Latest / Adventure Sports Podcast / Ep. 1090: Mimi Zieman - Tap Dancing on Everest

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Ep. 1090: Mimi Zieman - Tap Dancing on Everest · Adventure Sports Podcast

0:00
[SPEAKER_00]: It would be a long time before it understands everything we'd been through on that glacier.
0:05
[SPEAKER_00]: That I'd experienced the greatest emptiness and the greatest strength there.
0:09
[SPEAKER_00]: Now I realize that living and loving, while knowing all could be lost, is the essence of the greatest aliveness.
0:18
[SPEAKER_02]: Episode one thousand ninety, any zeem in, tap dancing on Everest.
0:29
[SPEAKER_02]: Hi friends, thank you for joining the Adventure Sports podcast.
0:33
[SPEAKER_02]: So the year was nineteen eighty eight and the location was the east face of Everest and it had only been climbed once before.
0:43
[SPEAKER_02]: And our guest today is here to regal us with all the wonderful stories about what it was like to attempt that face.
0:52
[SPEAKER_02]: Mimmy, Zeeman, is here.
0:54
[SPEAKER_02]: And she is written a book called Tap Dancing on Everest.
0:57
[SPEAKER_02]: Now we have to set it up a little bit.
0:59
[SPEAKER_02]: She was the only female on the expedition.
1:03
[SPEAKER_02]: And she was brought on as the medical person, though she was still in medical school.
1:09
[SPEAKER_02]: And it was the, I mean, it was an attempt to the east face that is just something that people don't do from the Tibet side, instead of from the Nepal side.
1:18
[SPEAKER_02]: And so anyway, this is going to be a lot of fun.
1:21
[SPEAKER_02]: Many welcome to the program.
1:23
[SPEAKER_00]: Thanks so much, Kurt.
1:24
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm really excited to be here with you.
1:27
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, so you're in Atlanta right now, but you just mentioned that you're headed to Colorado on a book tour.
1:34
[SPEAKER_02]: And then we found out we have more in common.
1:37
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
1:37
[SPEAKER_02]: So where are you going on your book tour?
1:40
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, I'm going to Aspen and to Vail.
1:44
[SPEAKER_00]: I find it in and out of Denver.
1:46
[SPEAKER_00]: But Colorado holds a huge place in my heart.
1:50
[SPEAKER_00]: It's where I discovered the mountains.
1:52
[SPEAKER_00]: When I was a teenager in college, I went to Gothic, which is where the Rocky Mountain Biological Lab is.
2:01
[SPEAKER_00]: Very close to where you live.
2:03
[SPEAKER_00]: Just north of Crested Beauty.
2:06
[SPEAKER_00]: And to this day, I think it's one of the most beautiful places on Earth.
2:09
[SPEAKER_00]: I've traveled a lot, but there's nothing like it.
2:13
[SPEAKER_00]: I went back there last summer for some book talks, and I mean, I still feel that way about it.
2:19
[SPEAKER_00]: Maybe because I grew so much when I was there, maybe it's, you know, emotional and spiritual beyond the physical.
2:27
[SPEAKER_00]: But I love your little corner of Earth.
2:31
[SPEAKER_02]: Well, thank you.
2:32
[SPEAKER_02]: It is very impacting.
2:34
[SPEAKER_02]: And for those who don't know, Gothic is just, I guess, north of Crestabute, Colorado, which is where the ski resort is, that is the claim to fame these days.
2:46
[SPEAKER_02]: But it was a mining town, and Gothic was as well.
2:49
[SPEAKER_02]: It's almost a ghost town now, but it's not because of the Rocky Mountain Biological Laboratory that's there.
2:57
[SPEAKER_02]: And now, did you work with the Laboratory?
3:03
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, so I went the first summer as a student learning field biology and I loved it so much I returned for a second summer right after I graduated college as a research assistant.
3:17
[SPEAKER_00]: So, you know, it's a lab that studies ecology and animal behavior
3:26
[SPEAKER_00]: and acid rain and all kinds of things.
3:28
[SPEAKER_00]: And it's an important part of what got me to the Himalayas and just changed me.
3:33
[SPEAKER_00]: I was a New York City girl.
3:34
[SPEAKER_00]: So part of why I wrote my book in my story is it was sort of an unlikely trajectory from where I started to where I ended up being that medic at age twenty five on the East face and Tibet.
3:50
[SPEAKER_00]: And but Gothic was a huge part of that story.
3:54
[SPEAKER_02]: That's fascinating.
3:55
[SPEAKER_02]: So I think the mountains impact different people in different ways, many.
3:59
[SPEAKER_02]: And I obviously love the mountains.
4:02
[SPEAKER_02]: My family took a trip to Colorado.
4:04
[SPEAKER_02]: I was from Oklahoma.
4:06
[SPEAKER_02]: But I was ten years old.
4:07
[SPEAKER_02]: And when I first saw the Rockies, and I knew then that I was going to live here.
4:11
[SPEAKER_02]: And so it took me a long time.
4:15
[SPEAKER_02]: But I eventually got to move to Colorado and then now to Gunnison, which is south of Crestabute.
4:22
[SPEAKER_02]: The mountains impact people, and you mentioned spiritual impacts.
4:30
[SPEAKER_02]: So can you elaborate a little on that?
4:32
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, so the mountains, I instantly feel happier, lighter, more vibrant.
4:40
[SPEAKER_00]: I feel like it's my place.
4:42
[SPEAKER_00]: I feel in touch with nature, which makes me more in touch with myself, in touch with the vastness of the world,
4:52
[SPEAKER_00]: And once I discovered that feeling, I saw it over and over again.
5:00
[SPEAKER_00]: So I did decide to go into medicine and not feel biology, but before I started medical school, I went to hike in Nepal by myself.
5:10
[SPEAKER_00]: And I was twenty-two.
5:12
[SPEAKER_00]: And I was a city girl, and I didn't even, I had a borrowback pack.
5:17
[SPEAKER_00]: I didn't have money or come from a family with money.
5:21
[SPEAKER_00]: the backpack ended up being like one of those suitcases with straps.
5:27
[SPEAKER_00]: But I spent months hiking in Nepal and it was towards it and to that trip that I met Everest climbers who later invited me to be their medic.
5:38
[SPEAKER_00]: But that's how it started.
5:39
[SPEAKER_02]: Wow.
5:42
[SPEAKER_02]: So let's rewind a little bit.
5:44
[SPEAKER_02]: Why tap dancing back to New York?
5:47
[SPEAKER_00]: Yes, so my first dream was to be a Broadway dancer, and I was a serious dancer in high school.
5:55
[SPEAKER_00]: And when I did go on the Everest expedition, I did pack my tap shoes.
6:02
[SPEAKER_00]: And there is people think it's just a metaphor, and it is a metaphor plus.
6:08
[SPEAKER_00]: It's a true scene in the book where I tap dance on a boulder during her expedition on his face.
6:15
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
6:16
[SPEAKER_00]: And you know, it's a moment of like, you know, my joys coming together, my joy of dance, of being in the mountains, and a finally feeling okay in my skin and being myself.
6:31
[SPEAKER_00]: So that's why we used it for the title.
6:34
[SPEAKER_02]: Well, there's something else we have in common.
6:36
[SPEAKER_02]: Nineteen eighty eight was the year that I moved to Colorado.
6:39
[SPEAKER_02]: Oh.
6:39
[SPEAKER_02]: So that's when my mountain adventures really began.
6:44
[SPEAKER_02]: And that's the year that you were tap dancing on Everest.
6:47
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, that's right.
6:48
[SPEAKER_00]: And what's fun about the book is it's a what we can call a throwback adventure at this point because it's before Everest was commercialized.
6:57
[SPEAKER_01]: Right.
6:58
[SPEAKER_00]: I was gone for four months and we saw no other Westerners while we were away.
7:05
[SPEAKER_00]: The climbers saw no other climbers on the mountain.
7:09
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, our team was small.
7:12
[SPEAKER_00]: It was just four climbers, a photographer and me, no use of supplemental oxygen, no use of sherpa support.
7:22
[SPEAKER_00]: And, you know, the East Face is still an extremely remote side of Everest.
7:28
[SPEAKER_00]: So to this day, only about fifteen people have summited from the East Face.
7:33
[SPEAKER_00]: versus over twelve thousand from the other popular roots that you see on the news with all those long lines.
7:39
[SPEAKER_02]: Right.
7:40
[SPEAKER_00]: So, it's kind of fun to think about adventure when it was more adventurous.
7:48
[SPEAKER_02]: Well, is the east face not climbed as often?
7:52
[SPEAKER_02]: Extremely, as often.
7:54
[SPEAKER_02]: Is that because of politics or is that because of difficulty or because of access or a levy above?
8:00
[SPEAKER_00]: access and difficulty.
8:02
[SPEAKER_00]: So you have the same politics to reach the north face root into bed, which is quite popular.
8:09
[SPEAKER_02]: All right.
8:10
[SPEAKER_00]: But the east face is hard to get to.
8:12
[SPEAKER_00]: It's very sheer, steep, remote, has lots of thundering avalanches all day and all night.
8:19
[SPEAKER_00]: And here's an interesting fun quote by George Mallory, who is the famous Everest Explorer in the nineteen twenties.
8:26
[SPEAKER_00]: He said,
8:28
[SPEAKER_00]: Other men, less wise, might attempt this route if they would or may, but it was emphatically not for us.
8:36
[SPEAKER_00]: And that's what he said when he saw the East Face.
8:39
[SPEAKER_00]: And I guess a lot of people still feel that way.
8:43
[SPEAKER_02]: Well, I get it.
8:43
[SPEAKER_02]: I have never climbed the really big expedition mountains, but I've climbed a lot of Fort Teeners, and quite often when I get to the top, I look off the other side and you go, not that side.
8:55
[SPEAKER_02]: So, yes, it's amazing to look down something and think that others have come up at, you know?
9:04
[SPEAKER_02]: It's impressive sometimes.
9:07
[SPEAKER_02]: and down is scarier anyway isn't it oh yeah i mean i don't mind repelling that's that's quick and easy but you have to down climb yeah yes that's rough that's rough so you were a dancer in new york you came to gothic and fell in love with the mountains you were back packing in Nepal and you met the climbers who invited you along in the expedition so that's how this came together
9:34
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, so I was twenty-two at the time and about to start medical school.
9:39
[SPEAKER_00]: And the way I describe it in the book is in a plucky move that surprised even me.
9:44
[SPEAKER_00]: I said, well, if you need a doctor on your next expedition, call me.
9:49
[SPEAKER_00]: I hadn't even started med school.
9:52
[SPEAKER_00]: And the thing is that I got the invitation one year later.
9:56
[SPEAKER_00]: So how was I going to do that?
9:58
[SPEAKER_00]: I was still in med school.
9:59
[SPEAKER_00]: I didn't know anything.
10:00
[SPEAKER_00]: and they were inviting me for an expedition that would happen at the end of my third year of men's school.
10:07
[SPEAKER_00]: And the thing is, though, I could not resist that.
10:10
[SPEAKER_00]: When else was I going to get an opportunity like that?
10:13
[SPEAKER_02]: Right.
10:14
[SPEAKER_00]: I had to make it happen.
10:16
[SPEAKER_02]: So how did you talk to school into it?
10:18
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, that's a funny scene in the book.
10:21
[SPEAKER_00]: Basically, the expedition leader Robert Anderson was a creative director and an advertising agency.
10:28
[SPEAKER_00]: So he coached me.
10:29
[SPEAKER_00]: He said, have he weights like big plans.
10:32
[SPEAKER_00]: You just go in there and tell them how it's going to be good for the school.
10:36
[SPEAKER_01]: Yes.
10:41
[SPEAKER_00]: And that's what I did.
10:42
[SPEAKER_00]: And then as soon as they agreed, I was terrified and thinking, what the hell am I doing?
10:47
[SPEAKER_00]: This is ridiculous idea.
10:48
[SPEAKER_00]: I can't do this.
10:51
[SPEAKER_00]: I was in the Bronx of New York City, the heart of the crack epidemic and gunshot wounds on Saturday nights.
10:57
[SPEAKER_00]: I wasn't in Colorado learning wilderness medicine.
11:02
[SPEAKER_02]: Oh, that's really, really fun.
11:04
[SPEAKER_02]: So did you take outdoor class type preparation?
11:08
[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, you know, there's the, there's the willingness first responder classes that we have now and there's Wooflin, Wooflin, you know, that sort of preparation was there's something parallel to that then that you could work out.
11:19
[SPEAKER_00]: That's the point.
11:20
[SPEAKER_00]: There was nothing back then.
11:23
[SPEAKER_00]: So what really saved me was, when I was hiking in Nepal, I did know I was going in medical school, so I stopped at the high altitude medicine clinic.
11:32
[SPEAKER_00]: I've been, I think it was near Ferricine in Nepal, I don't remember the exact village.
11:38
[SPEAKER_00]: And I met the doctor there, and we talked, and I wrote his name down, and all of that, never thinking, you know, I did think, well this would be fun, maybe I could do this at some point.
11:52
[SPEAKER_00]: But when I was invited on the team, I wrote him immediately to ask for advice, and it turned out he was preparing for an expedition up Monkolo, which is the fifth highest mountain in the world.
12:04
[SPEAKER_00]: And so he shared all of his expedition medicine lists of everything I needed to take and had a prepare and that was kind of the biggest help that I had.
12:20
[SPEAKER_02]: Well, isn't it fun the way that these things come together?
12:24
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
12:24
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
12:25
[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, it is a juxtaposition and tap dancing on Everest kind of captures that, right?
12:31
[SPEAKER_02]: For a Bronx girl to be on Everest, being the medical person without a medical degree.
12:38
[SPEAKER_02]: But that's a beautiful, it's a beautiful story.
12:41
[SPEAKER_02]: So how did the expedition go?
12:43
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, and that's why I just do, that's why I wrote it because I felt like the subtitles are young doctors unlikely adventure, but the whole point of unlikeliness is that we can do a lot of unlikely things that we don't think we're the best person for.
12:57
[SPEAKER_00]: We're not ready for capable, you know, other people can do better.
13:01
[SPEAKER_00]: So I talk a lot about myself down in the book.
13:04
[SPEAKER_00]: Okay, how did it go?
13:06
[SPEAKER_00]: We had a lot of setbacks and obstacles as these things go and happen.
13:13
[SPEAKER_00]: And like I said, I was away for four months.
13:20
[SPEAKER_00]: I left New York in February and returned in June.
13:24
[SPEAKER_00]: And we did experience trauma on the mountain.
13:28
[SPEAKER_00]: That was another reason I wrote the story because I think we're used to mountaineering stories and every story is as focusing on the climber, who's the real hero of the story.
13:37
[SPEAKER_00]: They attempt something amazing and they have to get through a lot to go up and down the mountain.
13:44
[SPEAKER_00]: And I wrote my story because it's about someone in the background, right?
13:48
[SPEAKER_00]: The medic, the only woman.
13:52
[SPEAKER_00]: But that person went through a lot, especially when we had trauma.
13:57
[SPEAKER_00]: And I wanted to write that less told story and what that was like.
14:02
[SPEAKER_00]: So that was my motivation now, so many decades later.
14:12
[SPEAKER_02]: How did it change you?
14:15
[SPEAKER_00]: It changed.
14:19
[SPEAKER_00]: I certainly developed a stronger sense of self, although I did that also by trekking alone in Nepal, both of those experiences, which is also on the boat.
14:32
[SPEAKER_00]: It led me to a greater trust in myself, because I got through what we went through.
14:41
[SPEAKER_00]: and in others because my teammates were amazing and helped each other in difficult times.
14:46
[SPEAKER_00]: Like it was my job to help them when they were heard and injured, but the other teammates really stepped in and we bonded in an unusual way where to this day, even though they've become adventures that have continued to do many expeditions,
15:06
[SPEAKER_00]: this particular experience really, really bonded us.
15:09
[SPEAKER_00]: And I think it's partly because we came together so much for each other.
15:13
[SPEAKER_00]: We were such a small team.
15:16
[SPEAKER_00]: And you know, there was no one else to rely on.
15:19
[SPEAKER_00]: There was no chance for rescue into bed at that point.
15:22
[SPEAKER_00]: And so I'm having a little, I'm not telling you all the details because I don't always reveal them.
15:28
[SPEAKER_00]: But we did, but we did have trauma.
15:32
[SPEAKER_00]: The book opens with three climbers missing on the mountain.
15:35
[SPEAKER_00]: And we thought there were no chance that it could still be a live or survive at that point without supplemental oxygen.
15:43
[SPEAKER_01]: Wow.
15:46
[SPEAKER_00]: So I do think there's value in taking on these experiences where you have to face fear and reach deep inside yourself.
15:57
[SPEAKER_00]: You get to know parts of yourself that you wouldn't reach otherwise.
16:02
[SPEAKER_00]: And that doesn't have to be an Everest or on the mountains, or as one of your last guests running hundred mile races and stuff.
16:11
[SPEAKER_00]: I think that we have challenges every day where we have fear.
16:16
[SPEAKER_00]: And we don't think maybe we can get through it.
16:19
[SPEAKER_00]: And there's so much more I think that we're capable of.
16:24
[SPEAKER_02]: You know, if you never stretch beyond what you know you can do, you'll never find out what you're capable of doing.
16:32
[SPEAKER_02]: exactly right and we want to do that in a way that's reasonable and safe and exciting fun and but in retrospect I mean I just heard you say I think we should take on these big challenges but in retrospect um or some challenges a little too risky a little too big
16:55
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, yeah, that's for each person to decide.
16:58
[SPEAKER_00]: Absolutely.
16:59
[SPEAKER_00]: I had to go through that.
17:00
[SPEAKER_00]: I had to go through thinking, I may not come back from this trip, right?
17:05
[SPEAKER_00]: I had to go through, and I was young, so that plays into the equation.
17:08
[SPEAKER_02]: Sure.
17:09
[SPEAKER_00]: But I mean, what we did was pretty risky.
17:15
[SPEAKER_00]: So you can say, maybe it was too much.
17:19
[SPEAKER_00]: But I really think that that is an individual decision for each person.
17:22
[SPEAKER_00]: If you talk to our climbers,
17:25
[SPEAKER_00]: They will talk about calculated risk.
17:28
[SPEAKER_00]: They knew what they were capable of or not capable of.
17:34
[SPEAKER_00]: In any of these kinds of situations, luck will play a part.
17:38
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, you could be lucky or unlucky.
17:46
[SPEAKER_00]: I think that we have to, yeah, just make those as individuals' decisions.
17:50
[SPEAKER_00]: Which, you know, I am a physician and the same thing happens in medicine.
17:54
[SPEAKER_00]: It's so much about risk and, you know, whether you're choosing a certain treatment plan or medication, there's a risk benefit analysis to everything.
18:05
[SPEAKER_00]: And it's very individualized.
18:10
[SPEAKER_02]: I personally know that I've grown a lot by wilderness adventure.
18:17
[SPEAKER_02]: It's a lot of who I know myself to be now, right?
18:20
[SPEAKER_02]: I identify with that.
18:22
[SPEAKER_02]: And it has helped me in everyday life.
18:27
[SPEAKER_02]: Sometimes it helps me when times get really tough and I just need to persevere.
18:31
[SPEAKER_02]: But at other times, I think it's just having the memories of the amazing experiences that can be, I don't know, like old friends that come alongside you when you need them.
18:42
[SPEAKER_02]: But I'm curious in the medical profession,
18:45
[SPEAKER_02]: How did this trip have there been times when you've thought, well, when I was into bed, when I was on Everest?
18:56
[SPEAKER_02]: And then it fortified you.
18:59
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, when I got back, the one thing that I was extremely grateful for was having colleagues and ceilings to work under ceilings versus snow falling on me.
19:14
[SPEAKER_00]: But colleagues to ask questions and work with, you know, versus being alone.
19:24
[SPEAKER_00]: I think, you know, it's a long list of experiences that make you grow and give you fortitude, and this was one of them.
19:35
[SPEAKER_00]: I, when I wrote the book, I, a lot of, I experienced a lot of the same fears and self-doubt as I did, and Everest, which I was writing about, right?
19:46
[SPEAKER_00]: Who am I to do this?
19:47
[SPEAKER_00]: Who am I to write about?
19:48
[SPEAKER_00]: Who would want to read this?
19:50
[SPEAKER_00]: You know,
19:51
[SPEAKER_00]: because I was like, who am I to be a doctor or an Everest, right?
19:57
[SPEAKER_00]: But, yeah, I think it's all flexing that courage muscle.
20:02
[SPEAKER_00]: Once you do it once and then second time and then at the third time and you keep going.
20:08
[SPEAKER_00]: It definitely accumulates over time.
20:12
[SPEAKER_00]: In my epilogue, I talk about right after residency, I went to work in Guam.
20:19
[SPEAKER_00]: And I was alone there again.
20:20
[SPEAKER_00]: I wasn't expecting that.
20:23
[SPEAKER_00]: I guess some of my decisions were impulsive, but it was another growing experience.
20:30
[SPEAKER_00]: I had to figure things out on my own.
20:33
[SPEAKER_02]: And it seems to have worked for you, Amy.
20:38
[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, you just recently got the Georgia author of the Year for memoir award.
20:41
[SPEAKER_02]: Congratulations.
20:43
[SPEAKER_00]: Thank you.
20:43
[SPEAKER_02]: So I think the risk of writing the book is paid off.
20:46
[SPEAKER_02]: People are saying, yeah, this is great.
20:49
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, and it was hard.
20:50
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, none of these things were easy for me.
20:52
[SPEAKER_00]: They were really, really hard.
20:54
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, writing, I had to learn craft and study and try to make it a good book.
21:00
[SPEAKER_00]: Nothing about that was easy.
21:02
[SPEAKER_00]: It's great to have the reward at the end.
21:04
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, the reward is connecting with readers.
21:07
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, to hear that people valued it or got something out of the story, that's what's amazing about writing.
21:17
[SPEAKER_02]: So, what was your motivation for the book, besides sharing your amazing story?
21:24
[SPEAKER_02]: What is it you're trying to communicate to the reader?
21:29
[SPEAKER_00]: Definitely that we're all capable of more than we think we are.
21:33
[SPEAKER_00]: Like I said, I was very honest about myself doubt.
21:38
[SPEAKER_00]: And so to me being empowering to other people is the main reason I wrote the book.
21:48
[SPEAKER_00]: And to show that we can all do unlikely things.
21:52
[SPEAKER_00]: Like I did.
21:53
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
21:56
[SPEAKER_02]: Well, I love that.
21:57
[SPEAKER_02]: I love that theme.
21:58
[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, it's the theme of the Adventure Sports podcast, really, that by taking on a challenge, we learn more about ourselves and we grow and we have more success and success doesn't necessarily mean money or fame or any of the things that sometimes we think of.
22:16
[SPEAKER_02]: Success is more along the lines of joy.
22:21
[SPEAKER_00]: Exactly, and asking where, like I said, the reason I went to the mountains, that's where I felt the most myself, the most joy.
22:29
[SPEAKER_00]: I was following my gut instinct to a place where I felt happy.
22:34
[SPEAKER_00]: I was following curiosity, and everyone can do that.
22:39
[SPEAKER_00]: One thing that was interesting to me, and one of my earlier book talks, someone said, what if you've never felt a gut instinct?
22:46
[SPEAKER_00]: And I was taking it back.
22:48
[SPEAKER_00]: I was taking it back because a lot of my book is about being present in the body too because I feel I am someone who's too much in their head.
22:57
[SPEAKER_00]: But if I'm hiking or dancing, I feel more in my body and more in tune.
23:03
[SPEAKER_00]: And that was new to me to hear that some people can't connect to gut instincts, for example.
23:11
[SPEAKER_00]: But I think our bodies are very, very wise.
23:15
[SPEAKER_00]: And if we can connect more, which I do think nature helps us do that, that can help us be in happier places.
23:24
[SPEAKER_00]: And then I learn these interesting stats, like your brain receives a million bits of information a second.
23:34
[SPEAKER_00]: And only forty bits around are your conscious brain.
23:41
[SPEAKER_00]: So, your body's unconscious to me knows a lot that we don't know.
23:49
[SPEAKER_00]: Right?
23:50
[SPEAKER_00]: For me, my journey was often following my, where I felt happy.
23:55
[SPEAKER_00]: That's like following, I'll calling, or my body, or gut instinct.
24:01
[SPEAKER_00]: A notion that might seem, you know, silly on the surface.
24:06
[SPEAKER_00]: But I think there's value in that.
24:09
[SPEAKER_02]: I've learned so much value in that, and I still won't claim to be good at it, but there is a season of my life as a young man that I really had to quit feeling emotion.
24:22
[SPEAKER_02]: And I think that adventure sports help to draw that out in part.
24:28
[SPEAKER_02]: But learning to feel what you feel and what your body is trying to tell you, and it's not always pain or pleasure.
24:35
[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, your body might be giving you that gut signal that's hard to, it's hard to really explain.
24:43
[SPEAKER_02]: But I, you know, I've interviewed a lot of explorers over the years and I remember one fellow who just said,
24:51
[SPEAKER_02]: you know sometimes you come to a decision point and you don't have enough information to make a logical decision and he says you know I I look down the trail to the left I close my eyes and I imagine what it feels like and then I look down the trail to the right and I close my eyes and I imagine what it feels like he says and then I follow that feeling
25:16
[SPEAKER_02]: I love that.
25:16
[SPEAKER_02]: I just thought, wow, my mind has a hard time computing with that, because I'm more likely to say, where's my map?
25:24
[SPEAKER_02]: And of course, he's talking about instances when you don't have a map for the decision you're trying to make, right?
25:29
[SPEAKER_02]: But he said that that it worked very, very well for him, and there is something to that, Nemi.
25:34
[SPEAKER_02]: I don't really understand what that is.
25:37
[SPEAKER_00]: I agree because I think your body is storing memories and information that you might not have access to, but it has a certain wisdom.
25:45
[SPEAKER_00]: And when you're listening to it, you're following that.
25:48
[SPEAKER_00]: And, you know, when I was in the Rocky Man by luck, like how did I even decide to go to Nepal when I was in the Rocky Man by logical lab, one night a researcher gave a slideshow on his research on acid rain and Tibet.
26:04
[SPEAKER_01]: Wow.
26:04
[SPEAKER_00]: And I was sitting in the audience.
26:06
[SPEAKER_00]: And I said, I want to go there.
26:09
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm going to go there.
26:10
[SPEAKER_00]: It was totally random.
26:12
[SPEAKER_00]: It was a gut feeling I had.
26:15
[SPEAKER_00]: Tibet was close to foreigners at the time, so I ended up in Nepal, and that was my backpacking trip in Nepal.
26:21
[SPEAKER_00]: But it was the willingness to follow that notion or gut instinct that, yeah, that's what you actually should be doing.
26:30
[SPEAKER_00]: It's not just
26:32
[SPEAKER_00]: a crazy idea that you should say, well, that's a nice idea, but I'm not going to do that.
26:36
[SPEAKER_00]: That doesn't make any sense.
26:38
[SPEAKER_00]: It's not practical.
26:39
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't have the money and all the other reasons.
26:43
[SPEAKER_02]: I want to point out to everyone.
26:45
[SPEAKER_02]: You've already said that you didn't come from a wealthy background.
26:49
[SPEAKER_02]: You said that you followed your gutting and it up in Nepal.
26:54
[SPEAKER_02]: You ended up in ultimately into bet.
26:56
[SPEAKER_02]: You still became a doctor.
26:58
[SPEAKER_02]: I'm most people would think it's an either or, right?
27:02
[SPEAKER_02]: It's like there's no way I could do all of this.
27:04
[SPEAKER_02]: I can't do it.
27:05
[SPEAKER_02]: But you did it.
27:06
[SPEAKER_02]: You did both.
27:07
[SPEAKER_02]: You did all of the above.
27:08
[SPEAKER_02]: What's that about?
27:11
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, I am, I am willing to work hard.
27:18
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, for good or for bad.
27:21
[SPEAKER_00]: I had to, so the other thing I write about in the book is I struggled in medical school because it's such a box.
27:28
[SPEAKER_00]: You have to conform to the medical school hierarchy.
27:33
[SPEAKER_00]: I had just been hiking Nepal.
27:35
[SPEAKER_00]: All of a sudden, I'm under fluorescent lights in the cadaver lab.
27:39
[SPEAKER_00]: I was not happy.
27:39
[SPEAKER_00]: I was not happy.
27:41
[SPEAKER_00]: I wanted to quit.
27:45
[SPEAKER_00]: But I persisted.
27:50
[SPEAKER_00]: Even throughout my career, I had a pivot many times, because I didn't feel that things were right or aligning with my soul or my values or this and that.
27:59
[SPEAKER_00]: But when I listen to myself and I pivot, it's good.
28:02
[SPEAKER_00]: And now I'm happy, because I mostly use my voice for reproductive rights advocacy, which sort of my whole career sort of pointed in that direction, too.
28:13
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm in OBJYN.
28:16
[SPEAKER_00]: So I don't know, but there were always trade-offs to your point.
28:19
[SPEAKER_00]: I would have loved to just continue the adventure life, but I was committed to start medical school.
28:26
[SPEAKER_00]: And then when the expedition happened, I was already in medical school, and then I had a lot of loans that I needed to repay.
28:32
[SPEAKER_00]: I was invited on some other expeditions.
28:34
[SPEAKER_00]: I couldn't do that.
28:35
[SPEAKER_00]: I was going to repay my loans.
28:38
[SPEAKER_00]: But you know, you make it work.
28:40
[SPEAKER_00]: And you try to be a true to your values as you go along.
28:45
[SPEAKER_02]: For those people who say I've never had that gut feeling, I don't really have great intuition.
28:51
[SPEAKER_02]: I don't know what instinct feels like.
28:53
[SPEAKER_02]: Can you describe it?
28:55
[SPEAKER_02]: But that feels like to you.
28:58
[SPEAKER_00]: It sounds really tried because I do feel it in my gut.
29:02
[SPEAKER_00]: And I've done a little research in this and not everyone feels it in their gut.
29:06
[SPEAKER_00]: Like I mean my physical stomach area.
29:11
[SPEAKER_00]: apparently people feel that instinct in different parts of your body.
29:17
[SPEAKER_00]: To me, it feels like that word that's a calling, but it's a drawing to something.
29:23
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, I'm drawn to something, whether it's an idea or curiosity or place.
29:29
[SPEAKER_00]: And I think that's important too because when you make these to your point decisions that involve risk,
29:36
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't think they're worthwhile if it's not like a passion of yours or something that's falling to make you happy or fulfilled in some way.
29:45
[SPEAKER_00]: You shouldn't do it just to check off a box.
29:47
[SPEAKER_00]: Now I ran a marathon.
29:50
[SPEAKER_00]: But if you're drawn to it for a reason, does that make sense?
30:00
[SPEAKER_02]: I think it does make sense.
30:03
[SPEAKER_02]: Another way that I've said it is that when you find out what it is, you value, which is a word you just used, right?
30:09
[SPEAKER_02]: You believe in that it's worthwhile.
30:12
[SPEAKER_02]: And then you pour yourself into something in a way that not only aligns with your values, but also helps other people.
30:19
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
30:20
[SPEAKER_02]: That gives back on some level.
30:25
[SPEAKER_02]: I think that that's a great source of meaning.
30:30
[SPEAKER_02]: and joy and obviously self-actualization and all those sorts of things.
30:35
[SPEAKER_02]: But people may ask what the meaning of life is and I respond.
30:42
[SPEAKER_02]: That's a wrong question.
30:44
[SPEAKER_02]: It's not what is the meaning of life.
30:46
[SPEAKER_02]: It's what gives life meaning for you.
30:49
[SPEAKER_02]: That's what matters.
30:52
[SPEAKER_02]: And I don't think we find that cerebrally.
30:54
[SPEAKER_02]: I think we have to listen to our gut and say, you know, I am pulled toward
31:00
[SPEAKER_02]: Like I mentioned to you, I came to the, to the Rockies for the first time when I was ten.
31:05
[SPEAKER_02]: And at that point in my life, I, I felt like I had come home for the first time, and I knew where I had to be.
31:12
[SPEAKER_01]: And exactly.
31:13
[SPEAKER_02]: You know, I moved back to Colorado, and, and I've claimed this is my space ever since.
31:20
[SPEAKER_02]: I think there's something to that.
31:23
[SPEAKER_00]: I do.
31:24
[SPEAKER_00]: And that's a great way of putting it.
31:28
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, when we're talking about doing hard things and we want to quit, which I mentioned, I wanted to quit med school.
31:36
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, expeditioning was hard.
31:39
[SPEAKER_00]: I have a line in my book, you know, quitting would be reserved for things that didn't align with my heart and soul.
31:46
[SPEAKER_00]: Because I have quit certain jobs in my medical career and stuff.
31:50
[SPEAKER_02]: Right.
31:52
[SPEAKER_00]: To pivot, to find what's feeding my true purpose.
31:58
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, better than what I'm doing now.
32:03
[SPEAKER_00]: If what you're doing is feeding your purpose, then it's worth it to work through the hard times.
32:09
[SPEAKER_02]: That's where you persevere.
32:11
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
32:13
[SPEAKER_02]: Okay, so on your expedition to Everest, where there are times that you, you, you were the team, you were saying, we should just quit now.
32:25
[SPEAKER_00]: We never talked about quitting, but we were almost not going to even get to base camp.
32:30
[SPEAKER_00]: It was supposed to be a five-day trek.
32:34
[SPEAKER_00]: And we were stuck by storms in one camp for two weeks.
32:39
[SPEAKER_02]: Oh, wow.
32:40
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
32:41
[SPEAKER_00]: So we had really, really bad weather with a whole exhibition.
32:46
[SPEAKER_00]: It's new storms.
32:48
[SPEAKER_00]: And so we didn't know if we would make it.
32:52
[SPEAKER_00]: Our expedition leader also had a great quote at one point.
32:56
[SPEAKER_00]: I can't say verbatim, but, you know, he wanted to do this crazy thing, which was try a new route on the East Face.
33:03
[SPEAKER_00]: So the East Face had only been climbed once before, but yet he wanted a new route.
33:08
[SPEAKER_00]: And he said, you know, when you do something new like that, you just don't even know if it can be done.
33:14
[SPEAKER_00]: But that's where the excitement lies.
33:16
[SPEAKER_00]: You might fail.
33:17
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, there's a good chance you're going to fail, so you have to accept that.
33:21
[SPEAKER_00]: But, you know, the excitement of doing uncharted territory is amazing.
33:26
[SPEAKER_00]: So we were kind of an uncharted territory for a lot of it.
33:30
[SPEAKER_00]: So we really day to day had no idea if what we were going to do, you know, going to try to do would work in any way.
33:39
[SPEAKER_00]: I had no opportunity to quit.
33:41
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, I was there for the long haul.
33:43
[SPEAKER_00]: I kept worrying, you know, because of our delays that I would be late getting back for medical school.
33:49
[SPEAKER_02]: Oh, yeah.
33:50
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, so it's really worried about that, but there was nothing.
33:53
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, there was no way I was leaving or quitting.
33:55
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, I was there.
33:57
[SPEAKER_02]: Yep, what you had to be.
33:59
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
34:00
[SPEAKER_02]: You probably didn't have a real choice, but you were also committed to the expedition to the... I had no choice.
34:05
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
34:06
[SPEAKER_00]: And I was committed.
34:12
[SPEAKER_02]: Was there a time in the expedition where you feared for your life?
34:15
[SPEAKER_02]: Where you thought, we may not get out of this.
34:19
[SPEAKER_00]: There was only one night, I was afraid for my own life, but I was definitely afraid for the climbers all the time.
34:27
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, we were camped on this steep slope with heavy wet snow that could add a lunch.
34:34
[SPEAKER_00]: And there's a chapter in my book called How to Write an Anlanche, because my tent made side.
34:40
[SPEAKER_00]: Hey, let's run through an avalanche drill because you might have an avalanche tonight on this level.
34:46
[SPEAKER_02]: It will help you sleep.
34:48
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
34:49
[SPEAKER_00]: So that was really the only night where I think I was afraid for myself, but I was afraid for them all the time.
34:57
[SPEAKER_02]: Wow.
34:59
[SPEAKER_02]: I don't know how many people, I think most people have close calls, but when you find yourself coming out the other side of a harrowing experience,
35:10
[SPEAKER_02]: and you're still alive.
35:12
[SPEAKER_02]: And there's a new day and a new dawn and a new, you know.
35:17
[SPEAKER_02]: I think somehow that, and I'm not trying to encourage people to take unnecessary risks.
35:23
[SPEAKER_00]: Right.
35:24
[SPEAKER_02]: But I do think that when you come out of that sort of an experience, there's something about it that gives life itself more value.
35:32
[SPEAKER_02]: Maybe it builds an appreciation for the opportunity of what could lie ahead.
35:37
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
35:38
[SPEAKER_00]: For sure.
35:42
[SPEAKER_02]: So what's your next big adventure?
35:51
[SPEAKER_00]: It's probably writing related.
35:54
[SPEAKER_00]: Now that I've written a play also, so I've written this memoir, written a play.
35:59
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm writing poetry, and I hope to maybe write a novel.
36:04
[SPEAKER_00]: So now my adventures are that.
36:06
[SPEAKER_00]: We did just come back from hiking in Norway.
36:09
[SPEAKER_00]: So yes, I still love to hike.
36:12
[SPEAKER_00]: go, you know, we were in Uzbekistan this year, so we still like to travel and see the world.
36:20
[SPEAKER_00]: That will always be important to me.
36:24
[SPEAKER_00]: And to stretch myself, look, I have bad knees at this point, but I'm not going to miss out.
36:30
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm just determined.
36:31
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, thank God I went hiking and felt pretty good the whole time.
36:35
[SPEAKER_00]: I didn't know if I would, but I was willing to take that chance.
36:40
[SPEAKER_00]: I do think we have to keep moving as we get older for sure.
36:43
[SPEAKER_00]: Movement is so important to health.
36:46
[SPEAKER_00]: To your point, you know, you want it to be safe, whatever, under doctor supervision or whatever.
36:53
[SPEAKER_00]: Luckily, my doctors say pain is no problem.
36:57
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, it's not going to kill you.
36:59
[SPEAKER_00]: So if you have a little pain in my knee-doings, I can work through that.
37:07
[SPEAKER_02]: There comes a point where a little is too much.
37:09
[SPEAKER_00]: Absolutely.
37:10
[SPEAKER_02]: You don't want to cause injury, but the question I guess is, what's the difference?
37:15
[SPEAKER_02]: And there's a metaphor here too, but how much pain is okay and how much pain is too much?
37:22
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, and that's something, you know, that I think imaging helps to know the actual state of your joints, right?
37:30
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, mine are okay at this point to keep going.
37:34
[SPEAKER_00]: But, yeah, I will advocate for Dr. Supposition and for, you know, doing what they sanctioned.
37:48
[SPEAKER_02]: Well, what is the name of your play?
37:50
[SPEAKER_00]: Oh, my play is called the Post-Rome monologues.
37:54
[SPEAKER_00]: It was interesting because it felt like a real moment of inspiration took a bind my medical work as an OBGYN and my writing work.
38:06
[SPEAKER_00]: I never planned to write a play and it came out of wanting to do just a one-night way to educate the community
38:15
[SPEAKER_00]: as to what life would be like after the Supreme Court dobs decision overturning Ruby Wayne.
38:22
[SPEAKER_00]: But it became a real play that other people wanted to put on.
38:27
[SPEAKER_00]: So it's had a couple of
38:31
[SPEAKER_00]: performances and that was a really interesting journey especially when I got to New York it was just a one night thing but with fifteen Broadway performers and I felt like oh this is kind of like a full circle with my dream to be a Broadway dancer because yeah now I'm working with people on stage and yeah
38:55
[SPEAKER_00]: So that was exciting and unexpected too.
38:58
[SPEAKER_00]: So again, just something with following curiosity and trying something even if your voice in your head is saying, who are you to write a play?
39:08
[SPEAKER_00]: You know anything about that.
39:14
[SPEAKER_02]: Well, you're a great example of what can happen when you do follow your interests and your values and how back an impact your life.
39:25
[SPEAKER_02]: Everybody has a variety of experiences, but what I'm hearing from you is that you've had some, I don't know, some true juxtapositions, right?
39:36
[SPEAKER_02]: And that your life is more interesting for having paid attention to those.
39:42
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, paying attention to opportunities, the universe is all for you and following your curiosities and not letting the, what they call, I hope this is a mad to say,
39:54
[SPEAKER_00]: with people call that asshole between your ears.
39:57
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, who's going to try to tell you that all of your ideas are crazy.
40:04
[SPEAKER_00]: You're not good enough.
40:07
[SPEAKER_00]: Because that voice is pretty strong in my head.
40:11
[SPEAKER_00]: But you overcame it.
40:14
[SPEAKER_02]: Over and over and over again.
40:16
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
40:19
[SPEAKER_00]: is willing to take that risk of putting yourself out there and that risk of judgment and failure.
40:24
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
40:24
[SPEAKER_02]: Okay.
40:25
[SPEAKER_02]: Well, but give us some advice or at least an example.
40:32
[SPEAKER_02]: There are people out there who have the dream.
40:34
[SPEAKER_02]: They have the pulling and they're like, this is what, but I don't have a time.
40:39
[SPEAKER_02]: I don't have the experience.
40:40
[SPEAKER_02]: I don't know what to do.
40:41
[SPEAKER_02]: I don't know how to start.
40:42
[SPEAKER_02]: I don't know who I'll land up.
40:44
[SPEAKER_02]: I don't know if the risk is too much.
40:46
[SPEAKER_02]: What do you say to that person?
40:49
[SPEAKER_00]: I say you probably won't have all those answers.
40:53
[SPEAKER_00]: But if you really want to do it, it's worth a try.
40:57
[SPEAKER_00]: Look, when I went to Nepal a twenty-two,
41:01
[SPEAKER_00]: I couldn't even find anyone in my New York circles who had been there.
41:06
[SPEAKER_00]: And it's just before the internet, I went to the bookstore, I finally tracked down a friend of a friend who lived in Chicago who had been there, you know, to get advice.
41:14
[SPEAKER_00]: Nowadays, you have the whole internet.
41:16
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, you have access to old and knowledge in the world to make your decisions.
41:24
[SPEAKER_00]: And I think that you can often make them with
41:30
[SPEAKER_00]: without optimal resources, you know, and like I had a borrow not only backpack, I was into photography, so I had bought a camera lens, but I didn't have a money for a camera body.
41:42
[SPEAKER_00]: I borrowed the body.
41:45
[SPEAKER_00]: You can make do with less, you know, and sing with writing.
41:52
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, I literally started from scratch.
41:55
[SPEAKER_00]: But I was became so determined I took a million classes.
41:59
[SPEAKER_00]: I read craft books.
42:02
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, I devoted myself to it.
42:05
[SPEAKER_00]: And I didn't know that it would ever be published.
42:09
[SPEAKER_00]: But it became like once I started, I was not going to quit because that was my, that felt like a real purpose.
42:17
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
42:19
[SPEAKER_02]: How did you find the time?
42:20
[SPEAKER_02]: Doctors are busy people.
42:22
[SPEAKER_00]: No, I was very lucky because it actually happened.
42:25
[SPEAKER_00]: I had a very intense job and I had to resign spontaneously.
42:34
[SPEAKER_00]: And I was driving home like, oh my God, what am I going to do now?
42:37
[SPEAKER_00]: I had been traveling to three cities a week.
42:39
[SPEAKER_00]: I had been doing all the same.
42:40
[SPEAKER_00]: Oh my God, the next morning I went to my computer and started writing.
42:44
[SPEAKER_00]: I didn't plan to write the book.
42:47
[SPEAKER_00]: I just let it start poor anime so I wasn't actually doing doctoring at that point.
42:52
[SPEAKER_00]: I could devote myself a hundred percent to writing.
42:56
[SPEAKER_00]: But I didn't plan it.
42:57
[SPEAKER_00]: I just let it happen and followed it.
43:00
[SPEAKER_00]: And similarly, you know, I always thought, okay, I have a great ever story when I tell that story, but once I started writing, all this family stuff came out on the page.
43:10
[SPEAKER_00]: And I was like, what is this?
43:11
[SPEAKER_00]: I never planned to write about my family.
43:14
[SPEAKER_00]: And then I said, this is part of the story.
43:16
[SPEAKER_00]: I have to figure that out.
43:18
[SPEAKER_00]: What is the story?
43:21
[SPEAKER_00]: Then it became more about how did that girl who was born to parents who came off the ship in New York?
43:28
[SPEAKER_00]: My father was a Holocaust survivor.
43:30
[SPEAKER_00]: I was raised in an orthodox Jewish community.
43:33
[SPEAKER_00]: How did that girl end up on Everest?
43:36
[SPEAKER_00]: So the family became the story also.
43:39
[SPEAKER_00]: But none of that was planned.
43:40
[SPEAKER_00]: I had to just let it happen.
43:46
[SPEAKER_02]: You know, my sister is a writer and she recounted to me one day that she was writing and she was crying and her husband says, what's going on?
43:54
[SPEAKER_02]: Because I didn't know that he had to die.
44:01
[SPEAKER_02]: But these things happen as you explore and idea deeply, then it takes you places you did not anticipate.
44:09
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, which is actually what you're saying about your book.
44:13
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
44:14
[SPEAKER_00]: And that's the exciting part of writing is letting the story carry you.
44:18
[SPEAKER_00]: Not planning everything, which is kind of what we've been talking about life, right?
44:22
[SPEAKER_00]: Not to plan everything and succumb a little.
44:27
[SPEAKER_02]: Oh, that's excellent.
44:30
[SPEAKER_02]: You know the idea of everyone out there to look at a map and dream a little bit and ask yourself the question, what does it look like in this place?
44:42
[SPEAKER_02]: But you're finger on the map.
44:44
[SPEAKER_02]: And then look at other maps.
44:46
[SPEAKER_02]: But once you've done that, the next step is to go and see.
44:54
[SPEAKER_02]: And it might not be that you're going to go to an appolar Tibet or wherever the faraway dream place is right now.
45:01
[SPEAKER_02]: But you can go to a wild place near the city where you live.
45:11
[SPEAKER_02]: maybe it this last year gotten a little bit of a rut and I was just kind of like.
45:16
[SPEAKER_02]: Cali this is this is not really fun and then I stopped and I said.
45:21
[SPEAKER_02]: All I have to do is go because when you go you see and you experience and your life gets richer.
45:27
[SPEAKER_02]: But if you sit here and say what I'm gonna do or you sit there and you know doomskrill on your phone or whatever the case may be, you don't have those life experiences.
45:36
[SPEAKER_02]: So when you're in that moment for your like, I actually have an extra hour and a half right now and I don't know what to do with myself.
45:46
[SPEAKER_02]: Then go.
45:49
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, great advice.
45:51
[SPEAKER_02]: You won't make a memory otherwise.
45:53
[SPEAKER_00]: And if Go means going in nature, the answers may come to you.
45:59
[SPEAKER_00]: And it's for June the Nating, you know?
46:01
[SPEAKER_02]: Absolutely.
46:02
[SPEAKER_00]: And they connect to you with yourself and the greater world, and maybe you connect with a greater purpose.
46:08
[SPEAKER_00]: And with today's mental health problems, I think, to your point, stopping to do in scroll and getting out more is good for all of us.
46:22
[SPEAKER_02]: So maybe do you have a passage in your book, a paragraph that you would be willing to read to us?
46:29
[SPEAKER_00]: Oh, you didn't ask me to prepare that?
46:31
[SPEAKER_02]: No, I did not.
46:33
[SPEAKER_02]: So this is really off the cuff.
46:36
[SPEAKER_00]: It would be a long time before it understands everything we've been through on that glacier that I'd experienced the greatest emptiness and the greatest strength there.
46:46
[SPEAKER_00]: Now I realize that living and loving, while knowing all could be lost, is the essence of the greatest aliveness.
46:56
[SPEAKER_02]: Wow.
46:58
[SPEAKER_02]: I think that's summarize is everything that we just talked about.
47:03
[SPEAKER_02]: That's fantastic.
47:05
[SPEAKER_02]: And well written as well.
47:06
[SPEAKER_00]: Thank you.
47:08
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, thank you for that.
47:10
[SPEAKER_02]: That's a lot of fun.
47:12
[SPEAKER_02]: Well, what would you have people?
47:14
[SPEAKER_02]: What would you want people to know or to think about as they consider their own lives and their own adventures?
47:23
[SPEAKER_00]: Mostly that they're capable of more than they think they are.
47:27
[SPEAKER_00]: And in particular, I think women underestimate themselves.
47:32
[SPEAKER_00]: And that when you do try new things, stretch out your comfort zone, face fears, face yourself down, you'll grow.
47:43
[SPEAKER_00]: You may not always have success to your brain, you mentioned that.
47:47
[SPEAKER_00]: We may fail, but we will definitely grow.
47:50
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, that's beautiful.
47:53
[SPEAKER_02]: Well, how can people learn more about your book, find your book, get in touch with you?
47:58
[SPEAKER_00]: You can get in touch with me through my website, which is mimizemenmed.com.
48:06
[SPEAKER_00]: And my book is, you know, on all the online sites, there are links to buy it on my website.
48:12
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, on bookshop.org, you know, Amazon.com, and all those places.
48:17
[SPEAKER_00]: And I'll be in your neck of the woods in Colorado, giving some book talks at the end of the month.
48:26
[SPEAKER_02]: In Aspen and Inville,
48:29
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I'll be in Aspen on July twenty ninth and bail on July thirty.
48:35
[SPEAKER_02]: That'll be fun and welcome back to Colorado.
48:38
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, thanks.
48:39
[SPEAKER_00]: I can't wait.
48:40
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, that'd be fantastic.
48:41
[SPEAKER_02]: So the, the name of the book is tap dancing on Everest.
48:46
[SPEAKER_02]: And, uh, Nini Zeman, that's ZIEMA in MD is the website.
48:53
[SPEAKER_02]: And, will you relate to us to close this out?
48:57
[SPEAKER_02]: Will you just tell us a story?
48:59
[SPEAKER_02]: Something from your expedition that impacted you that you, you draw from from time to time.
49:10
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, there were so many potential titles.
49:16
[SPEAKER_00]: And now that we chose to have dancing, I think of that moment as just being a moment when I was fully myself.
49:26
[SPEAKER_00]: Because I was kind of in the shadow of the men.
49:29
[SPEAKER_00]: I wasn't a climber.
49:31
[SPEAKER_00]: I didn't have much of a voice to what we were doing.
49:37
[SPEAKER_00]: And I looked back at that moment of being able to be myself in front of them, and to bring what I had to the team, which was singing Broadway Showtunes.
49:52
[SPEAKER_00]: It's happening to me.
49:55
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, as something valuable.
49:57
[SPEAKER_00]: And again, we judge ourselves so hard, actually.
50:02
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, what am I bringing to this team or whatever?
50:07
[SPEAKER_00]: So, yeah, I look at that as a moment to remind me of what it feels like when you are comfortable in your skin and really letting other people see you, which is hard, which is a really hard thing to do.
50:23
[SPEAKER_00]: So, yeah, so one of the climbers was so generous and kind this year.
50:31
[SPEAKER_00]: We had been texting and he said, you know, that was the best day of the trip.
50:38
[SPEAKER_00]: I think you completing a new route on Everest was probably your best accomplishment, but that was very kind of him to say.
50:46
[SPEAKER_02]: That's really, really fun.
50:48
[SPEAKER_02]: Well, thank you so much for sharing your story with us and all the encouragement to everyone, you know, that there's a reason to get out there and to try these things and to follow your heart and your gut.
51:01
[SPEAKER_02]: So, Amy, thank you very much.
51:02
[SPEAKER_00]: Thank you so much, Kurt.
51:04
[SPEAKER_00]: It was really great to talk to you.
51:06
[SPEAKER_02]: That's great to talk to you too.
51:07
[SPEAKER_02]: And for all the viewers and listeners out there,
51:11
[SPEAKER_02]: do get out there and have fun, but realize that there's a reason for it, it does make life better.
51:18
[SPEAKER_02]: Take care.