um, and, and how preserved the boat was. I mean, oh my gosh.

   3. CWChris Williamson1:28

      Have you got any idea how they actually managed to find it? Because the Antarctic is pretty big-

   4. COColin O'Brady1:33

      (laughs) .

   5. CWChris Williamson1:33

      Presumably the GPS coordinates that they had from whatever it was, 1914, 1915 or something-

   6. COColin O'Brady1:39

      Yeah.

   7. CWChris Williamson1:39

      ... when they departed, they wouldn't have been particularly sophisticated. So, have you got any idea how they knew where to look?

   8. COColin O'Brady1:44

      I, honestly, that, that is the part that I, I, I should probably look deeper into it, 'cause I'm fascinated to know the answer to that question. Um, I have no idea, particularly because, uh, the Weddell Sea, um, and then that section over there, I mean, they were on sea ice and it melted and it shrank and you, I mean, I've literally been in a rowboat i- in these waters with 40-foot swells. And so I've been bashed around just, uh, in the course of a couple of weeks. And then, you know, hundred years you think it's gonna move around at the bottom of the ocean. Um, and I think even they were, from the, the reports I read, pretty, uh, surprised to see, I mean, for one thing they found it, but how well preserved it was. Like, there, it's just the water is so cold that there was not as many sort of natural predators and things that they would have in a warmer environment of, of co- corals and barnacles and things that, um, would normally kind of decay. So like, I mean, it was like, uh, practically frozen in time. I mean, it was wild.

   9. CWChris Williamson2:31

      Dude, it's so good. Uh, given the fact that you've spent so much time in the Antarctic, did it give you a different sort of appreciation for what Shackleton and those guys did? Was there any extra insights? You know, if you're reading Alfred Lansing's book, which is my favorite, uh, description of the, the Shackleton crossing, uh, you know, you read that and it's such an intense story learning about how they were, first they had to kill the dogs and then they're having to look for seals, and then they leave some of the men behind and they strap all of the ballast that they can to one of the ships. But you, you got to see this yourself firsthand. Did that add some richness to the story?

   10. COColin O'Brady3:05

       Um, I mean, completely. I will, I will say this. I, uh, you know, I, I am proud of my, uh, solo crossing of Antarctica and the various expeditions. I've been to Antarctica four times and several expeditions down there. But, you know, walking across solo, um, poland- you know, what I was doing is I was trying to become the first person in history to cross Antarctica solo, um, unsupported, which means no re-supplies of food or fuel along the way, so taking all your gear with you, and then man-hauling, um, which is also what Shackleton and them were doing, but no, no, no kites, like no, no motors, nothing propelling you. Just kind of mano y mano, um, kind of in the most primitive form. But I will say, I, you know, 54 days alone, I made it across, obviously proud of that, whatever. There was not a day that went by, in fact, there wasn't often many hours that went by where I would laugh and I'd be like, "But Man, you got GPS out here, you got Gore-Tex, you got, like, these boots that are molded to your feet." And I would think about Shackleton and those guys and be like, just to get to Antarctica, they had to, like, take a year to sail a boat down there, and then they're like, "Oh, it's winter, so we better sit here for six months on the sea ice in the, you know, the, in the hull of our ship basically, 'cause it's so cold outside with, like, oil lamps." And then when they're walking on, you know, seal skin and pelts and things like that, all of a sudden I was like, "Man, like, there's just a different breed of human 100 plus years ago." And so, like I said, m- mostly, what all I have is, is I can't even put it into words the level of gratitude, respect, and just, like, badassery that those guys were, um, having experienced the life and death intense stakes of Antarctica, but still through a lens of like, "Well, I've seen satellite images of where I'm going, and I do have a staff with me-"

   11. CWChris Williamson4:40

       So, you got it easy.

   12. COColin O'Brady4:41

       Yeah, completely, completely. Yeah. (laughs)

   13. CWChris Williamson4:41

       You're, this is the five-star experience of Antarctica.

   14. COColin O'Brady4:45

       Totally, totally, totally. No, it's, it's, it's incredible. And it's incredible the courage that those guys had to literally go explore things. You know, uh, we, we can't really do this anymore. I suppose space is this next frontier for that. But on our planet, it's pretty hard to just be like, "Oh, I'm, I'm taking a boat here. I don't know, I might be back in a few years. Don't worry about me." You know, it's, I mean, th- that's, like, adventure at its truest, truest, purest form.

3. 5:09 – 9:15

   Colin’s Thoughts on Nims Purja

   1. COColin O'Brady5:09

   2. CWChris Williamson5:09

      Given the fact that Shackleton's one of the heroes of yours and you've done a bunch of high mountain crossings within short periods of time and stuff like that, how much of a freak is Nims Perjer?

   3. COColin O'Brady5:22

      Yeah, dude, Nims- Nims is an impressive guy in- in a lot of ways, no doubt about it. I've, uh... I've been fortunate to be in the mountains with him on some bigger expeditions. I was on K2 in the winter in 2021, um, and then also on Everest, my second time on Everest. He was guiding over there and our camps were nearby each other. Um, and so, uh, yeah, we spent a lot of time together, not only up on the mountains, but also having some fun in base camp and throwing back some beers. Um, yeah, I mean, look, his record, uh, what he did with 14 peaks, uh, in the film is amazing, um, is- is really- is really special. And more- and more- even more importantly or certainly as equally as importantly is the team he's surrounded himself with, um, are incredible. I mean, Nims is an incredible climber, um, but guys like Mingma David Sherpa, uh, Mingma Tenzing, I mean, these guys are just also just incredible world, world class. And I'm so happy, um, you know, he's been... His spotlight is shining so brightly and it's wonderful, particularly for the country of- of Nepal. You know, I've, um, been- been in the Himalayas plenty and a lot, if not all expeditions in the Himalayas basically quite literally ride on the back of the sherpa communities. And it's been far too long that it's been like that and those communities haven't gotten their shine, um, and so for him to have the impact that he's having and be able to uplift those voices and now for these Nepalese guys who, in my opinion, are- are the best climbers in the world, to not be working for other people or Western climbers or Europeans and be like, "Hey, like, we're doing our own badass records, look at us," uh, i- i- it's amazing. And so, yeah, he's impressive and his whole team and those guys, um, grateful to know those guys because they're really special, special humans in so many ways.

   4. CWChris Williamson7:02

      Dude, he was telling me about how he used to run to school every single night and then he'd run home and train in the gym and he'd sleep for a couple of hours and then get up. So all of that stuff, like the physical stuff is pretty impressive. The most impressive thing that I think is his ability to drink. Like the fact that he did basically a heavy night in between that three peaks within the space of 48 hours or something is-

   5. COColin O'Brady7:26

      He's a wild man, that's for sure. (laughs)

   6. CWChris Williamson7:28

      (laughs)

   7. COColin O'Brady7:28

      But, you know, it's like, you see people high performing in all sorts of different ways. You know, I've learned this over time, been- been around lots of world record holders, Olympians, but also billionaires and entrepreneurs and whatever, and- and you're like, "Yeah, the only way you get to the top of that is like, yes, you're good at the thing that you're good at, but you're also usually just a wild human being in a lot of different eccentricities that makes you that way." So he certainly has that in spades.

   8. CWChris Williamson7:53

      Do you know the Beer Mile? Have you heard of this?

   9. COColin O'Brady7:55

      The Beer Mile? Yes, I'm familiar with this.

   10. CWChris Williamson7:57

       Yeah, yeah.

   11. COColin O'Brady7:58

       Yes.

   12. CWChris Williamson7:58

       So it's a record. People do four laps of a 400-meter track-

   13. COColin O'Brady8:02

       Yeah.

   14. CWChris Williamson8:02

       ... and they have to down a pint of beer at the start of each lap.

   15. COColin O'Brady8:07

       Correct.

   16. CWChris Williamson8:07

       And one of my friends in the UK for a while held the record. He held the world record for the Beer Mile.

   17. COColin O'Brady8:12

       Nice.

   18. CWChris Williamson8:12

       And I feel like that's the next stage for endurance racing.

   19. COColin O'Brady8:17

       (laughs)

   20. CWChris Williamson8:17

       That it's- it's how hard you can go the night before. It's not just about climbing Everest or whatever, like that's been done. It's like the 14 death zone peaks-

   21. COColin O'Brady8:26

       Yeah, the- the 15 shots-

   22. CWChris Williamson8:27

       ... on a hangover.

   23. COColin O'Brady8:28

       ... to the face and then you stand after that.

   24. CWChris Williamson8:30

       Yeah, and then you've got to go and climb.

   25. COColin O'Brady8:31

       Well, I'm curious, what was your buddy's, uh, what was his time in the... It was like four something, obviously.

   26. CWChris Williamson8:36

       Yeah. So I think it was like a 4:45, maybe.

   27. COColin O'Brady8:39

       Wow.

   28. CWChris Williamson8:40

       Um, but you'll see the way that they do it when they come back and they grab the drink. They're already speed walking along-

   29. COColin O'Brady8:46

       Right.

   30. CWChris Williamson8:46

       ... and then the pace, because it's a- a-
4. 9:15 – 18:35

   Chasing a More Beautiful Life

   1. CWChris Williamson9:15

      There's this quote from Henry David Thoreau that says, "The massive men lead lives of quiet desperation." What's that mean to you?

   2. COColin O'Brady9:22

      Yeah, you know, I- I opened the book with that quote for a reason, um, which is, unfortunately, I think in our modern society, people, a lot of people are kind of stuck. And- and I take it a little bit further, which is, you know, I kind of think of life, uh, an experience of life on a scale of one to ten. So one being kind of our lowest low moment. So we know what that's like, heartbreak. You know, I was... When I was younger, I was burning a fire. I was told I would never walk again normally. You know, I... You know, adversity. Pulling a sled across Antarctica, you're going to hit a lot of one moment. Shackleton and his team, man, they had some ones trying to survive and get out of the mess that they found themselves in, right? We know what ones are. We try to avoid them. The tens, we also know what tens are, right? Like, tens are, you know, falling in love, having a massive achievement, selling your company, having amazing sex, uh, you know, I don't know, skiing perfect powder. You know, whatever- whatever that is for you, right? We know these tens. We want the tens. Tens are amazing. Who wouldn't want those tens? But I've come to realize that every time that I experience a 10, it's not in spite of my ones, but it's because of my ones. Every time I've gotten to these peak moments, it's actually because I've been willing to risk or willing to take on the possibility of this low downside moment. However, when you... That Thoreau quote, the massive men lead lives of quiet desperation, um, you know, apply that to modern terms or this thinking is, I find that most people are kind of stuck in what I call the zone of comfortable complacency, between four and six. Like, just kind of like, "It's fine." You know, "I have this job. I don't love it. I don't hate it. I go every day. I show up like, five, five, five," or been in a relationship for a while, like, it's not toxic, it's not abusive, it's not like horrible. I'm just kind of cohabitating and it's just like, fine, five, five, five. And I'm like, why are so many people stuck there? Or- or as Thoreau, you know, 100 plus years ago said, this- this quiet desperation. What is that? And I think it actually comes from people trying to hedge so much against avoiding this discomfort or avoiding this pain or avoiding taking any risks. It's just easier, again, particularly in a modern society where you have a phone, where you can just order food and look at your social media and binge out on Netflix and get that dopamine hit here or there, you know, up- up and again. It's like, okay. So-But if you take ... If you're hedging so hard against those ones, what I found is you actually also take the sevens, eights, the nines, the tens off of the table. And so, I opened the book there not as a saying, "Well, let me just be depressing. We all live these lives of quiet desperation. Sorry, you're shit out of luck." It's actually to say, "Wake up. Wake up." Like, you don't have to be like this. You don't... And I open, I open the book with a story about meeting an 80-year-old guy who was a billionaire who pulled me aside and said, "I've made more money than you can possibly imagine," but he actually, in his own way, sure, in a nicer apartment or on his private jet or whatever than the rest of us, he even said to me, "I missed it, man. I'm 80 and I just, I just kept doing what other people wanted me to do, and I'm 80 and I don't have time to go back and summit my actual Mount Everest, the life that I wanted to live, full of purpose and desire." 'Cause even him at the highest peak arc of, quote-unquote, "success" was vulnerably sharing with me and saying, "Hey, I kind of missed the point." And so, this book, in a lot of ways, is a call to action to wake people up, to shake them out of this, um, you know, th- this, uh, this life of quiet desperation, and ultimately as, as the Thoreau quote is often misquoted, people say, "And die with your song still inside of them." That's actually... Thoreau never said that, but most people think he did, is to sing that song, to figure out what, what you're passionate about, dive into that deep fulfillment, and The 12 Hour Walk is a, a one-day prescription and an in- an invitation to invest one day, conquer your mind, and unlock your best life. And I'm sure we'll talk more about exactly what that means, um, but I'm passionate about spreading that message. And I know a lot of the conversations you have with incredible people on this show, um, feel very similarly through their own lenses.

   3. CWChris Williamson13:17

      There's an idea that I learned about last week called the Region Beta Paradox. So, imagine that you have a rule. You always walk whenever you're traveling a mile or less, and you always drive whenever you're going a mile or more. If you follow that rule, you will paradoxically travel two miles faster than you travel one mile. The important insight here is that if you only take action when things cross a certain threshold of badness, sometimes better things can feel worse than worse things. Look around and you'll find a lot of people stuck in Region Beta, the guy that stays with his just okay job instead of ditching it for the chance of something better, the couple who break up, should break up, but can't bring themselves to do it, the friend who refuses-

   4. COColin O'Brady13:56

      (laughs)

   5. CWChris Williamson13:56

      ... to get a new apartment because the current one only has some black mold. All of these people would actually be better off if their situations were worse, because they'd leave their jobs, partners, and apartments, and be glad they did. Their only regret would not be leaving sooner.

   6. COColin O'Brady14:12

      Oh, man. Yeah, I'm g- getting goosebumps, man. You got, you got to send me the link to that. That is, that is epic. Um, I've read a, um, this, this is kind of a, a funny tangent, but it's, it's, it's apropos for this. I, uh, I read an article, I think it came out a few years ago in the Wall Street Journal and then The New York Times or someone reposted it, I forget exactly where it was, but it was about a guy, um, who went to Harvard Business School. And he went back to his, uh, graduation, or sorry, his reunion, 20-year reunion. So he's in his early 40s, and, or yeah, mid-40s, something like that, middle-aged guy, and he goes back to Harvard Business School, um, (smacks lips) and, you know, everyone's there, of course, Harvard Business School graduates, you know, "I worked at this hedge fund, made this money, did this thing," you know, whatever. And he goes, "Look." This is anecdotal. So this ... I'm not a scientist. This is anecdotal. But what I found was that in my classmates, there was a reverse correlation between who graduated at the top of their class and who was the most happy 20 years later. And he breaks it down further as to say why. And he goes, "The people that graduate at the top of the Harvard Business School class had all of these opportunities." And it was like, "Hey, here's this $500,000 a year job that's a pathway to the million dollar a year job, to the this, to the that." It's like almost impossible to say no to, but it's just like, it's too good. It's like, that, I mean, that's what, you know, that, that's, you made it, top of Harvard Business School class, you take the top job. And he graduated in the lower 20 percentage, to- lower 20th percentile of his Harvard Business School class. Now granted, this guy's acknowledging privilege, he's got a Harvard Business School degree, there's still a lot of doors open to him, but the big banking/consulting, the like, sort of A-list jobs were taken up by his classmates who outranked him. And he found, in this story, that the people at the bottom 20% of the class, 20 years later were actually happier, just talking around. They weren't divorced. They were more satisfied with their life. They had deeper fulfillment. And the question is why, and it's really similar i- in, in a different context of what you're saying, what you just shared, is that they were forced to actually for one second think and actually choose, meaning it wasn't just laid out for them. It wasn't like, "Well, dude, you got to take the top job 'cause of blah, blah, blah." And those people, again, still with a Harvard Business School degree, so caveat there, but they had this point where like, "I got to make a choice about this." It's the guy in the black mold in his apartment where someone's like, "Yo, you actually have to leave this apartment. You have to go find a different way." Right? It's not just like the easiest next thing to continue on the hamster wheel. So whether that hamster wheel is the Harvard Business School pathway to millions of dollars at a hedge fund, or, you know, apply that to any sort of methodology, it's so interesting, right? We don't take these inflection points, and we also hedge against that momentary discomfort. I liken it, it's, uh, funny, I liken it to you're sitting in your kitchen a- a- and you or your spouse says, "I want, I want a kitchen remodel. I want a new kitchen remodel." And we'd all love that you could snap your fingers and be like, new appliances, new floor, new backsplash, all the fancy things that happen, but we also know that doesn't happen. What actually happens in a kitchen remodel is you rip your kitchen apart, you don't have plumbing, you've got no stove for a month. It sucks, man. Like, it sucks. Meaning, you have to actually, to your point, uh, about what you just shared, be less comfortable, you have to be worse off for a period of time to actually have the better new result with the newer kitchen, et cetera. So it's a silly metaphor, but I think about it similar- I love that. Seriously, man, you got to send me that link.

   7. CWChris Williamson17:27

      Dude-

   8. COColin O'Brady17:27

      I freaking love that.

   9. CWChris Williamson17:27

      ... Region Beta Paradox, it's a serious thing.

   10. COColin O'Brady17:29

       Region Beta Paradox, yes.

   11. CWChris Williamson17:30

       Yeah. So the... what you've got, you've got the zone of comfortable complacency. To me, it actually seems more like a chasm. So I think that you, you end up in an area that's very difficult to get out of because you just move backwards and forwards, four to six, four to six. There's a concept called the Overton Window, which you might be familiar about, which is, um, the total amount of acceptable speech that we have, right? So from the worst thing to the worst thing on two different extremes, and then the Overton Window is within that, what is, uh, societally acceptable, right, typically what's acceptable. And I've been saying for-... three or four years that I think that we exist... o- our, our life experience is kind of like an Overton window, and we've brought the constraints in on the lowest low and the highest high that we're prepared to go to. And most people go from air conditioned house to heated seat car-

   12. COColin O'Brady18:16

       Mm-hmm.

   13. CWChris Williamson18:16

       ... to whatever, whatever. And it's exactly the same, man. I think that a lot of people would do far better facing some adversity, and it's strange to think that worse situations can be better than better situations sometimes. And I think as well, like, I asked Jocko this,

5. 18:35 – 24:46

   Childhood & The Possible Mindset

   1. CWChris Williamson18:35

      and, uh, I wasn't sure whether he agreed, but I wondered whether or not perfect childhoods can create suboptimal adults-

   2. COColin O'Brady18:44

      Mm-hmm.

   3. CWChris Williamson18:44

      ... about the fact that not going through sufficient adversity at some point in life can actually make you more fragile as you grow up. I don't think that it's necessarily a hard and fast rule. I'm sure that there's people that have amazing childhoods and grow up to be complete killers when they get up, but I do think that there's a little bit of something there. And you've got this other concept called the possible mindset as well. So, how does that relate to the zone of, uh, comfortable complacency?

   4. COColin O'Brady19:09

      Yeah. No, y- you know, it, it, uh, it, it brings me back, you know, to thinking through my life. Um, I, I didn't grow up with a lot of resources as a kid. My parents were super young when they had me. Um, but my mom definitely dared me to dream, you know? Kind of like, "Hey, you know, figure out how to make your way in the world. You know, you can do anything you set your mind to." So, you know, definitely a lot of positivity, but not a lot of resources, um, as a kid. Divorced parents, certainly had my fair share of ups and downs as a kid. But a huge turning point in my life, um, I'm 22 years old, I graduate from college, and instead of getting a normal job, and again, even though it's, you know, I could probably have a more secure future, I decide to take a backpack and surfboard and, you know, I scrape together a few thousand bucks from painting houses a- and buy a one-way ticket, 'cause I just wanna, like, experience a little bit of the world. I didn't have that opportunity growing up. And I get out there, it's a, it's a great experience, my first layover, because I had such a cheap student fare, I ended up on this, like, random layover and I met my wife on that layover, who I've now been together for 15 years, so I think that was a win right out of the gate. Um, but, uh, you know, hitchhiked through New Zealand, slept on floors, ate peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, saved up enough, you know, money to have a few beers at the end of the night. But it was like, you know, it was, it was, it was cheap, cheap, cheap, you know, world travel. And I found myself on this small island in rural Thailand and 22 years olds and guys were jumping a flaming jump rope down the, down the street, uh, or down the beach, and I thought, "Gee, that looks like fun." And, uh, you know, obviously not, not the greatest idea in the world. Um, and in an instant, my life changed. I'm jumping the rope, the rope's sprayed with kerosene, I trip on it, the excess kerosene sprays my body, lights my bod- lights my body completely on fire to my neck, and I have to jump into the ocean to extinguish the flames, but not before about, I don't know, 25% of my body is burned, predominant in my legs and feet. And I'm in the middle of nowhere in Thailand. I... There's no ambulance. I get a moped ride down a dirt path to a one-room nursing station. Um, there's a, a cat running around my bed and across my chest in this makeshift ICU. I mean, this is a bad, bad, bad set of circumstances all around. And the worst thing about it, second and third degree burns all across my legs and feet. The doctor walks in one day, about four or five days in, and he goes, "Hey, Colin, I hate to tell you this, but you'll probably never walk again normally. Um, the way that your ligaments have been burned in your ankles and, and your knees, you're probably gonna never gonna regain full mobility." Now, the... It's obviously a terrible diagnosis. I'd been a, you know, an active kid, a swimmer in college, et cetera. I think it's a terrible diagnosis for anybody. My identity is wrapped up in being able-bodied and physical at its young age, as a young man. But thankfully, there is a heroine to this story. We'll get back to that possible mindset, and it really wraps around what you're saying, is my mother comes in to Thailand. She finds me on the fourth or fifth day in the middle of freaking rural Thailand nowhere, finally finds me, and she tells me now that she was crying with the doctors, pleading in the hallways, "My son, I'm so afraid. Like, what, how are we gonna get him out of this? You know, please tell me good news." But she actually never showed me that sadness. She never showed me that fear. She never showed me her own anxiety. Instead, she came into my hospital room every single day going, with this huge air of positivity, being like, "Colin, yeah, you screwed up. L- let's not mince words. You're an idiot. You shouldn't have jumped that flaming jump rope. But your life's not over. What do you want to do when you get out of here? Let's set a goal. Look toward the future. What do you want to do?" And she's, again, I didn't call it that at the time, but I now call it this, this possible mindset. She's daring me to dream, dream with limitless possibilities. "Forget about this circumstance. What do you want to do when you get out of here? Close your eyes, picture anything." So, I close my eyes and she sees me smile. She goes, "What'd you see?" And I said, "Well, this might sound ridiculous, but I just saw myself crossing the finish line of a triathlon." And she could've easily been like, "Yeah, I said set a goal, but, like, the legs and the bandages and the wheelchair, like..." (laughs) I mean, like, maybe something a little more realistic. But instead, she's like, "Great. You're gonna do that. In fact, you should start training right now." And she yells over, she goes, "Hey, Doc. Hey, Doc, my son's training for a triathlon. Um, bring him in some weights." So, I have this picture of me in a Thai hospital, bandaged from the waist down, lifting 10-pound dumbbells, and the doctor's looking at me like, "This stupid-ass American kid is never gonna walk again. We should just knock some sense into him." But it's fixed in my mind, because my mother opened my mind up. Again, fast-forward to this, several months I'm in the Thai hospital. I get released. I'm carried on and off the plane. I'm in a wheelchair when I get home. I literally have to w- learn how to walk one step at a time. It's an arduous process. My legs are atrophied to the size of my wrists. I mean, I am, I am in a bad state. But 18 months after being burned in this fire, I move to Chicago, I take a job doing commodities trading, I sign up for the Chicago Triathlon, and I complete the race. I crossed the finish line. But to my complete and utter surprise, when I crossed that finish line, I actually haven't just completed the race, but I actually won. I placed first out of nearly 5,000 participants.... on the day. Now, i- i- one easy moral of the story is like, "Well, it turns out you're a superhuman freak and you're amazing at sports," and whatever. Like, that's not the point of the story. Where my mind went immediately was, what would've happened had my mom not looked- forced me to look towards the future and set this measurable goal, had instilled what I call this possible mindset inside of me, right? I definitely wouldn't be sitting here with 10 world records. I wouldn't be sitting here talking to you. I set all of those world records with those same legs after being burnt. So, your entire point about adversity is, look, I wouldn't wish that burn accident on my worst enemy. I wouldn't. But I'd also be blind to the fact that that adversity taught me one of life's greatest lessons, something that I can take with me through resilience, through hard times, through that calibration of going, "Yeah, that's a one. That's a one." But that opened up that doorway to the 10s.

   5. CWChris Williamson24:43

      Dude, unbelievable.

6. 24:46 – 32:15

   Progressing from Zero to Hero

   1. CWChris Williamson24:46

      What was the... So, going from burn to running the triathlon, what was the most difficult part of that recovery?

   2. COColin O'Brady24:55

      Yeah.

   3. CWChris Williamson24:55

      Because, uh, th- this ... I always think about this. In any movie where the young kid in school wants to learn MMA so that he can beat up the bully and he can get the hot chick-

   4. COColin O'Brady25:07

      (laughs)

   5. CWChris Williamson25:07

      ... and become, like, homecoming-

   6. COColin O'Brady25:09

      Yeah (laughs) .

   7. CWChris Williamson25:09

      ... prince or whatever it's called. Like, during that, the progression from zero to hero is a montage.

   8. COColin O'Brady25:17

      Yeah.

   9. CWChris Williamson25:17

      At most, it's a 20-minute sequence, and maybe he gets kicked out of the gym by the coach because he did something wrong. But that is the period in which people make the most change. That is the bit that, as far as I can see, is actually the one where that inflection point becomes reality. So, talk to me about that.

   10. COColin O'Brady25:35

       I, I'm only laughing, man, because, uh, y- you're a kindred spirit, bro. Like, my brain (laughs) , like, I think about stuff, just, like, storytelling this, like, I, like ... man, so many things I thought about very similar. I love it. I love your vibe. Um, the, uh ... Yeah, it wasn't a montage, although you could play it that way. Da, da, da. The music is playing. It's building. Um, do you know, the hardest part, honestly, was the initial, um, momentum to get, you know, to get over that inertia of being in that wheelchair, to be honest. And it sounds silly, but it's those first couple of steps. Um, I remember, I, I get back to Portland, um, where I'm from, Portland, Oregon, where I grew up in my mother's kitchen. I'm sitting in this wheelchair, and she says to me, she goes, "Okay, Collin. Now, I know we've been, you know, kind of talking shit about this triathlon goal in the hospital, and, you know, joking around with the doctors and whatever, but, like, today's, today your goal is to actually take your first step." And she grabbed this wooden chair from our kitchen table and placed it one step in front of my wheelchair, and she says, "You need to figure out how to get out of your wheelchair today and take that first step into that chair in front of you." And I remember looking down. My legs are still bandaged. There's still literally, like, blood. The way that burns heal, you still have, like, a lot-

   11. CWChris Williamson26:42

       Mm-hmm.

   12. COColin O'Brady26:42

       ... of blood seeping out and stuff like that, so you gotta change the gauze all the time. It's a horrible injury to have. And my legs, like I said, they're, like, as skinny as my wrists practically. And it took me three hours that day, literally three hours standing at th- staring at that wooden chair, sitting next to my, you know, wheelchair to get up and take that first step. Um, you know, in terms of the medical reason why that was difficult is that the skin was healing so tight over the course of my ligaments and over the course of my back and my knees and my ankles that the flexibility and the mobility was there, so taking a step actually felt like you were, like, ripping brand new skin, um, which is just counterintuitive to your brain and super painful. But to me, where that applies, uh, more broadly than me in a wheelchair specifically, and, and certainly my book, The 12 Hour Walk, is really this exploration of how we can all overcome limiting beliefs wherever we find ourselves in our life, in our proverbial wheelchair, trying to set out on, on a goal, right? We set these big goals. We set these big goals. You, you know this feeling. Like, you, uh, you, uh, you drink a bunch of beers with your buddy on a Saturday night and you're like, "Yo, we're gonna train for this marathon, and we're gonna, like, do the training program, and the next six months we're gonna be as fit as we've ever been," whatever, and then you wake up with a hangover and you call your buddy and you're like, "Yeah, man." Like, "I'm out." Like, "I, I, I had a few too many beers last night, but, like, let's be honest, I'm not gonna fucking run a marathon," right? Um, what I mean by that is the momentum, like the beginning steps is where we so often quit on ourselves, because that negative mindset as we talk about, I talk about in The 12 Hour Walk, is limiting beliefs, they overcome you. "You're not strong enough. What if you fail?" Um, you know, "You don't have enough money. You don't have enough time," et cetera. When I was walking across Antarctica on my solo crossing, the first day, I started crying, man. I started crying because I could barely pull my sled. I had 1,000 miles to go and I couldn't even, like, literally cross the first quarter mile. And in my first book, The Impossible First, there's a chapter, it's called Frozen Tears, because when you cry and it's -30, -40 degrees outside, Antarctica doesn't take it easy on you. It just freezes the tears to your face. You feel like a real pathetic loser in that moment. A- and I joke around. I woke up that first day in my tent, and I'm like ... I go, "Guess who was there?" And people are like, "Wait, I thought you were alone. What are you talking about?" I'm like, "No, no, no. I was alone, but inside of my tent was the five other versions of myself staring back at me going, 'Collin, you're an idiot. You just told The New York Times you're gonna do this thing. You didn't even make it a day. You're a failure. You're horrible.'" We know this feeling, right? We beat up on ourselves in our own minds. And so, I think more often than not, you know, the question was about the burn accident, but again, applied more broadly, it's like, you can set that massive goal in the sum moment of inspiration or excitement or whatever, but so often, quite literally in my case, taking the first steps, believing in yourself to make incremental progress, because the summit, the triathlon finish line, the summit of Everest might be a million steps, quite literally, between where you are and there, and you're going, "These first three steps, they don't matter." But they do, because they create momentum to the next steps and the next steps and the next steps after that.

   13. CWChris Williamson29:41

       How can people remind themselves of the patience that they need?

   14. COColin O'Brady29:46

       Yeah. You know, I, I, I think that ... I always encourage, I love to ask this question, you know, what's your Everest? My childhood dream was to climb Everest, and so I, you know, it's a framing question and, and it's easy. I ask it to eight, nine, 10-year-olds in the school classrooms that I do public speaking for. I ask it to adults and, you know, whatever, in, in fancy businesses. You know, it applies across age groups, um, and demographics. But it's just a question of, like, let's set a big goal. Like, what, what's, what's your goal? Again, that possible mindset, let's dream with, with, with full purpose and passion. But then, and that- that's kind of the fun part, everyone's like, "Oh, one day I want to have a million dollars, I want a private jet, I want to have the thing, I want to have the cred-" Whatever. You know, people have different answers to that question. "I want to start the family." But then, where I very quickly- And again, I'm a dreamer, so I love those big dreams, but I also want to ground that in reality, and I say to people, I'm like, "Okay, great. You've got the big goal, you've got the North Star. Now let's get down to real business. What can you do today? Today. Like, what can you actually do today?" And again, it, it's kind of silly, but i- i- in my own life, I literally, you know, dreamed about climbing Mount Everest for my whole life. I finally summit for the first time in 2016. I'm up there on the summit, and I look down and what do I see? It, it's obviously a bunch of ice and rocks, but I literally see a small little pebble. And I'm like, "Huh." And I reach down, I pick up the small, tiny little pebble and I put it in my pocket. And for years, I carry it around in my pocket with me. And I carry it around as this reminder that even Mount Everest, the biggest mountain in the world, and for me, my childhood dream, is actually just a bunch of tiny pebbles, a bunch of small rocks stacked on top of each other, millions of steps leading to the summit. And so for me, again, I encourage people, set the big goal, dare to dream greatly, but then go to the micro, micro, micro level. You know, what is your wheelchair to wooden chair moment? What is the one more tiny little rock that you can stack? Because, you know, you've talked to so many successful people, I've been fortunate to be around many in my life as well, and what you really, the through line is, a lot, almost always, almost always, it comes back to consistency over time, more so than this, this sudden, like, one-off burst of, you know, creativity or something. It's that burst of creativity, but it's then that action to get over that inertia, to create momentum, and then you just keep chipping away, stacking those rocks.

   15. CWChris Williamson32:03

       Dude, I had Jocko on the show a couple of weeks ago, and he said, "Discipline eats motivation for breakfast. You don't fi, uh, rise to the level of your motivation, you fall to the level of your discipline." And there's this quote,

7. 32:15 – 37:46

   The Power of Endurance

   1. CWChris Williamson32:15

      going back to what you just said there about, um, not wanting to wish on anybody, even your worst enemy, the pain that you went through with that stuff, but also kind of being very appreciative of it. There's this quote from Nietzsche, and it's in The Will to Power, and he says, "To those human beings who are of any concern to me, I wish suffering, desolation, sickness, ill-treatment, indignities. I wish that they should not remain unfamiliar with profound self-contempt, the torture of self-mistrust, the wretchedness of the vanquished. I have no pity for them because I wish them the only thing that can prove today whether one is worth anything or not: that one endures."

   2. COColin O'Brady32:54

      Mm-hmm.

   3. CWChris Williamson32:55

      The fact that all of those things are the difficulty, and by getting through them, those are the things that prove you on the other side.

   4. COColin O'Brady33:02

      Yeah. I mean, look, I, I've never heard that quote, it's great. Um, the, uh, it's ... How do I say this? I think it's even, you know, Nietzsche wrote that, you know, many, many, many years ago, and I think it, it's obviously been true through human history, but I think it's actually even more true now than it ever has been. And that's because, you know, again, going back, you know, however many thousands of years, we were a hunter-gatherer society, right? There was actually things that, you know, literally fight or flight. You know, the saber-toothed tiger might get you. You know, there was s- some level of having to endure, to your point, right? And then of course, over time, we've created more and more and more modern conveniences. Um, and I love my modern conveniences. I love that you and I can sit here and have this conversation and, and scale ideas and impact, um, with, with things like the internet. A- and I guess, like, it's not to vilify that, but it's also to say we have to become more intentionable, excuse me, intentional about creating that suffering. You know, even at the, you know, obviously there's food insecurity in many places, but even at pretty low level of income, there's cheap accessible food at a grocery store, fast food, you know, et cetera, uh, on a lot of corners. Um, so it's not like we're, like, hunting and gathering, you know, anymore, although our DNA is still programmed for that kind of level of survival. And when you put on that kind of, um, uh, you know, I, I guess autopilot, I think that our spirit dies a little bit. And f- you know, for me, The 12 Hour Walk, uh, the book itself is about limiting beliefs. The book itself brings you through all sorts of high energy stories of rowing a boat across Drake Passage and climbing Everest and losing friends in climbing accidents and overcoming adversity, et cetera. But at its core, it's a call to action for this exact purpose, for this exact quote of, of what you're saying, which is to say, I am inviting people to actually walk out their front door, turn their phone on airplane mode, and go for a 12-hour walk by themselves. But it's through that lens. And again, I'll, I'll double back on the origin story of that, and you know, kind of wh- why, why that methodology, et cetera, but you know, skipping ahead for a second, which is, to that point, it's not suffering like go light yourself on fire on a beach in Thailand, you're gonna learn a good lesson, but it's to that person who's living that five, that five, that five, that comfort zone, that ... And, and I like how you thought about that chasm almost, this chasm that you can't get out of, right? It's to say, it's to say, man, like, you gotta shake it up. You gotta try something different. If you stare at your phone every single day for the last 364 days, try a day without that. Not because I'm telling you not to use your phone, but just take a break. Move your body in a different way, try something different. That implicit, your feet, your legs will get tired at the end of 12 hours. Your mind might get exhausted 'cause you're not used to being alone in your thoughts, 'cause you can distract yourself with dopamine hits from your social media whenever you want.... but that, so what Tanisha is saying right there, is to say like, but that is how you're going to learn. You're going to learn when you have that adversity, that suffering, that challenge. Are you familiar with, um, the concept of Type 2 Fun?

   5. CWChris Williamson36:03

      No.

   6. COColin O'Brady36:04

      Okay. Uh, I, I think you're gonna love this. Um, so Type 1 Fun is, uh ... This is not something I made up, by the way. But Type 1 Fun is like, you know, just the fun, uh, dancing with your friends, partying, drinking beers, uh, you know, whatever. Just fun. Skiing powder, surfing a beautiful wave, you know, whatever you're into, you know, that's fun. Just fun, man. That's fun, straight up. Type 2 Fun is when you're doing it, and, and mountain climbing is cl- is classically Type 2 Fun, but there's all sorts of different things, so is starting a business, so, you know, there's a million things like this. When you're doing it, in the moment, so let's just say you're climbing a mountain, and the wind is blowing you in the face, and you're exhausted and you're starving, maybe a little bit scared 'cause it drops off thousands of feet right beside you. Like, in the moment, you're like, you're looking over at your buddy and you're like, "Bro," like, "Why are we doing this? This is fucked, man." Like, "This is terrible," right? But then, a week later you're at the bar with your buddy and you're like, "Bro, remember when we were out on that mountain? That was so epic, man. We were like out there, we were living, we were this." Like, Type 2 Fun is not necessarily fun when you're having it, when it's happening, right? But it is epic and fun upon reflection. And what I think that is, is the psyche in the moment is kind of trying to p- protect you, right, this, this animalistic instinct, uh, to protect yourself from this discomfort or whatever. But the payoff is in the future you're like, "Oh, I learned something from that. Oh, I felt alive. Oh, I was like really living." Uh, and so for me, Type 2 Fun is epic. Now, Type 3 Fun is not fun when it's happening and it's not fun to reflect on later, so that's to be actually avoided at all costs.

   7. CWChris Williamson37:37

      (laughs)

   8. COColin O'Brady37:37

      But, uh, the Type 2 Fun, that's that middle ground between just hedonistic pleasure and actually, you know, the, the grit and challenge of something that is awesome to reflect on with nostalgia.

8. 37:46 – 51:36

   Going to Antarctica

   1. COColin O'Brady37:47

   2. CWChris Williamson37:47

      If you're going to the Antarctic, who do you need to speak to? Is there a, is there a, a gatekeeper somehow? Is there a person that you need to have a chat with before you can start walking across it?

   3. COColin O'Brady37:57

      Yeah. So, um, the, the short answer is yes. It's a, it's a pretty protective place. Although, it, it, it's, it's always a funny conversation. Uh, you know, I've been on Joe Rogan's podcast a couple of times, and he loves to stoke a good conspiracy th- theory. And he's always like, "So how are the flat Earths?" Then all of a sudden the comments go crazy and everyone's then messaging me about flat Earth and all this stuff. So, uh, as far as I know, the Earth is not flat. Uh, I didn't see the edge, I didn't see any, uh, trenches or whatever down there. But a part of that big, uh, theory, I, I guess, from all the people that have heckled me on the internet about the flat Earth, um, is that it's like Antarctica is this, like, place that no one can go to and it's government controlled. Um, that's not entirely true, of course. Um, however, it is a very protective place, and that's what makes Antarctica amazing. It's not an autonomous region of any country. There's 12 signatory countries, um, the United States being one of them, who have sort of the protecting scientific rights of Antarctica, and that's why there's no mineral drilling or, you know, anything like that. Um, and that actually can change. In, in 2041 that can change, but I think that we will renew that treaty and hopefully all the countries agree. But the, the short answer is, is there's this treaty called IADO, um, which, uh, it stands for the International Antarctic, uh, something, something Treaty, um, and I forget what all the, all the letters stand for. But IADO, um, is basically this group of people that you have to contact to be able to be there, um, because you can't just like go cruise around Antic- Antarctica if you're not doing the m- most important things, which really is just preserving it, um, is, is not, you know, messing up the landscape, is not changing it. Um, again, probably too in the weeds, but when I rowed a boat to Antarctica, there's even different things about the exterior of Antarctica and the ocean part of Antarctica because there's so much sea life there, versus the interior of Antarctica when I walked across is actually a whole different ... But it's all governed by IADO. Long story short, in terms of logistics, um, and, and this is kind of funny, is that there basically is one guy with one plane, or I should say one company, but basically, uh, it's, uh, one single plane of this company called ALE which governs almost all of an expedition context of most of the continent. And so, when I was crossing Antarctica, uh, uh, as I think you might know, I was tr- trying to be there solo, trying to be the first, but it turned out there was another Brit, uh, who announced his project about a week before I was getting ready to depart, this guy named Captain Lewis Rudd, this badass special c- uh, special forces, very experienced polar explorer. And both of us had been planning our expeditions autonomously of each other without announcing it to the world, and then I, I take an interview with the New York Times, he takes an interview with The Telegraph, and they come out on the same day, and it's like, "I'm gonna be the first." And I'm like, "Wait, there's like another guy? Like, this is like a, a race now?" (laughs) Like ... And the funniest part of it, to go back to your question about, you know, the literal logistics of going to Antarctica, of course we both call the same one guy with the one plane to take us to the edge of the continent, and there's only one, you know, weather window, the Antarctic summer, that's long enough for you to be able to do this expedition. So before we know it, I found myself on a cargo plane, shoulder to shoulder, sitting next to this special forces British badass (laughs) , getting dropped off to not what I th- I ... Now, in my whole mind I visualized it's gonna be this hard 1,000 mile journey across Antarctica. I never once visualized it was a head-to-head, mano y mano race with one of the most badass humans I've ever met in my life, and we're dropped off on the ice, like, "Ready? Go." Um, so anyways, the, the logistics make that funny. It's not a, it's not as if there's all these different ways to get there, and to and from there, and a million ... You know, it's like a, it's not like United Airlines, Delta Airlines, American ... No, it's not like, there's not the choices. It's like a very specific region, window, logistics, um, and a lot of paperwork, of course, just like all these things are.

   4. CWChris Williamson41:38

      Presumably one of the biggest decisions that you need to make when you're walking across is how much you pack versus how hard it is to pull that, that pa-

   5. COColin O'Brady41:45

      Yeah.

   6. CWChris Williamson41:46

      ... that, uh, I guess, resources to weight differential.

   7. COColin O'Brady41:49

      Yeah. So, um-No one had completed this crossing in the style that we were attempting to do it, which is a solo. So people have crossed Antarctica solo, um, in a few different ways, but not in what's called unsupported. So unsupported is no resupplies of food or fuel. People have actually done solo unsupported but aided, aided by kites or dogs or other things propelling them. So we were doing solo unsupported and fully human powered. But exactly to your point, that unsupported nature of that i- is kind of the crux of this, which is, of course, there's not a lot of infrastructure in Antarctica, but there's enough infrastructure that you could get a plane to drop you off a depot of food, you know, 300 miles into the journey, 600 miles into the journey. Or, uh, we're both crossing through the South Pole and there's a scientific research station there, uh, an American base. And you know, there's only, you know, a small amount of people there, but you could probably arrange some logistics to pop inside, have a coffee, you know, resupply your food or whatever. And that would obviously negate the unsupported nature of it. So when I went there, there were some buildings. I hadn't seen anyone in 40 days and I just, like, was like, "Well, it looks like a warm building in there, that'd be nice." But obviously, you know, I can't even take a cup of coffee from a scientist who wants to come wave to me, you know, to maintain that unsupported nature of this. But yeah, the math equation, the math equation i- is what played on people's minds of why this may or may not have been possible. I called my project The Impossible First, and it's also the name of my first book, because people for a long time were like, "This thing's impossible." Um, a long lineage of British explorers, actually, I mean Shackleton was one of the first people to say, "Let's try to cross the entire continent." That's what he was doing on the Endurance, um, Expedition. Obviously they got waylaid and a whole other adventure ensued (laughs) , um, as we both know from the Alfred Lansing book. Um, but it kind of, you know, it'd been in the curiosity of peoples minds of the full crossing of the continent. Um, Henry Worsley, a very famous British explorer attempted the crossing, uh, in 2015, and he made it 71 days in, only 100 miles from the finish line, ultimately got sick, fell ill, and ultimately died. Super sad. Another super, um, renowned British explorer who I have a ton of respect for, this guy named Ben Saunders, the year before, uh, Captain Lou and I attempted, he was out there for 50 some days, um, and then ran low on food and supplies and, and had to be evacuated from this. And that is the s- because exactly what you said, which is you'd love to have 1,000 pounds of food and gorge yourself. You're burning 10,000 calories a day walking and trying to survive, and in temperature it's minus 40 degrees. 10,000 calories a day. If you brought 10,000 calories a day for 60, 70, 80 days, however long you think it's gonna take you, that's 1,000 pou- you know, that's 1,000 pounds before you know it. Like, you're not going anywhere on the first day. You're not gonna be able to pull your sled. So I loaded up my sled with as, as much as I possibly thought I could carry, which was 375 pounds. Now hence the, uh, frozen tears on day one and day two, because it turns out pulling a 375 pound sled is at the very limit of possibility for me as well. So much so that I called my wife on the first day from my satellite phone, I said to her, in the midst of my tears on day one, I said, "Well, babe, um, I think we named our project the right thing. Like, this is for sure impossible. Uh, definitely. I, I can't even, you know, make it the first day." But I chipped away at it. But your, your question is astute, which is it's, it's this math equation between how much you can carry, how much you can drag, et cetera, and the amount of time you need to be out there. Um, both Captain Lou and I, uh, lost a ton of weight. I was eating 7,000 calories per day but I was burning 10,000, so I'm on a 3,000 calorie deficit from day one. I know by the end, my hips were sticking out, my ribs were sticking out, my body was completely beat up, fully, fully, fully, um, declined. So yeah, I mean, it is a, a, a rough situation. And you know, people wrote, there's a, there's a quote that I pulled from Wired Magazine before I started, it says, "It is straight up impossible to take enough calories to cross Antarctica in, in this form." Because you run the spreadsheet and the math and it's kind of like, uh, kilojoules in, energy output, this amount of days, this amount of weight. Like, it just doesn't ... It, it's ... I mean, on the ... I mean, I was on my literal last bite of food when I made the crossing after 54 days. Like, I was, that was it. I c- I didn't have, I didn't have ... I definitely didn't have a week more in me, uh, of food or supplies. I mean, I was on the limit, so ...

   8. CWChris Williamson45:53

      I suppose as well that the pace that you move at is also determined by that too. If you move a little bit quicker, that's going to be more hard on your body, but it also means that you have fewer days, which means less food, but it also means more energy requirement per day because you're using more energy to move yourself more quickly.

   9. COColin O'Brady46:08

      100%. And, and I say this, and I say this in all seriousness, I literally didn't change my underwear for 54 days because I didn't bring an extra pair of anything, because I wanted 100 more calories of food in my sled, was more important to me than, you know, the, the nastiness of, you know, being in your own same clothes for, for two months. But, you know, that, that, that's 100% true, uh, of just trying to figure that out. The 12 Hour Walk, the name, the origin of that is actually because I ... Lou kicked my ass in the first da- first week, and then I caught up to him on, uh, day six of this Antarctic expedition. Uh, I, I finally caught up to him, and I thought he, I had actually thought I'd never see him again. I thought he was gonna smoke me. But I was fortunate to catch up to him. And at that point, at that 10 hours is the maximal amount of time that I can pull my sled. It's just, it's just the maximum amount of time I can pull my sled. There's no way I can pull it any further. And then I catch up to Lou, and we have this, like, kind of funny exchange. He walks up to me and he's, like, all chipper. He's like, "Hey, good morning, mate. Um, you know, I've got a bit of a suggestion for you." And I'm like, "This is, like, a special forces trained killer. Like, this dude's not just, like, being nice to me out here. Like, there's no freaking way." And so I said, "Lou, I wish you no ill will. We both know the stakes out here. You could die out here, like, whatever. But let this be the last time we speak. I'm pretty certain you're not just, like, giving me, like, friendly chipper advice." And I remember he, we all had to wear a face mask on, right, 'cause we can't have any exposed skin, and he lifts his face mask up for 10 seconds and just stares me in the eye and he's just kind of like, "Okay. Suit yourself." And I was like, "That's right. We're done talking. I'll see you later."We're both carrying 300-pound sleds, so it's like, "I'll see you later." And we're just like tortoises, like one step, and we're going in the same direction. (laughs) So, we're like, right next to each other, for like, an hour, two hours, five hours, he's still right ne- I mean, if you saw, if you had like, a video camera on both of us, you'd be like, "These two dudes in the middle of nowhere, pretending like the other one's not there, they're walking shoulder-for-shoulder, like marching in like, slow motion next to each other. Like, "I will see you later."

   10. CWChris Williamson48:08

       It's like saying goodbye-

   11. COColin O'Brady48:09

       (laughs)

   12. CWChris Williamson48:09

       ... to somebody and then leaving out of the building in the same direction, isn't it?

   13. COColin O'Brady48:13

       Totally, it's just awkward. (laughs) It's just like, this is the most awkward of awkward. And so, in my mind, I'm like, "Okay, 10 hours. I'll make it to 10 hours. He's gonna stop before then, there's no way he's going that long. I don't know how long his days are with this." Eight hours goes by, he's still right next to me. Nine hours goes by, he's still right next to me. 10 hours goes by, he's still right next to me. 10 and half hours goes by, he's still. I'm like, "This guy is like, relentless." And I'm exhaust- I mean, I'm literally, I'm, like, out of my daily food ration, I'm spent for the day. 11 hours goes by and he finally reaches down and pulls his, his tent out of his sled. And I'm like, "Thank God." But I don't wanna like, I don't wanna, I wanna pretend, I'm totally pretending that I'm like, that I'm all good, that I can just keep walking forever, you know? It's a, we're set psychological games. And so, I say to myself, "I'm going one more hour." And so, I gain another, like, mile on him, and I get my first true lead in the race, is 12 hours. And then that night, my wife says to me, she's like, spreadsheeting all this stuff back home. Like, how many calories I ate versus how many miles I'm going, and like, kinda trying to solve stuff. And I talk to her on my satellite phone and she just goes, "I've been waiting for an opportune time to tell you this, and I guess this is the moment to tell you, but unless you start, unless that 12-hour day becomes your normal day, and you don't take any breaks, like, you don't take a day off, whatever, like, you're not even gonna come close. I'm still not sure that's gonna get you there, but I can tell you right now, 10 hours is not gonna cut it. So, if you thought that was hard, like, I need you to repeat that 50 more times." Um, and honestly, my limiting belief in that moment was telling me I couldn't go any further, but I recalibrated. 12, if I can do it once, I can do it twice, I can do it three times, and I kept that up. And honestly, I've said this to Lou, we both acknowledged this, I, I, I was first and, and he finished a few days behind me. But we've both acknowledged to each other two things. One, just do the math. If I had gone 10 hours instead of 12 hours over 50 some next days, that's 100 hours less that I would've traveled, I would've made it nowhere near the finish li- I mean, I would've been hundreds of miles away from finishing. So-

   14. CWChris Williamson49:59

       Because you would've run out of food?

   15. COColin O'Brady50:01

       I would've run out of food. 'Cause you're gonna kind of, I had a daily ration, like, set up. So, it wasn't like I was like, it was like, I would've eaten my daily ration and then I would've quickly realized it wasn't gonna make it far enough. But the second thing is just kind of a, an interesting human thing about competition and how we can s- in a strange way uplift each other, which is, I've said to him, he's said to me, he goes, "Man, I don't think either of us would've made it across had the other one not been there." Which is like, I never saw him again, and I actually waited for him at the finish line, um, for a few days. But I never saw him after the day six. But every day for hours, I would look over my shoulder like he was gonna like, pop up out of nowhere, like, I was like, "This guy's, he's coming for me, he's coming for me, he's coming for me." There'd be a 50, 60 mile per hour headwind, and I'd think to myself like, "Yo, this is the day to take this off, like, it's minus 70 wind chill. Like, you're gonna m- you're gonna get lost in this whiteout, like, don't go out there." But then I'd think to myself, "But what if Captain Lou goes? If he goes and he passes me, like ..." You know, and so, i- it forced me to keep going, right? That competition, that intensity, um, of that. So, um, you know, it-

   16. CWChris Williamson51:01

       Do you think you'd have made it had it not been for him being there as well?

   17. COColin O'Brady51:05

       That, that's sort of my point. Like, him being there uplifted my game for sure. It made me, it made me, it forced me to recalibrate what I thought my limits were, 100%, you know, in this moment. Um, and it made me get out of my tent on days would've been so easy to be like, "If no one else is out there and no one's, like, racing you, you think to yourself, well, I could eat a little bit less food but I could just sleep in my tent for the day and just rest, or something like that." But in the end, that would've caught up with me. Um, but I never took a rest day, I never took a single day off, um, for 54 days straight, uh, pulling the sled across there.

9. 51:36 – 1:00:37

   Removing Limiting Beliefs

   1. COColin O'Brady51:36

   2. CWChris Williamson51:36

      I'm thinking about this mediator of limiting beliefs, right? The story that we tell ourselves about who we are or what we do or what our capabilities are. It seems like after practical restrictions, like money, and the ability to not fly or defeat gravity, and the requirement to sleep, and stuff like that, limiting beliefs really are the, the main, uh, rate limiting step between where you are and you reaching your potential, because there's not really anything else in between it. It's like, look, it's just, other than genuine practical restrictions, and most of those practical restrictions probably are filtered through your limiting beliefs as well, like, "I can only do 10 hours," "Actually no you can't, you can do 12," limiting beliefs kind of place a glass ceiling on, a, a, a pretend glass ceiling on what we achieve in life. And it's a case of trying to move that up so that we have more capacity.

   3. COColin O'Brady52:38

      Oh, 100%. You know, I, I couldn't agree more. I think it's, and, and the reason that in the book, and obviously, people, people use that phrase limiting belief, but the reason that I use that phrase, you could call it excuses, you could call it doubts, and there's a lot of different, like, words that you can use for that. But I prefer limiting beliefs for a specific reason which is, they're beliefs. They're just that. They're not limiting truths. These are not limiting facts. You know, you, you named a couple of the facts, right? The, you know, humans can't fly w- you know, just with wiping their arms or something like that. But there's, tho- those are maybe a couple truths. But the, in our minds, what are holding us back, these obstacles, there's beliefs. And beliefs can be reoriented, rewritten, we can write the new story of what we're telling ourselves, and that is when you step into that possible mindset. And that ultimately, through, through rich storytelling, i- is what the 12 hour walk is about. What, what's, uh, the, the kind of origin of that, you know, g- taking that from the 12 hours of walking in Antarctica to sort of applying the, the thought behind this book, or the origin of it, is when I got to the end of this crossing, my body was beat up, man. I mean, beat up. Like I said, I was skinny, I was, I mean, I was frail, I was exhausted. But strangely, through the solitude, through the silence, through the conviction, through the, as Jocko says, the discipline, I'm getting out of my tent no matter what, my mind got stronger. I got sharper. I had more clarity than ever before. And that tapped me into fulfillment, passion, curiosity, creativity. I was lit up, man, from the inside. Even though the external view of my body was just like, I mean, a bag, my, my wife was like, you know, looked like I was, like, a drug addict for, like, 10 years or something like that. Like, you know, (laughs) I was just, like, so frail. Um-But, anyways, she... I- I get back from that, and I find this place in my mind of just deep positivity and deep strength, and I think, "Great, like, I have it, man. I- I've got it. I can take this with me for the rest of my life." And in... in some ways, that's true. However, a couple years after this Antarctica crossing, got a bunch of big stuff planned, you know, touring around, my New York Times best-selling book, all this stuff, whatever. Boom. COVID hits. Everything gets canceled. My next expedition, canceled. My book tour, canceled. And look, my s- you know, my silly life being canceled is the least of the world's problems in this moment, right? We were all disrupted in this time. But also, not just disrupted. Like, there's bad stuff happening, right? So, I find myself, as many of us did, like, I'm locked in... in my house with my wife and my dog. We're on the Oregon coast in this small cabin. And that mindset of strength and fulfillment and courage and positivity that I found in Antarctica was gone. And that was... that was a... You know, I'm doomscrolling the news, I'm getting, you know, every bad hit off the internet of this, and I'm starting to worry about my grandparents, and the borders are closing, and the people, like, in my life that could get this sickness, and what... what does this all mean, right? That uncertainty at that moment. O- obviously, we know a lot more now than we did then, but March, April of 2020, like, it was a strange time for, you know, all of humanity, I think. And... And that wasn't... That definitely... I wasn't impervious to that. And I found myself just in a downward spiral. Negativity, fear, doubt, limiting belief, whatever you want to call that. My wife looks over at me one day and she's like, "Hey, you know, you haven't changed out of your pajamas in three days? You've been sitting on the couch just, like, just literally reading a headline, headline, this person died, this is happening," da-da-da, da-da-da, da-da. Just spinning, spinning, spinning. And so, I was like, you know, thank her for calling my attention to that, but, okay, I gotta get myself out of this funk, right? And I was like, "When was the last time I felt so tapped in like this?" And I was like, strangely enough, it was actually when I was walking across Antarctica. Silence, stillness, solitude, quiet in my mind. Maybe I can get back to that. So, I say to my wife, I say to Jenna, I say, "Look, hey, uh, I'm gonna go for a long walk tomorrow alone." Um, you know, one of the few things you can do during a lockdown is to be outside alone for a period of time, uh, depending on where you were in the world. And I said, "Don't w- don't worry, I'll probably be back around dinner, I don't know, 12 hours," something like that, like I used to walk. And she's like, "Oh, have fun." (laughs) So, I walk out my front door. 20 minutes in, my phone buzzes in my pocket, and I reach for my phone. Instinctively, I look down. You know, my buddy's texting me. I'm gonna text him back and I'm like, "What am I doing?" Like, I'm just, like, out here on this walk, I'm gonna stare at my phone texting my buddy and like, what, I'm gonna get on a Zoom call next? Like, hold on a second, like, you don't need this, just today. So, I put my phone on airplane mode and I keep walking. 12 hours. I take breaks, I rest, but I'm out there for 12 hours alone in the stillness and silence. No music, no podcasts, nothing. And I get back to my front door 12 hours later. My dog jumps up on me. And my wife looks over at me and she goes, "You're back." And I'm like, "Yeah, I told you I was gonna come back around dinner time," whatever. She goes, "No, no, no. You're back. You're back." Like she could just see it in my spirit that I was back. And I was like, "Yeah, I feel better than I've felt in a long time. Really needed that." Now, I thought, look, I'm the guy who walked across Antarctica, walked around solo, has done all these, like, whatever, epic endurance challenges, blah, blah, blah. Maybe this is just a me thing. But during COVID, all sorts of friends of mine would call me, you know, family members, colleagues, et cetera, and be like, "Yo, I'm struggling with this. I'm trapped in my house. I'm stuck in my..." You know, "My... My job just... I just lost my job, my this, my that." And so I started suggesting this 12-hour walk to people. I said, "This might sound crazy, but take the 12-hour walk. And that can look like anything. You know, young people, old people, fit people, not-so-fit people." I said, "Th- the walk is 12 hours in silence. Take as many breaks as you want. I don't care if you go for one mile or for 50 miles." My 77-year-old mother-in-law, she did her walk by walking one time around her block and then sitting on her porch for an hour, and then walking another time by... around the block, but she maintained the silence and solitude, training her mind throughout this entire 12 hours. And again, we talked about this a little bit, but it's... it... it is a little bit chal- it... it's challenging. It's outside of your comfort zone. It forces you to do something different. But what I have found is that despite maybe hour five, your legs get tired, hour seven, your mind's exhausted, like, "Oh, I just wish I could have a podcast to distract me." Don't get me wrong, I love a good podcast, and I usually listen to music podcasts, et cetera. But taking that one day that's just to shake that up, that difference, every person I have known to get back to their front door after that 12-hour walk is lit up. They're refreshed, they're re-rooted. They have more creativity, more curiosity. They've been working on this problem in their own life and they uncover it. Whatever limiting beliefs are coming up for them, they're battling back through them. And in fact, the 12-hour walk, I always say it starts right now in this moment, because if you're listening to this podcast, you're hearing this for the first time, what ends up happening is you're either, "This Con O'Brady guy, man, this guy's full of shit. I'm never gonna do this walk. This is stupid," or whatever. The point being, and why I say that it starts right now, is that the 12-hour walk, of course, when you pick that date and you put it on your calendar, you take the walk, that's the experience. But right now, you're bargaining with yourself in your mind. You can't help it by listening to this right now. Something is coming up in your mind. You're either going, "Yeah, I'm gonna do that," or, "I'd love to do that, but I don't have enough time, I don't have enough money. What... What if I fail? My feet are gonna be hurt. I'm gonna be this." And here's the thing. Whatever limiting beliefs, if they're coming up for you and you're hearing this for the first time, I'm holding up a mirror to you. Because these actually are the same limiting beliefs, I'm certain, that are looping on your brain dozens and dozens and dozens of times, that are actually, as you said, Chris, putting the glass ceiling on your own hopes and your dreams and beliefs. But here's the thing. The invitation of the 12-hour walk that anyone can do on any day is for you to actually say to your limiting beliefs, your own interior dialog, "Oh, I don't have enough time? I'm gonna make the time." And then you do the 12-hour walk, and then that limiting belief comes up for you a week later, you go, "Oh, hello, limiting belief. I see you there. But I remember last time, I pushed that aside. I... I can overcome. And I can prove that I can actually optimize my time, or I'm... I'm willing to seek a little bit of discomfort to get those 10s." A- and that's really the... the beauty and the juice. And for me, man, I'm... I'm so excited about this book, but more than anything, I'm excited about just sharing this methodology that is free, accessible to every single person, because the ripple effect in people's lives and that positivity, you know, that's the world I want to live in. I want to live in a world where people are lit up, not... not surrounded by the massive men leading lives of quiet desperation, but the massive men and women who are lit up to take on life and to summit the Everest, whatever that Everest looks like for them in their own lives.

   4. CWChris Williamson1:00:34

      Dude, let's fucking go. I love it. It's so, so

10. 1:00:37 – 1:04:17

    Colin’s App

    1. CWChris Williamson1:00:37

       good.Am I right in thinking that you've made an app as well, and is there a day that people are supposed to, that you can do it with if you want to do it with a bunch of other people around the world?

    2. COColin O'Brady1:00:46

       Yeah, yeah, yeah. So, those are all true. It's funny, I did make an app. It's funny, I'm saying, "Turn off your phone, put it on airplane mode," but I built an app for you.

    3. CWChris Williamson1:00:53

       (laughs)

    4. COColin O'Brady1:00:54

       (laughs) Uh, I did build an app because here's the thing, people started going like, "Well, if I put my phone on airplane mode, I'm not going to be able to look at maps and I'm going to get lost and I'm going to be afraid I'm not going to be able to find my way back home," whatever. I said, "Great. I built you an app and it does two things. It puts your phone into airplane mode, so, so you got that covered." No, no app, no, no texts, none of this stuff. But the GPS tracks you. GPS, as some people know and don't know, actually can track you with your phone in airplane mode. So, it draws a line, you can see where you've been. It's basically Google Maps, you can scroll in and out inside The 12 Hour Walk app. And then the other thing it does is it's a clock, man. It counts down from 12 hours. So, you can look down and say, "Okay, I've been seven miles, I've got five hours left to go," whatever that is. So, I've basically taken care of the two things I think you, you need your phone for. And I tell people, "Put your phone in your pocket on airplane mode, but have it with you for safety, of course." And there's a lot of FAQs on the website, 12 Hour Walk. You can sign up any single day to do the walk. Obviously, read the book. The book is kind of an essential companion that, this is not just a dense textbook about walking, it, it'll light you up about all sorts of stories, um, that I think you'll really enjoy about how we can all conquer our minds. But on the website, you can sign up, pick a day. 'Cause here's the thing, you and I both know this, Chris, actually picking a day, putting it in your calendar, committing to something is a lot different than saying, "Hey, I'm going to do this thing one day." One, one day becomes next year, next two years, and you're just gonna kick that down the can. So, it's free, I don't get a dollar for every person doing the walk, but I'm asking you to commit because I'm your accountability partner. I'm going to send you emails and say, "Remember? Okay, you're a week out. You're five days out. Here's a few tips and tricks," et cetera. So, come and sign up. And then to take that one step further, again, this is evergreen, do it on any day that you wish, but on September 10th of this year, I'm inviting global mass participation, which is to say you're doing it by yourself, you're doing it out your front door. And just a note, ambient city noise out your front door, if you're in Manhattan or you're in Austin, whatever, that doesn't negate your silence. Your silence is your own. If cars are driving past, people walking past you on the street, totally fine. Uh, your silence is your own commitment to, you know, maintaining your solitude and your own, own brain. Um, but, uh, on September 10th, I'm gonna do the walk, all sorts of people doing the walk. Chris, I'd love for you to join the walk on that day if, if you're up for it. Um, but basically, it's to say we're doing this alone together, and we're going to do some meetups and some Zoom calls and some integrations with that, with that community of people that are picking that day. But it's just to say if you need that accountability. But if you also need accountability, there's a million other ways, or you're listening to this and it's after September 10th, is to say, look, you got that group text in your, you know, pocket with your five college buddies, like hit them all up, pick a day. Just put it on your calendar. Your mother, your sister, your best friend, pick a couple people. You're all doing it by yourself, but you have that accountability. "We picked this day." "Okay, it's 6:00 AM, you on your front porch?" "Yeah, man, I'm on my front porch." "You about to start the walk?" "Yeah, I'm about to start my walk." "All right, phone on airplane mode, see you in 12 hours." Maybe you meet up for dinner that night and talk about your experience. So, it's just the power of collective accountability. Ultimately, the, the 12 Hour Walk is to be done alone, but to be in participation of community, of community of like-minded people that are trying to cultivate a possible mindset, trying to unlock their best life. Um, and so it's not, uh, a call to action to become a hermit and, uh, sleep in the, a cave by yourself afterwards. It's a call to action to say, "Take a deep dive in your mind because you're going to be a better friend, a better community person, a better colleague, more lit up throughout your life." And then to integrate that, uh, in community. So, sign up any day. September 10th I'll be doing it with you, so if that works for you, put that on your calendar, check out the book, um, uh, I know you're gonna love it.

    5. CWChris Williamson1:04:12

       Dude, I fucking love your energy. It's so good, so inspiring. Uh, what's the website

11. 1:04:17 – 1:05:14

    Where to Find Colin

    1. CWChris Williamson1:04:17

       people should go to? Where can they get the app? When's the book out?

    2. COColin O'Brady1:04:20

       Book's out on August 2nd, uh, so, uh, don't know when this is coming out, but it's coming out in just a few days. Uh, probably out by the time this goes live. Um, pick up the book, um, the website is 12hourwalk.com. So, everything you need is there. Also, inside the book, um, are a number of QR codes, um, that actually bring you to archival video content from the story. So, I tell you a story about rowing a boat across Drake Passage, I'm lighting you up with words, and then it's like, oh, you want to actually see a video of me getting my ass kicked in the middle of the ocean? Well, scan this QR code and check it out. So, there's a whole sort of interactive component to all that. Um, the app also should be live in both the App Store and Google Play, um, right around the time of book launch. It's the last, last little tweaks we're making to it, but, uh, it's ready to go. I'm excited to, you know, have everyone participate in the walk. Uh, come join the movement, um, and come say hello to me on social as well. I'm @colinobrady, pretty active on Instagram. So, uh, come say hello, share your story with me, and, uh, can't wait to see you out there on the walk.

Episode duration: 1:05:35