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Hello! As I began thinking about what I might write tonight, it occurred to me that this letter marks the fourth anniversary of this soul-stoking project. Wow… Four years! That’s 1,460 days spent in relationship with this website. We’re still going strong and so deeply invested in each other at this point, I can’t image life without her. Nor you: I deeply thank you for sharing your time, the most valuable resource of all of us living things, with me. That is an absolute honor, and I hope you always feel that I feel that. Thank you. Such milestones often cause us to look around and from a higher perspective and this evening has been no exception. What started as The Living Theory, a blog of wild, throbbing inspiration, has evolved and matured a bit over the past four years (I would like to think, at least). In the beginning, I felt that I wanted life shot directly at me through a fire hose and that everyone else should too. Today, I know that what is best is not always of greater intensity or more. And that what is best for each of us is complicated and personal. Yet, I also know that we all naturally lean toward comfort, away from fear, and that we often need to push ourselves a bit further out on the branch than we want to go. Four years of evolution from the launch of The Living Theory, my sentiments remain the same. I suppose they have just become more nuanced and understanding of the powerful shaping influence of our circumstances. In the fifth year of its writing, this blog will undergo a serious environmental change, in that — for a while at least — the gap in responsibilities, bills, and other ties that I have taken great care to maintain since graduating college five years ago is coming to a close. For over half a decade, I’ve been geographically, financially, and philosophically free to roam about as far as my body and mind might take me. It was a damn great, learned time. But this August, I clipped my wings. I signed a year-long lease on a house in Glendale, Arizona. And just yesterday, my brother, one of his best friends from college, and I moved in. Tonight I’m writing to you from a bedroom I plan to both pay for and inhabit for an entire year (that is a crazy thought for me). Why surrender that freedom? Because, over the next year, the three of us plan to learn to fly airplanes so well that people will trust and pay us to fly them and their things through the sky. To me, flying looks like both one of the most wondrous ways in the world to make living and to support this curious, passionate pursuit of mine, rather than demand it support me. I also have little worry the life of a pilot will rob me of my zest for life, as I feel so many other potential paths would. However, learning to fly airplanes is damn expensive. A year after conquering my college student loans, I’ll be going much deeper in the financial hole than before to earn the wings I plan to fly out with. As a vagabond, my instinctual thrift and love of mobility have me feeling a bit like a kid at a waterpark who started down a super intimidating waterslide and is second-guesses himself. Press and grab at the slick sides with all his might, it doesn’t matter: it’s too late to stop, he’s going down! The beauty is that he’s sure the fear is a sign of impending danger, but rather, it’s a sign of growth. I both suspect and hope flight school is the same sort of thing. Lastly, you may have noticed I changed the name of these monthly letters from “A Letter to You” to “A Late Night Letter.” I’ve become a bit enamored with the depths of the night and the responsibility to write a letter to the 2,700-some-odd-number of you wonderful people in one go and press the send button before the sun rises or I fall asleep. This feels high-stakes. It has this whimsical intensity that I don’t know how to access in any other way. The name change is a way of doubling-down on the practice and honoring its magic. Til next month! With love & stoke, Ethan P.S. I spent two and a half weeks in Silver Gate, Montana this August — my summer home just outside Yellowstone National Park, where I managed the spectacular Range Rider’s Lodge the previous three summers. It’s a special place. While I was there, I took a long while to write a heartfelt something about it. Give it a read (or a listen, I’m recording my articles now). If you ever visit Yellowstone, I highly recommend you go check it out for yourself!
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