Let me make something very unusual, clear, and be forewarned, as it is sure to come across as tough love for many.

Walking the great trails, is not optional.

You must be very confused by hearing such a thing, most people don’t even know what the great trails are.

But they are in fact more important than a High School Diploma, more important that a College and University Education.

The trails are more important than your career, and all the promotions combined.

They are more important, than any advice you ever heard, they are certainly more important, than making others proud of you.

The trails are also very hard, but it is just tough love, you are not a pumpkin, not a worker – you are meant to become a great being.

Only those things that deeply matter to you, are as important as the trail.

I recommend you to section hike, so that the triple crown takes you a lifetime.

And please always hike as a group, the cranky but powerful holding up the rear.

And the energetic and cheerful, on point leading the way.

And don’t worry, there is a lot of space out there, you keep in touch by texting over satellite.

The groups will shift, it is always like that.

Some will have to go to fight in wars, or put out cranial blazes as Bryson puts it.

Others will come and join, to question their tacit assumptions, and unarticulated presuppositions as Cornel West puts it.

Go as a group, don’t go alone.

You see, Humanity is too young to get any thing right, we are glued, and taped up, by sticky invisible indoctrination.

It is really hard to see it, you need to get to the other side, become a Cast Away, so that you see with your own eyes.

You will also need narrated books, your intellectual inheritance, the books are as important as the trail it self.

You know... the books and the trail are one and the same, indivisible really.

Books written by clear thinking great beings, which are also loved by intellectuals, adventurers, and lovers of wisdom…

Are worthy of your precious time, they are far more important, than standardized lectures, career advice nonsence, and especially text books.

Yes, something is wrong, but it is just a wrinkle, that something comes from Humanity’s immaturity.

But you see, we are also likely genetically predisposed, to hold whatever opinion we are born to, over the facts that are actually worthy of us.

One way to break out of the indoctrination, is to shake off the stress, by letting the trail run it into the ground.

We will all read different books, we will absolutely cry to different stories and pages.

But the direction, the direction will always be the same for all them many generations, that will need to walk the trail to get there.

Humanity’s point of convergence, on Wisdom and Greatness.

Lastly, I wanted to name the trails, so that you know where to go.

Take a look at What is the Appalachian Trail? a very short and powerful introduction to what a trail really is.

And then give Dixie a listen, she’s a guide, a kindred spirit, she’ll show you what got lost in translation.

Appalachian Trail Documentary: DIXIE TO MAINE

Pacific Crest Trail Documentary: A YEAR OF ICE AND FIRE

Continental Divide Trail Documentary: CHOOSE YOUR ADVENTURE

If you are from other parts of the world, don’t forget that we are one huge family, we are only divided by indoctrination.

The same indoctrination that keeps the world at war, and in poverty, the same indoctrination that prevents you from reaching out for your true intellectual inheritance.

The many thousands of life changing books, written by clear thinking great beings, that help us set course for wisdom and greatness.