#2230 - Eric Leupold
By Gabe Bree
“Eric, thank you so much for coming on the podcast. I appreciate you finding time.”
“Yeah man, I’m a regular listener, and I love the work you’ve done with this podcast. I think you have connected with the people in a great way.”
“Thank you, that means a lot.”
“Yeah dude, in the world we live in now, there is so much polarization everywhere. Whether it’s politics, conservation, or any movement, there is just so much conflict and separation, but you are the only one to diversify the people you have on, and it's very unbiased. So, I congratulate you.”
“Yeah, I mean, that’s one of the major reasons I started this podcast is to give multiple sides to one story and hopefully bring the sides back together. Anyways, I've been reading your book Alpine Solitude, and I have absolutely loved it; your detail and dedication to this piece of art are fascinating.”
“Well, thank you. This book is kind of a memoir of all the things I have learned and experienced in the wilderness. I tried my best to make it as accurate as possible. I had gone back to all my old journals and notebooks, where I had gone into detail about trips and experiences. Anything and everything I could find I would use.”
“That's awesome. From the sounds of it, you have had quite the amount of experiences in the mountains.”
“You could say that.”
“Well, Eric, there’s one chapter in particular I wanted to talk to you about. You wrote a chapter called Life. That is one of the best pieces of literature that I have ever read. It’s so intricate and well-written. Would you tell me what prompted you to write that chapter in such detail and thought?”
“Ok first of all, how in-depth do you want me to go with this?”
“As in-depth as possible.”
“Ok well, the chapter was written so thoroughly because it needed to be. I mean, it was called Life for a reason. I also wanted to show the importance of wilderness in relation to life.”
“I see. Go into ‘Wilderness in Relation to "Life,’ expand on that.”
“77 years, that’s how much time we have. When I was younger, I looked at this number and thought, ‘Wow. There are so many things I will be able to do.’ I can remember saying, ‘I have so much time.’ Since then, my perception of time has changed drastically. I was only 17 when I said that. The number one factor in changing that perception of time is life; Life is the driving force that pushes everything forward. It is kind of stereotypical, but the more I think about it, the more it is true. When you stop, life does not, and after a while, it will run you over and force you into the ground. Life is a rush. When I was young, it was hard for me to understand this; it drove me insane. I always wondered if there would ever be a break or an end to it—something to put it in slow motion.
The year I hit 12 was one of the most important years of my life. At the time, I didn’t even realize it. In the state of Wyoming, to be able to hunt, you have to be 12 years old. I can remember countless times my dad left early in the morning to go hunting, and every single time, I wished I could go. Before my 12th year on this earth, my time spent outdoors was relatively limited to driving through scenic areas and enjoying from behind the glass. Being that young, I had never put much thought into going out into the wilderness and enjoying it there, outside in the moment. The time had finally come for my chance to truly experience the wonders of the wilderness, free from the shackles of enclosed buildings and vehicles.
Since that moment, my love for the wilderness has been growing at an exponential rate. In the wilderness, the possibilities are endless. There's a certain amount of peace in knowing that you don't know what's going to happen. The wilderness is an escape from the penitentiary of life. Countless trips I've been on and an endless amount of scenarios I encountered, and none of them were more challenging than the burdens of life. Life has a way of pushing you over your limit, the wilderness has a way of only pushing you to the limit rather than over. As we grow into adulthood and expand into the ever-flowing complexities of life, the wilderness has a subconscious way of knowing that—drawing you closer until you can no longer fight the urge to stay away from the wild. When you're in the wilderness, it allows you to be truly free. Nothing is stopping you from climbing the nearest peak, or taking a nap and relaxing in your sleeping bag.
The wilderness understands your struggles, it feels your pain and agony. In the beginning, God created the heaven and the earth. Along with the earth in its physical form, God created the earth in a form that only humans themselves can perceive. It’s a form of earth that lives in all of us, it is interconnected with our souls. It’s that little essence in the back of our minds that longs for us to experience the wilderness from more than just our man-made means of travel and comfort. The wilderness is interconnected with humans; that is where we began as a species. The earth we were born into was unlike anything anybody today has ever seen. The wilderness is interconnected with life and that is what secretly drives all of us. I know for a fact that it is what drives me. The wilderness is in every part of my life. It's in my writing, in my actions, in my behavior, it’s in everything I do. That's the issue with society nowadays, the population masses live in these massive urban centers full of man-made objects. Buildings, cars, furniture, and people; an endless amount of people. What we are missing is a presence of solitude.”
“Wow, that was a lot.”
“Well, you told me to go in depth.”
“No, I appreciate the depth that you went into, this is the kind of thought that we need more of rather than whimsical ‘fly by the seat of your pants’ thought, we need real meaningful thinking. So that was perfect.”
“Ok, good.”
“I couldn’t help but notice that towards the end there you began talking about some issues with our society today. Why is that?”
“Well, a lot of my writing is centered around the issues that I see in our society. There is a lack of drive in all of us, we need to have the ability to push ourselves rather than be influenced by outside forces. In other words, we need to break the laws of physics. An object at rest will stay at rest unless acted upon by an outside force; we need to have the ability to start in motion without an outside force. Now, I'm not saying that everyone needs to be a David Goggins, but we can keep living like this, or it will drive our society to the ground. As I said before, the wilderness is interconnected with life, so life and wilderness are what drives us—not one or the other, but both together, and we all have plenty of life so it's obvious what's missing.”
“I agree with a lot of what you are saying. I too think that something is missing in society. I think one of the main reasons for our struggles is technology especially phones they hold us back more than we know.”
“Yes, technology is a big one because who hasn't wanted to go do something and then sit on their phone and lose track of time, or get too focused on what they were watching and decide not to go do whatever they were going to do before? I’ll admit to it I've done it plenty of times, so it's not like I'm some special occasion it happens to all of us.”
“Yeah, the kids these days are the worst. Everywhere I go, I see kids, especially teenagers, on their phones all the time. Even the parents of these three-to-six-year-old children are buying their children iPads instead of raising them.”
“The young kids are what truly matters because they are the building blocks for the future. They are the ones growing our world, but if they don’t escape the chains of technology that will never happen. So it is imperative that they are the ones getting outside and into the wilderness.”
“I agree. I take my kids hunting, fishing, backpacking, and biking all the time to show them that there are better things in the world than your phone.”
“That is important also, not only getting the younger kids into being outside but getting the parents of the younger kids into being outside and active because it really does benefit all of us.”
“Well Eric, I believe that we have used up all our time here, and I appreciate you making time to make it onto the podcast.”
“Thank you for having me.”