Thoughts of a Modern-Day Mountain Man.

This is the second of a weekly blog series that will focus on leadership in the outdoors and how to get the most from the least. Even though the title is called, “Thoughts of a Modern-Day Mountain Man”, it will hopefully cover topics that are useful to everyone.

Chapter 2: Learn a skill as though your life depended on it.

"I was lucky to get out alive on my first trip in 1924. I learned I was a damn fool, and that if I was going to live around mountains and do these things, I had to get some horse sense."- Paul Petzoldt at age 90 on climbing the Grand Teton

Many times in my life I have found myself in a predicament where the next move or two may determine if I live or die. When a modern-day mountain man finds himself deep in the wilds of the world, away from all that is known and comfortable, his decision-making process comes down to two simple truths; live or die. This is where skill really comes into play, when the margin for error is the most narrow. Paired with experience, skill will make an all-around competent and confident modern-day mountain man. Education and learning, especially concerning a new skill, should always be about being the best you can be every day. The modern-day mountain man should always seek to make himself better than the person he was yesterday. To improve your chances for success and survivability we must learn and master as many skills as we can. The learning process should never stop, and it should be a life-long pursuit of any modern-day mountain man worth his salt.

Skills are not something that are inherently born into us. We can learn skills, but we cannot learn talent. The man that has talent and who doesn’t seek to be a master of his skills, is a man that should be regarded as lazy and not a benefit to a modern-day mountain man’s company. I often heard it said during my baseball playing days that you cannot teach size and speed, which is 100% true, but you can learn the skill of fielding a ground ball or how to perform a proper run-down drill on defense. When you pair talent with skill, you have an unstoppable pairing. When the mountain men and women of yesteryear first came to the Rockies from the East, they had much to learn and a short time to learn it. The native population and the mountain men that arrived earlier played a huge role in teaching and guiding the newly arrived. They had to learn these skills, as their very daily lives depended upon it. Mastery was not an option, but a requirement. The highest honor and ranking that a mountain man could achieve was being able to call themselves a free trapper. These were men who were masters at their trade and skills, but no one starts out as a free trapper, everyone starts as an apprentice.

The desire to learn new skills and accomplish tasks comes from our God-given desire for knowledge and exploration. The best skills that a modern-day mountain man can learn is to learn what they need to know, what they don’t know, where to find the knowledge, and someone reputable to teach it. This will help to turn a weakness into a strength. Sometimes nature will teach us very quickly and very painfully what we don’t know, but if we are willing to observe the lesson being taught and put in the effort to learn from it, there is no skill that cannot be mastered to some extent. The ultimate Mastercraftsman is God, and His creation can be the consummate educator. I will use the skill of fire building as a great example. Fire building was designated as one of the first skills the Girl Scouts in our Council would learn during a program that I helped design during my tenure as a professional Girl Scout in Oregon. The reasoning behind this was simple, it was all about confidence. When the single most important task is trying to keep your core body temperature at 98.6 degrees, having the ability to get a fire going quickly, reliably and efficiently every single time with a 100% success rate is a determining factor in living to see another day. Girls as young as 7 were taught fire craft and the complementary skills that go along with being able to build a safe, effective fire, every time without fail. The root of this is a skill of confidence to help with maintaining a Positive Mental Attitude (PMA). If you have the skill necessary to build a fire in a pouring rain or heavy snowstorm and are able to do it 100% of the time, you then have confidence in your ability to get a fire going anywhere, anytime, using any resources available. The fire building skill session had little to do with building an actual fire, but everything to do with building confidence. It was about being able to learn a skill, replicate that skill and master it to have another tool in your mental toolbox for use at a later time. In a program like the Girl Scouts that is so focused on leadership, confidence is what allows someone who would normally take a backseat to stand up and be a leader. Fire building can give ultimate confidence.

Spark of life while fire building

In conclusion, fire craft was one of the first life skills the mountain men of yesteryear had to learn and master. Their very life and livelihood depended upon it. The modern-day mountain man would do well to learn this skill, or any skill as though their life and livelihood depended upon it.