This Life Is an Adventure—Live Like It

In yet another attempt to revive theMangoTimes podcast I talk with Kendra about a recent blog post I wrote about living a life of adventure. Along the way we talk about the Fletchifesto, selling our home and the freedom of podcasting.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:03

Welcome to the Mango Times Podcast. This is Fletch. I am the writer and editor for everything you read and listen to here on the Mango Times Podcast. You know, this is my own personal podcast where I like to talk about just about everything from great music to great movies to great food and what life is like in a big family, which for me is eight awesome kids, a beautiful wife, and two crazy dogs. So I would like to encourage you to stick around and join me as I quietly make some noise. Hey, welcome to this episode of the Mango Times Podcast, where we are talking about adventure. You know, one of the things about doing this podcast is I often fall off track along with my blog. I just life gets busy and life gets hectic and I forget to blog, I forget to podcast, but then I remember how much I love it. So here's what happened. Uh towards the end of last year, 2015, I was looking around at some of these manifestos that different companies make that have kind of values and statements and quotes on them, and I thought it'd be fun to make my own. So I started gathering quotes, I started gathering uh statements that I liked that I thought symbolized kind of who I am or what I believe, and they all had one kind of guiding principle, and that's that that they were all positive and encouraged positivity. So I put these together and I started laying them out graphically, and I created my own manifesto. Now, to have some fun, I called it the Fletch Afesto, and I published it on the Mango Times on the blog. There'll be a link to it in the show notes here. And you know, one of the things I did was I made postcards and posters. You know, the idea is that I wanted my friends to have some of these uh positivities surrounding them as well and have it be, you know, kind of a statement of what Fletch believes. So then I got this idea about revitalizing my blog, and I thought what I would do is take each of the statements on the Fletcher Festo and kind of blog about them. So the very first one was Live Each Day Like an Adventure, and I blogged about it and I got some feedback, and then I did Be Kind and I got some feedback on that. And I thought it'd be fun to complement that with some discussion on each of those topics. And that's why uh this episode is about adventure. It's about living each day like an adventure. And you know, I really enjoy podcasting. I I do a weekly podcast with my wife over at Homeschooling in Real Life, uh, homeschoolingirl.com. And I told her how much I just enjoy talking to her uh when we do those podcasts, and I thought it'd be fun to bring her on uh maybe on a couple of these. I don't know. We're gonna you know what the thing about this podcast is I can do whatever the hell I want to do. And so uh I'm bringing her on to talk about living each day like an adventure. And uh before we get to that section, uh let's just take a quick break. Alright, so as a listener now of the Mangotine Podcast, and maybe a follower of the blog and the website over the years, uh, I really enjoy podcasting. I like listening to them. I'm I'm kind of a uh podcast junkie, and I thought it would be fun to share a few of my favorite podcasts with you so that you could get out and listen to them yourself. Now, there's two brand new podcasts out uh that I want to tell you about. The first one uh comes from uh Redeemer Modesto. It's a church we go to in Modesto, California, Redeemer Church, and they have a new section of their podcast called the Multiplier Podcast. And the deal here is a friend of mine, Bill Kanoyer, is interviewing um disciplers and people who've been discipled just to talk about the process. I think so often we get stuck wondering what that looks like. Um we have some kind of real life stories on what the discipleship process looks like. It's called the Multiplier Podcast, and it will release, I think, monthly. Initially, it's a Monday morning release, and the very first one went up this week. I'll have a link to it in the show notes. You know, the second podcast I've fallen in love with that I think you'll really like is The Way I Heard It with Mike Rowe. Now, you know Mike Rowe from Dirty Jobs, he's got this great deep voice. He is uh doing a podcast in the style of Paul Harvey, and he's kind of telling the rest of the story, but his, in fact, is called The Way I Heard It, and they're short seven to eight minute podcasts once a week, uh, where he releases uh a little bit of a behind-the-scenes story of something you may or may not know. Uh so I would encourage you to go check it out. It's very entertaining, it's very quick and brief, and he does a smashingly good job at uh the scripts that he puts together and reads. Um, it's just supernatural. So uh those are the two podcasts I'd recommend. I encourage you to go check them out. Alright, and we're back. And uh, you know, what we're talking about today is this manifesto that I created at the beginning of January 2016. I've been working on it for a couple months. Different layouts, different color patterns, and I finally came up with one that I really liked, and I I posted on it uh the first part of January, and I called it the Fletch Afesto, and uh what I wanted to do was start blogging as well. I wanted to start, you know, building up my writing skills, so I thought I would take one of these statements a week or thereabouts, nothing pressured, and and that's just the way I do things. I I blog and I podcast whenever I can. That way there are not people that are expecting anything from me. So I decided to take one of the phrases at a time. And at the beginning of May, I wrote uh on Live Each Day Like an Adventure. It was the very first one. Um and I just talked about what it meant to live an adventure, why I thought that was important. And I I made reference to Indiana Jones, I made reference to uh, you know, my love for uh adventureland in Disneyland, and you know, just how that just tended to be the place I would gravitate towards. Uh I talked about my love for pirates and how they live a life of adventure at the sea. But then I really broke it down and just talked about um the fact that so many people go through life just bored as hell, uh same job, but just kind of cruising along uh and just kind of hoofing through the same routines. And you know what? Truthfully, that's a crappy way to live your life. And I was encouraging people to join with me on this. You know, literally change your costume, wake up tomorrow and put on adventure clothes, whatever those are gonna be. Go for a walk in your neighborhood. You know, one of the exercises I loved are the guys that'll go outside and just start walking and see how far they can walk in a day. You know, we all have smartphones. We can walk as far as we can and call people. So for the summer of 2016, I'm uh hoping to do this epic walk. Now it's an urban adventure, so it's not gonna be out in the hills, it's not gonna be dangerous. We're just walking in an urban region where I live. And I have a friend that lives about 20 miles away. And I'd love to see if I could make it to his house in one day. If I left early in the morning and maybe took uh Jack, one of my sons with me, and we just took a walk and and saw whether we could do it. Uh that's kind of the goal. Um, but this idea, you know, buy a notebook, write things down, write down what you see as you're walking. You know, as you walk and as you live an adventure and you're hiking around, or just even if you're just driving around and you just carry a notebook, jot things down, make a sketch, you know. Whatever you're looking at, write it down so you remember. You know, the time you take to sketch or write something down or to describe it, it'll stick that much more in your memories. Um, and so my ideal is to live this adventure every day. So I thought it'd be fun to sit down with my wife. I love podcasting with her over at the homeschooling in real life podcast that we do. And I told her, truthfully, she's the one I like to podcast with because since I know her the best, we can have the most fun. So um let's take a quick break and we come back. Uh Kendra and I will talk a little bit more about what it means to live a life of adventure. So, as I've said, I've been trying to revive my blog and my podcast, and I was telling Kendra the other day that one of the things I love podcasting on Thomango Times is uh I like to talk to her. She's fun to talk with. And you know, we do a podcast called the Homeschooling in Real Life podcast, and I kind of feel like there are bumpers on the road, like we could only kind of stay in the homeschooling world, and anytime we jump off of that, people get their panties in a bunch and they get all pissy about the fact that we can't.

SPEAKER_01 8:19

Did you just say pissy?

SPEAKER_00 8:20

Well, I can't say that on the homeschooling in real life podcast. You know why? Because there are a bunch of people that get pissy. So I over here on the Mango Times I have a lot more freedom, and this is uh I just like to talk about topics. So I'm revi I'm I'm revamping my blog. You know that, Kench?

SPEAKER_01 8:36

I do. I'm I'm so impressed.

SPEAKER_00 8:37

Yeah, so what I did is I I created this thing called the Fletchifesto, it's like a manifesto. Right, I remember and I printed it up and I have postcards made. I drop them all over town.

SPEAKER_01 8:45

I've pinned them on you were criticized for it.

SPEAKER_00 8:47

By who? Oh yeah. Yeah, my aunt criticized me. She probably even listened to this. Aunt Gracie was like, You didn't say enough about Jesus. Well, she didn't talk like that, but she's like from Georgia and she's got like a New Jersey accent. She's like, You didn't say enough about Jesus. But you know, so no, I didn't. I purposely didn't. Jesus had given your life thinking. I can I cannot say it. Um, so anyhow, so I'm doing this this uh Fletcher Festo, and I got criticized, Aunt said not enough about Jesus on there, and I purposely didn't do it. But I'm posting these all over um all over the place, wherever I can can put these things. Okay. So um so I'm I've been re-uh blogging about this, and I wanted to go through the list as well. So the very first one was uh live your life like an adventure. And I just wanted to get your opinion on that. What does that mean? When I say live your life like an adventure, does that stir up anything in you at all?

SPEAKER_01 9:42

Yeah, uh my first thought is it's the antithesis of fear. I think a lot of people live with fear.

SPEAKER_00 9:47

And the fear of what? Like I can't do this, I can't go out and live a life of adventure.

SPEAKER_01 9:51

You know where I see this, Fletch? I think um maybe it's just where we live. Uh maybe it's just the community of people we live around, and I might be pushing some buttons, but there are a lot of fearful parents. They don't want their kids to go off to college. They don't oh, but he was he wanted to he was interested in this school, but uh that's six hours away. It's a good one.

SPEAKER_00 10:14

And you and I look at that and just go, it's an adventure. Yeah, go ahead. Let your kid go.

SPEAKER_01 10:19

If you can afford it. Well, yeah, if you can afford it. Well, well, and I'm talking about college too. I'm not talking about like big expensive trips or anything like that. Um, I know our daughter is going to Nicaragua this summer with a min on a missions trip with some people from church, and um, I've had a negative about that. You know, like, oh, you'd let her go. She's only 15. Yep. Because you know what I love? She's not going by herself. She's like hiking down in Nicaragua.

SPEAKER_00 10:44

In Nicaragua. If we give her 50 bucks, she'll be fine. When you get to Managua, here's the deal. Get off the plane. Uh just go try to find a taco shop.

SPEAKER_01 10:52

Okay, so let me say this though, because of the fear element. You know, uh, do you know how Stonewall Jackson got his name?

SPEAKER_00 10:58

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 10:58

Because he was a, in fact, like a stonewall. That's what they said. But he had this great quote, I'm gonna butcher it. You can look it up. You know, it's the goog googs, you can just Google it. But he was on his horse. The Googs.

SPEAKER_00 11:09

The Googs, go to the Googs, check out the YouTubes, go on the interwebs.

SPEAKER_01 11:13

So he's on his horse and he's in the middle of the battle, and that's how he got his name, because he was just fearlessly out in the middle of the battle. He was not the um captain or terrible at military. He was not the guy in charge who just sat back and watched his troops do all the work. He was in the middle of the battles. And he said, Look, God is sovereign. He's in control, and I'm gonna die in bed or I'm gonna die on the battlefield not one minute sooner than he has ordained me to die. And so he fearlessly went into battle. He fearlessly did these things saying, look, God's in charge. And I think that that is the that's adventure. You have an you can have that spirit of adventure fearlessly, because look, you're not, nothing's gonna happen to you that's outside of God's sovereign, beautiful plan. And I always think, you know what, you could slip and die in the bathtub. So get on a plane, get on a boat, get on, you know, whatever it is. And I'm not even talking about travel, because I know that's not what you're just talking about. You're not just talking about travel. No, not at all.

SPEAKER_00 12:09

No, no, no, no. You know, and and I talked about it a little bit when I was just uh when I wrote this, is like a a trip to the store can be an adventure. You know, you could you can uh turn everything into an adventure. But I like this idea of adventurous kids, you know, um giving your kids a heart for adventure and and what does that look like? So I love the fact, um, and I'm glad you didn't go down this path, but but you should have, because it's what you've done.

SPEAKER_01 12:34

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 12:35

You've given kids the world of adventure through books. Yeah, right. You know, whether it's the the great kids that are uh sailing over to the island on Swallows and Amazons, or whether it's um any of these these adventure books that kids have read or just stort great stories of adventurers. Uh, you know, I think of that guy, um Robin Graham, who uh sailed around the world alone. Yeah, you know, in in Dove. And then again, just building relationships with the Sunderland families, uh, kids, and knowing that Zach and Abby had sailed around the world as the youngest, you know, uh youngest boy and girl, I guess at the point, she didn't quite make it. But but again, give and they got tons of grief for that.

SPEAKER_01 13:15

They got a ton of grief because Abby's boat capsized in the Indian Ocean, and then you know, oh, they're the the worst parents, and it's all about the dad. And but we know them, and we know it wasn't about the dad, and we know that Abby was equipped to do this. She'd been sailing her whole life. Yeah, and so that there's that element of saying, our daughter wants to try this, great. She's not going to die one moment sooner than God has ordained for her. And so she set out on it. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 13:41

Don't blow Jackson out in the ocean.

SPEAKER_01 13:42

That's right. She set out on that trip and um and hit a rogue wave, and that was you know the end of the trip. But just the spirit of like, hey, go go tackle that thing you want to tackle, kiddo.

SPEAKER_00 13:53

So we've sent kids on missions trips to Mexico. We've sent them on missions trips to uh Nicaragua. This that's within the church, very safe.

SPEAKER_01 14:01

I think those are like super safe trips. You know what else I hear I just because this is where we are in our kids' lives and you know, friends' kids' lives, there are a lot of people fearful to let their kids drive a car. What? Yeah, I mean, just even like getting a license, you know, or that all the kind of thing. Like just let again, yeah. Are they going to make stupid mistakes learning to drive? Yes. Did you not? I did. Yeah, sure. You know, um, and and they will, but just take the fear away and and let them.

SPEAKER_00 14:27

All right, let's get the kids off the story here. Let's talk about you and me.

SPEAKER_01 14:30

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 14:30

You talked a little bit about fear, this the spirit of adventure. Sometimes that's what? Dropping a career? Sometimes that's selling a giant home in the middle of a gorgeous two-acre piece of property because you you're going to go on another adventure. Yeah. And this other adventure is let's live with less so that we can do more.

SPEAKER_01 14:50

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 14:51

And I think uh a lot of people don't get this when I say, hey, we're and they see pictures of our house online. Yeah, they really don't understand why we're not. Why would you leave? Don't you you know, are you gonna miss washing the dishes, looking out this giant window? And you know, there are times when I look out that giant window and I go, This is a gorgeous piece of property. We have a yellow um aureole that's been flying around our house lately.

SPEAKER_01 15:12

Did you notice that? Yeah, it's gorgeous.

SPEAKER_00 15:17

It's shocking when you see it because he's so contrast. But you know, you have cows next time, you have a you know, all that stuff. It's gorgeous, people. I get it. It's beautiful, it's a nice piece of land. I live next door to my parents on a piece of property. All that's fantastic. But you know what? Sometimes at age 48, you need to downsize and have less on your plate. So that we can you can do more adventuring with your family. And and that's that is not just um a financial thing. Like, oh, we'll have less cash outflow. That's part of it. That's definitely part of it. But do I really want to come home every weekend and either do work on two acres or pay someone to do work when I could say, hey, let's button up the house, let's hit the road.

SPEAKER_01 16:00

Yeah, or let's let's be able to uh afford things in helping other people or doing some of those kind of projects as well.

SPEAKER_00 16:06

Yeah, you know, like that that's all of it. That's all it I'm just talking about. So clearly hear me. I'm not saying let's sell this so we can spend more money doing other things. I mean let's free up income, let's free up time so that we can serve more, let's free up money so that we can bless other people's all those. That's I mean all of that. But specifically on this adventure, um, we want less so that we can do more. So hey, thanks for being on the Mango Times podcast. You're coming back uh almost regularly because I told you I love talking to you.

SPEAKER_01 16:36

But I don't know that everybody else loves listening to me, so I don't give a rim what other people think. Oh, now you're sound pissy.

SPEAKER_00 16:42

I am. So hey, thanks for being on the show. All right, so that wraps up this episode of the Mango Times Podcast. It's uh the episode on adventure, and I'd like to hear from you. So go ahead and write in. You can write to me at fletch at the mangotimes.com, let me know what you think. You can leave a review over at iTunes. Um, I'm going to try and revamp this. I'm bringing Christian back on. We're gonna do more real-life Calvin podcasts, we're gonna have some fun together. Let me know what you think of what we're doing. If there's something you want me to talk about, I'd be happy to. Um, just let me know. And thanks for listening to this edition of the Mango Times Podcast. Now, get out there and quietly make some noise.