Closing Keynote: Exploring Passion and Perseverance with Jimmy Chin

Please welcome to the stage the CEO of Instructure, Steve Daley. How's everybody doing? Woo hoo. You good? Yeah. Woah. That's a lot of energy for the last day. So, congratulations.

You must not have lost as much money as I lost last night. Welcome to our final, to the final day. Right? And this is the final keynote. It's been a great it's been a great time, and we're really excited and we're really proud of of some of the the work that you all have done. We're grateful to all of those of you that have shared with us.

And, really, we wanted to share a few of the moments that we've had over the last, over the last few days. So we're gonna go ahead and roll a video. Oh, sweet Cathy. That is awesome. That is awesome.

What a what a fun time. Well, I'm stoked to bring out our final speaker, for a fireside chat. Jimmy Chin is, it's amazing if you've seen any of his work, what he's done, what he's overcome. You know, as I watch some of the footage of of some of his, documentaries, you get a real sense for the risk that he takes, the, appreciation of but his appreciation of collaboration, trust, and perseverance. So let's take a look at, what I mean, and you'll see it in this trailer here.

I always wondered how I was gonna die, and now now I know. Meru is the culmination of all I've done and all I've wanted to do is this peak and this climb. Conrad's reputation among climbers is flawless. I only go on expeditions with people that I know and that I trust. As a team, you're the sum total of all your experience.

I had heard about Renan. I knew he was strong enough. When we got there and I looked up at the mountain, I didn't know what we were getting into. This is the test of the master climber. Jimmy and Conrad have climbed Everest four or five times.

This is a whole different kind of climbing. Sixteen days of here. We lost half our food, and ninety percent of the mountain was still above us. The center of the universe is unattainable. Climbing with your mentors is a dangerous thing because you give them all of your trust.

I gave them everything. Go. Go. The rewards of climbing are huge. The problem is you don't always come out of okay.

People die. And then you can't justify it. That is the great dilemma. The idea of not climbing was too much to imagine. I've got two kids.

My wife's there, and I'm responsible for them. I had this premonition. I didn't want them to go. If we go for it, there's a probability that we aren't gonna come back. Am I taking too many chances? Can I control the risk? Of course, you can't control the risk.

It was something that I had to do. It was Conrad saying, you can do this. He knew that that we had to trust him, and that's all we did. We had become so close. It was worth the risk.

It was worth possibly dying for. I was alter I was alternating between, goosebumps and nausea watching that. So, it's crazy. So, I would like to bring out, Instructure's VP of Global Academic Strategy, Ryan Lufkin, and professional climber, skier, photographer, director, and National Geographic Explorer, Jimmy Chin. Please welcome.

Well, hello everybody, and thanks, Jimmy. As someone that's terrified of heights, I'm, aggressively in awe of everything you do. I it's amazing. How did you, find yourself going down this path in life? Well, first of all, before I start, I just wanna say that, I that you all, the educators in in this room, are what I think are the most important people in the fabric of our society. And I just think it's a hugely noble profession and that I appreciate you all.

Yeah. Yeah. And my my parents were were librarians. I was, Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Which I I think is amazing. So you you tell us about your kind of academic journey as librarians. Did they push you, you know, for education? Like, what did that look like? Yeah. Well, so my parents were, Chinese immigrants, and they both studied library sciences and moved to Minnesota, because they heard it was a really nice place to raise a family.

And they were librarians at what used to be called Mankato State University is now called Minnesota State University. But, you know, they're very traditional Chinese parents. You know, education was hugely important and and a major priority for them. So is, you know, extra extracurricular activities. Like, I grew up you know, I started playing the violin when I was three.

Mhmm. I swam competitively. I studied martial arts from when I was very, very young, and it was always about excellence and, you know, being the best that you could be at Yeah. You know, anything that you set your mind to. And so, you know, academics was a huge priority, for them.

And, you know I do, credit them with, you know, giving me a lot of books, and I and I read a lot, as a kid. And I had an older sister who was six years older and she read a lot. And then she would hand the books down to me, but six years difference is quite a bit, but I was reading, like Yeah. Everything. And I think that all of that reading really kind of, expanded my imagination of what the world could be.

And, for me, obviously, I latched onto this idea of the kind of adventures in the world that, I wanted to to pursue later in life. I don't think I was very conscious of it at the time, but, you know, I clearly We're impacted by it. Was impacted by it. Yes. Amazing.

Wilson Lobel and I, host a podcast called the Educast three thousand. And one of the things we like to ask is, our our guests generally is, do you have a favorite learning moment? Was there a was there a moment or a mentor that really impacted your path? I mean, I've had a lot of incredible mentors in my life. But I think, you know, early on well, I'll back up a little bit just for a little background context. You know, I I finished school. I studied, international relations at Carleton College and, and and kind of a lot of comparative religion as well.

I thought they were actually very related. And then but during that time, I had found climbing, when I was probably sixteen or seventeen, and I became obsessed with climbing. And I took all of these other, you know, swimming and martial arts and what I learned from those things and and really kind of applied them to climbing. So when I finished school, college, you know, my parents were very much interested in where I was gonna go to graduate school and when I was gonna study because, you know, from the from when I was very from when I was very young, my parents were like, you know, you're gonna be a doctor, a lawyer. I was gonna ask how did they react to it, but, you know, you say, I wanna climb out.

You said hall camera gear. A professor, you know, and and I I literally thought there was, like, three jobs in the world. And, you know, for a long time, I was like, oh, wow. So lawyer, doctor, and professor. Okay.

And then, and then I found climbing. And I actually also grew up skiing even though you don't think of Minnesota as a place to ski, but there was a tiny ski hill behind my house. Where I learned to ski. And I I loved skiing because I loved being outside. So I actually skied at Carlton, although, we weren't known for skiing as much as other activities.

But but, I finished school and I told my parents, hey. Look. I'm not I'm I'm I'm gonna take a year off. I'm gonna really focus on climbing and skiing and just get it out of my system, you know, and then I'm gonna pursue my career. They were obviously very skeptical.

Uh-huh. They should have imagined. And, I basically moved into the back of a of of a old beat up blue Subaru and moved to Yosemite, which is kind of like where where you have to really, you know, if you wanna climb or be a serious climber, you have to spend time in in the valley. We call it Yosemite Valley. And one year turned into two, and two turned into three.

And eventually, from, like, twenty one to twenty eight, I was literally living out of a vehicle and just so focused on climbing because I found this thing that I just you know, every day that I woke up, I was like, that's that's all I wanted to do. I wanted to push my Yeah. Limits as a climber. And, you know, that didn't go over I can imagine you got some phone calls that were real well. You know, that didn't go over I can imagine you got some phone calls that were real well Yeah.

With my parents. And, you know, I I would call my sister and I'd be like, how are mom and dad doing? And she'd say, well, mom just keeps repeating to herself, I've raised a homeless man. And I would talk to my dad and inevitably the conversation would turn to, like, what are you doing with your life? And I would say, well, I'm gonna keep climbing. You know? And when I first started climbing, climbing wasn't so much a professional sport. It wasn't so mainstream.

And he would say, our language is five thousand years old, and there is no word for what you do. And so that's kinda like the the the backstory. I I was kinda really going against the grain of Yeah. How I was raised and I and, you know, then that was hard as it was I was filled with a lot of doubt about the choices I was making, but I I just felt so committed. And and in some ways, the harder it was to justify, the more committed I became.

It's it's thinking I'm gonna make something out of this life and I'm gonna take it as far as I possibly can. Yeah. And that was kind of the trajectory that is the early years of of of coming up through the, into my current career or careers, I guess. But I had a lot of great mentors, because there wasn't sort of a higher education. You know? There there isn't wasn't really a road map for me, so I really had to find people who With mentors that Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. And I I had some great mentors, my friend Conrad Anker, who's in this, in that trailer, Rick Ridgeway, who is a great explorer, and filmmaker. He was great. I I I became very close with Jon Krakauer, the author, and and, you know, it's just some really incredible people, like Yvon Chouinard who started Patagonia, great environmentalist.

But I I always have these little quotes, these moments, you know, when I I remember, with with some of these, mentors. I remember early on, I was invited on a National Geographic expedition, my first expedition, and, Rick Ridgeway was the leader of the expedition, in the mountain world, and actually really transcended that world. He made the Everest IMAX film, which was the highest grossing IMAX film of all time. And, he had to bail on the trip last minute because of another film project, and they brought me in. And I had never filmed before.

And, and I wanted to be pretty transparent about it. I was so excited to go on the trip. I said, I would love to go when they asked me to go, and I and they told me what I was supposed to do. And I said, but just to be clear, I've I've never filmed it before. And there was this pause, and Rick Ridgeway, I remember on the phone, just said, commit and figure it out.

And so there's, you know, the sometimes these little things stick with you for your entire lives. And, like, as educators, you know, they're they're just you never know what it's gonna be. I don't even think Rick probably will remember ever saying Yeah. And that thing has stuck with me for my entire career, and that's basically how I've approached everything. I'm like, just commit and figure it out.

You know? And What about I think that's something that's so powerful. It's such a huge opportunity you all have as educators. Those those moments that pass by that you don't might not have even thought of that are gonna have a huge impact on people? Yeah. I always think of educators as storytellers first and foremost. Right? The that's how we weave, you know, learning into really compelling lessons.

That's how we engage with students. How did you make that transition between, you know, that love for climbing and now you've started to film and now you wanna tell stories. Right? How did how did that transition or transition come about? Yeah. These things happen in such strange ways. So, I was really focused on climbing.

I was actually on a climb with a really good friend of mine who was trying really hard to be a professional photographer. And he handed me his camera and showed me how to use it, and I took one photo with it. And, at the end of the month, he took all his photos and he tried to, submit them for for, different places to see if they would sell if he could sell some of his photos. And he didn't sell any photos except for one. It turned out to be the photo that I took.

Woah. And he was so pissed. But but you gotta remember, I'm living in the back of a car, so and I'm living on, like, absolutely nothing. I'm, like, eating rice and beans. Like, I lived on, like, a few hundred dollars a month just climbing.

And so he sold it for five hundred dollars, and I was like, that is so much money. And I just thought, I only have to take this is a twenty one year old. I only have to take one photo a month, and I live like this forever. So it wasn't, like, such a noble kind of, like Yeah. Yeah.

I I don't wanna be a storyteller. I was like, I can get paid for what? Yeah. Yeah. It was purely, like, a very pragmatic, like, oh, I'm just gonna take one photo a month and then, you know, I was just. But, eventually, I kinda I became really obsessed with photography as a as a vehicle to to as a artistic, you know, vehicle, but also to to start to tell stories.

And, you know, I always like to set goals. And as I started shooting more and more, I eventually thought, you know what? I wanna be a National Geographic photographer. I wanna shoot for National Geographic. And I I grew up looking at National Geographic magazines, and we had Oh. You know? If you did grew up in a house with, you know, a show full of National Geographic magazines, I don't know you.

Right? Like, that's the Exactly. Like and so I started to really kind of obsess about what that would take, and I really started studying a lot of different photographers. And this idea of visual storytelling really became this art form and this craft that I I became really focused on on top of the climbing. And I started getting published pretty quickly because I was living in the valley and I was hanging out with all of the basically greatest climbers of our generation. I didn't think of them that way.

I thought of them as my friends. And so I just was, shooting with them and as, professional climbing became more of a a thing Yeah. You know, I started being asked to shoot with my friends or they would ask me and say, hey, like, my sponsors needed some shots or or I started putting together a lot of expeditions and I was starting to shoot these expeditions as stories. And eventually, you know, I started to understand, like, the elements that you need to tell a visual a good visual story. And and really, I was really inspired by the people I was with.

And, you know, unlike, you know, mainstream professional sports, a lot of them are doing these world class athletic feats in places that no one would ever see. Yeah. And I was constantly overwhelmed by what I was experiencing and seeing. And so I wanted to kind of share those stories and eventually was, after shooting for a few years was was brought on to start shooting for National Geographic, which which was a big moment for my parents because you were like That bookshelf full of National Geographic. Well, they were like because they understood.

They were like, oh, National Geographic. We know what that is. Yeah. And so, you know, you go to I'd go home and the coffee table would have, like, stacks of magazines with little stick it notes in the pages of the photos, and, and they understood they understood that. They could say he's a National Geographic photographer.

Yeah. And that that was, important to them. One of the things I love about the way you tell stories is you blur the line between those adventures and the storytellers. Usually, you know, you mentioned the the shot of the IMAX, right, which really was just shooting the scene. In reality, there's you're the climber standing there behind the camera doing everything they're doing, but with a hundred pounds of gear.

Right? And and I think and to me the story, you kind of weave that in so people get exposed to that. I think that's such an interesting, Yeah. I mean, I think a huge part of the storytelling that I've kind of been focused on has been, about kind of the human potential and kind of the power of the human spirit and what humans can achieve when they set their minds to it or commit to something. And these people who really push the edge of Yeah. What the human experience is.

And so, that was part it seems like part of my DNA. Like, I was always curious about how far I could push something as an athlete. And so I really connected with that in a in a way that I felt, like, could bring authenticity to these stories because I I was seeing it from the inside out, and I wasn't just an observer shooting from the outside in. And I felt like that gave me kind of a a step up to to be able to tell a lot of these stories in a way that I felt were true to the spirit of what was happening. Because I think from the outside, it's always like, oh, these people are crazy.

You know, they're adrenaline junkies when when I I don't I think the perceptions of what people think these athletes are doing is is is not actually accurate. Yeah. So I wanted to I wanted to bring those stories into a place where people could really authentically understand what the motivations are and the craft of it and the beauty of it and what makes it inspiring for me. Well, the preparation behind it. Right? There's so much preparation that goes into doing it, doing it safely.

I mean, educators have so much in in much the same way, educators have a lot of preparation they do behind the scenes before they really interact with students. And I I think that's one of the interesting aspects is watching that preparation and Yeah. And seeing that. As you you know, one of the themes this week has been lifelong learning. Right? This idea that, you know, we don't just go to school for sixteen or twenty years.

Right? We we are going back to school. We're learning throughout our life. I mean, you've kinda done the same thing throughout your career learning, you know, first timing, then photography, then videography. What's your kinda take on lifelong learning in your program? Yeah. I mean, I think it's so much of the approach I've taken to all of the different aspects of work that I do, I I would really credit to my experience as a climber because climbing actually is kind of an exercise in failure.

Like, if you're a climber, you're always trying to do something that you're not sure that you can do. Yeah. And usually well, not usually, always part of that process is failure, figuring out what went wrong, how do you improve, making those improvements, training harder, whatever it is. For expeditions, it could be like, you know, dialing in your gear. So it's better, you know, when you fail on your first attempt.

Like in Meru Yep. We got within a hundred meters of the summit and we failed and we had to come back. That that pursuit of, you know, these huge objectives in which failure is such a huge part of it, and and using failures like an opportunity to to grow and learn and to come back Yeah. Stronger, better, faster, smarter, whatever it is. That approach has been, what I've really applied to everything I've done.

And so with photography, it was the same. I blew it on so many shots early in my career, and I learned from them. And that mentality really allowed me first as a climber to understand, okay, if you fail, that's totally fine. You just have to keep learning from those until you can achieve what your objective is. And then I just applied that to to, photography.

And you have to remember that my climbing objectives got harder and bigger and more difficult, over my career. And I I also learned, like, you can really go far Yeah. If you apply this sort of, mental attitude. And so that's what I do with photography, and then that's what I did with filmmaking as well, because I knew nothing about photography, and I knew nothing about filmmaking. Yeah.

And I didn't study any of those, but I had great mentors. I I tried really hard. I failed a lot. And, you know, I think that for me, that that was a huge part of Yeah. My career.

You you said something so interesting when we were talking backstage about, the power of stories, right, and that ability to impact people's, opinions and people's right? The the documentary you did on Patagonia and, like, the single largest philanthropic effort in the history of the world that not a lot of people know about. Right? I I think that was so remarkable. I'm like, how how are they buying hundreds of thousands of acres and and donating them as national parks? They don't know about that. Right? Yeah. Well, I mean, I'll start first with with storytelling is somewhere along the line.

It was probably after my first National Geographic assignment, where we were going to a remote part of Tibet in the northwest corner of it called the Chang Ting Plateau, and we are documenting where these endangered Tibetan antelope or shiru, they were called. We were trying to find where they were their birthing grounds because they were going extinct, and highly endangered, basically because the wool from from the Shuru is the finest wool in the world, and it became hugely fashionable to sell these, they're called, like, scarves. Yeah. They're selling for, like, fifteen thousand dollars, and it was this huge thing in vogue, and all of a sudden, they were just getting slaughtered. And so we were trying to find this birthing grounds and protect it, And we did this major expedition, crossed the Chingting Plateau on foot following their migrations, and we found their their birthing grounds, and we were able to document it.

And once we were able to document it, the Chinese government actually, moved to protect that space. Yeah. And that was through storytelling. And, you know, I think storytelling is so powerful, a, because I think and probably the most power important and powerful thing about storytelling is it can it can change people's perspective Yeah. And their point of view.

And that's something that's really, really powerful. And I think as educators, you have the opportunity to do that. You you you have the power to change people's point of view. And I mean, what what's more powerful than that? You know? And, but you also get to highlight and bring to life stories or ideas that are really important that don't necessarily get the kind of platform that they deserve. And so, you know, we made a film called Free Solo that did very well, and, we had we knew we had a platform.

And so the next film, we knew we were gonna get financed, but we didn't we picked Yeah. How do you choose what what's the next story? Yeah. Well, we picked a story that we felt like was never gonna get the platform it deserved, but we had the opportunity to to to give it that platform because it was our next film. Yeah. And we knew we could get it financed, and we knew that, National Geographic would would, back it.

And so it's a little known story about Yvon Chouinard, Chris Tompkins, Doug Tompkins. Mhmm. You know, some of the greatest, environmental They basically this. You know, founded North Face, Patagonia. They the outdoor industry, like Yeah.

Clothing Yeah. Yvonne Shania founded Patagonia. Doug Tompkins founded The North Face. Those two, they were best friends and climbing partners. And Chris Tompkins was the first CEO of of, of, Patagonia.

And they started buying land in Chile and putting it together, and they, you know, told the Chilean government, when we finish with this, we're gonna build them into national parks, and they hand it over to the Chilean government. And, of course, the Chilean government was like, yeah. Right. Yeah. That's why you're buying.

And so there was a twenty five years of pushback, and they fought for twenty five years. And and they did exactly what they said they were gonna do. Chris Tompkins eventually ended up falling in love with Doug Tompkins, and they spent twenty five years building the Toms Tompkins conservation, organization, and they ended up, I think it's now over seven they they bought and protected seventeen million acres Yeah. And built In Chile and Argentina. Built sixteen national parks.

They built the infrastructure, and then, a couple years ago, handed it over to the Chilean people. And just for kind of context, like, Yellowstone National Park is the biggest national park in the United States. That's two million acres. And they protected and preserved, right now, over seventeen million acres. And it's the jewels of of Chile.

It's spectacular. The the you gotta watch it. It's amazing. But the way we the way we did it, our films are always kind of like Trojan horses. You think it's about one thing, but it's it's really about another.

And and wildlife is the name of the film, and, you know, it it was a love story. Yeah. And through this love story, you kind of learn about this whole Yeah. Journey. Because he's killed and Chris carries on Yeah.

His work, you know, their work together on our own. And and truly amazing. I love that story. How do you how do you I mean, everything the hallmark of of your, storytelling really is, you know, whether it's mountain climbing or, you know, the the, you know, or swimming the ocean, you know, like, ocean, open ocean swimming, that kind of stuff. It's that extreme aspect.

How do you find the courage to dive into the next thing? Do you just, I mean, sometimes I'm really tired in the morning. I don't wanna get up. Like, you're you're like, I'm gonna go get, you know, film a film a, story on a mountain. Right? How do you how do you find the courage to do that? I mean, it's not so much courage as much as it is feeling really compelled by a story because I'm inspired by it. And, you know, if I think it's an important story.

But sometimes I once I latch into an idea and I see the potential of what it can say, and especially now that I feel like I have a a platform, it's because you you you bleed for these films. I mean, it's a fight every step of the way. It that they're making films is is certainly harder than climbing mountains, because you you literally fighting for your films every step of the way from the concept, the development, to the financing, to going into production, to post production, and then releasing the film. And if it does well enough, you know, pushing it through the awards campaign so that more people will see it. I mean, it's literally a fight every single day, and things are falling apart all the time.

You're you're putting out fires all the time as a producer, not just as a director because we produce and direct. And and they're hard. And and and that idea of, like, suffering for your art is a very real thing. So it it has to be inspiring and and I have to feel like it's important, and that it's bigger than me. And, that's that's really it's it's less about the courage than it is about that commitment to to making it happen because you believe, hopefully, it makes the world a slightly better place.

Yeah. You mentioned Free Solo earlier and, Alex Honnold's, you know, climb with El Capitan. What was the most surprising I mean, it's fascinating film. You're and again, you get kind of a glimpse into the filming of it being so logistically difficult and so much planning going into that. What did you discover on that? What did like, it was there I guess, what was most surprising about that effort? I mean, every film, if you wanna talk about lifelong learning, I mean, every film project for me is I learn so much.

And it's like, then I take what I learn and I leverage it and into my next project. And so part of another part of the reason I continue to make films is because I wanna keep learning, and I wanna take what I learned and apply it and see how far I can take it. You know, these these new ideas that I've gained or this new knowledge or information. So, you know, I think in free solo, I mean, I had to learn a lot about compartmentalizing a lot of different things. Yeah.

It it was the biggest budget film. I had gotten up to that point. There was a lot of pressure, from the studios, and there's my personal pressure. There was a pressure of my team's safety, Alex's safety, and I really had to kind of prioritize how I was going to think about it before I went into making the film. And, you know, this is kind of new territory for me, but I I I thought deeply about it and I I made a decision before we even started production.

And I said, okay. Alex's safety and Alex's dream is always gonna be the priority, and we are gonna support him to achieve that dream. And the filmmaking was always gonna be secondary. Mhmm. And I told my team that, and, you know, that was the mentality that we went in it with, that it wasn't about the film, it was about Alex, and it was about his experience.

And we wanted to make sure that that was always elevated at the forefront of our minds before we went to shoot. And I was hoping that was the right mentality to go into it, and it turned out it was. So it was a real confirmation about how you set your intention when you go into a film, how important it is to set your intentions and be clear what those intentions are and make sure that everybody on the team understood what those intentions were and what the expectations were. And having that singular focus allowed us all to achieve, the goals that we had for the project. Last year, at this conference, we had, Arina Huffington and Deepak Chopra, actually focus on self care.

Right? The last four years have been an incredibly stressful time to be an educator. What what can you recommend to to these three thousand of our friends around self care and and, you know, that that fight that they do every day? Everybody faces some version of that. I mean, it's so personal. Right? Yeah. How people take care of themselves.

I mean, I just speaking for myself, there are things that I love deeply and that I'm passionate about and, you know, that when I wake up in the morning, I'm really excited to do that really feed me. And and for me it's still climbing and being in the mountains and being someone that's thinking always about my team and others, sometimes it feels selfish that I'm going back out there and climbing and taking that time to do that. But I'm at the point in my life now where I recognize how important that is because And I think one of the reasons I love the climbing, and it can be whatever pursuit it is that you are passionate about, is that climbing for me, I always found the best version of myself. And it was always like a reminder of that best version of myself. And if I don't protect that, you know, the rest kinda falls apart.

Yeah. And so maybe I'm just justifying my selfish need for going climbing. My my wife would be so rolling her eyes right now. But, you know, I just I I I really believe that it's it's so important to protect that stuff because I think it really benefits everybody around you. Yeah.

And and I think when you take that perspective, which was for a long time hard for me to to to take take in, you know, I think that it's it's very justified and it's really important. Yeah. Because it is it is gonna benefit the people around you when you when you take care of yourself. Because if you if you only care about other people, you can still do that to protect to protect that space because it it will benefit everybody around you. It'll benefit your work.

It'll benefit, you know, your, kind of mental health. It's it's you you really have to do that. And your family, I think it's important. Yeah. You know, we talked about National Geographic earlier and the fact that, you know, many of us had the the show full of National Geographic magazines growing up.

Well, that kinda dates us, but yes. It does. Well, yeah. Yes. And, you know, amazing views like this, a lot of us were exposed to those via National Geographic, the photography, you know, the, even the the specials, the TV specials that we're on.

How are they as a partner? What has that been like? Because I do think that's so amazing. Yeah. I I National Geographic has probably been the most important partnership in my career, not just because they're such a huge and incredible platform and the people who've supported me there starting as a young photographer, all the way through becoming, you know, a a we have a first look deal with National Geographic meeting. All of our original nonfiction ideas go to them first, and they've been hugely supportive. But it was the the the organization itself has been hugely important to me, but it's the people there.

Yeah. You know, like my first photo editor that kind of really mentored me. The the first editor in chief, Chris Johns, who gave me a pat on the back that gave me the confidence to really continue to push, myself as a photographer. But all of the photographers there, the photographers there are so so incredible, passionate, journalists. And we we just came out with a series that's on Disney Plus right now called photographer.

And it was a series that I had dreamt about making for ten years where you get to really meet the photographers and understand final product. But when you really hear what the intention is behind their work, it it totally hear what the intention is behind their work, it it totally changes how you look at the images and how you experience the images and and the power of the images because these people are so committed to ideas and whether that's science or social justice or conflict or, you know, just it it it really brings home kind of, the importance of of photography. I love that. Is it is it a supportive community? Is it one of those, you know is there is there a level of competition amongst There's always a level of competition, but, you know, every year, National Geographic has a get together where they bring all the photographers together for the photographer summit. And it is incredible.

People are flying in from covering conflict in Libya or Afghanistan, and there are deep sea diver photographers who are trying to save the oceans, and there are photographers who are covering, you know, well, during COVID, like, the impacts of COVID in in rural Midwest or just it it they all understand that the power of storytelling and photography and how it can change a person's point of view, and they're so committed to it. It's hugely inspiring. It's my favorite kind of gathering of the year, and and there's some pretty wild characters as you can imagine. Not unlike this group of people. Yeah.

You know? Yeah. So I always like to ask if if, you know you talked a little bit about how there was no real path, no intentional path necessarily to where you you got. But if you could go back in time and and talk to your eighteen year old self and and give your eighteen year old self advice, what would it be? Well, I I well, I probably would say do exactly what you're doing because because I was so fraught with doubt and and guilt. You know? Asian guilt. I was just like and and it was really hard at that time.

And I think, you know, at this point in my life, I look back at the decisions that I made and that I committed to that were totally based on heart and instinct. And I thought and I think, gosh, you know, I made I did make some good decisions because even yesterday, I was up in the Sierras climbing this big root, on this thing called the Incredible Hulk. It's such an awesome name for a mountain climb. And I came out of there just thinking, this is still so special. So many decades later, it is still something that gives my life so much meaning and purpose.

And, and I appreciate that about my eighteen year old self that I I made those decisions. But I think as a practical thing, I would probably tell myself, don't don't be afraid to fail. Yeah. Like, you you should you should go for it and, you know, and don't don't be afraid. It's funny.

Felice from Champlain College, who's on a panel with me this morning, said much the same. She was talking about applying AI in the classroom and and how to try that. And she she was she was talking about how happy she was that she had been given the freedom to fail, right, and to try again. And that can be hard in in your in your line of work where, you know, life life and death. Right? Yeah.

I mean, we we a lot of my job is risk assessment and managing risk and, mitigating risks. And, you know, I say that to, when I say don't be afraid to fail, I'm I'm applying, like, certain, you know, like Controlled failure maybe. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Calculated risks. You know, so much of when we go on expeditions, we look at everything from between best case scenario and worst case scenario. We spend most of our time thinking about worst case scenario. And so you need to, you know, have an understanding of what worst case scenario, understand the the stakes so that you understand what kind of risks you're allowed to make in those situations. So, you know, failure, within, you know, the scope of of the appropriate amount of risk that you can take in a particular situation.

So what's I mean, maybe you can't tell us. What's next? What what what are your you know, what's your next focus? Yes. There's there are a few things that are under NDA that I can't tell you about, of course. You know, we're finishing four feature documentary films right now. Last year, we the last couple years, we made our first narrative feature, called NIAID with, starring Annette Benning and Jodie Foster.

Fascinating story. So that was our first foray into narrative features. We have a quite a few narrative features on on the docket. And, actually, it was just announced yesterday. We have been attached to Mike Crichton and James Patterson's most recent book called Eruption Yeah.

That's that came out, June in June. We've been attached as directors and it just auctioned and sold to Sony. So, hopefully, we'll be making You need to fight another one of those fights to to get it to reality. Right? Yeah. A a big a a kind of a bigger box office movie, which is kind of like another realm to explore, try to make a a bigger narrative feature.

Yeah. That's amazing. How how much different are those narrative features than than the documentaries that you've shown in the past? In some ways, they're very similar. It's still storytelling. It's it's still, our instinct as as filmmakers were very applicable, but they're different in other ways.

They're much, much bigger budget, many magnitudes bigger budget. There's different pressures because of that from studios. Yeah. And you're working with actors, which in some ways I was very comfortable doing. At first, I was very concerned about the fact that I hadn't worked with actors, but, my years of working with top top end athletes Yeah.

They're very similar in ways that I won't talk about, but also in ways that, my job as a director is really to create the space for someone like Jodie Foster to do what she does so well. Yeah. You're not gonna tell Jodie Foster how to act just like I'm not gonna tell Alex Honnold how to climb. But I created the space for them to do what they do best and that they they feel like they're very supported in in being able to bring their greatest potential to, whatever they're doing. Awesome.

This has been amazing, and we are out of time. But, Jimmy, thank you so much for joining us. Hopefully, everybody enjoyed the Thank you so much. What'd you think? That's awesome. Before we officially end, if you there's just a few things.

Anybody interested in where we're going next year? Yeah. Alright. It's going to be some place that's not quite as hot, which should could be any place, except for Death Valley. But, let's go ahead and take a look. Any guesses? Spokane, Washington.

It's beautiful. There's a lot of water. There's a lot of space, and, we can't wait to see you all there next year. So, we've had fun connecting with you this week. On your way, please leave your, you know, your click badges.

There's a place that you can drop those off, and, you know, once again, we'd really like to, thank our sponsors for all the all the making this all possible. They are amazing partners. Let's give them a hand. You know, it is a phenomenal effort that goes into putting something like this together for three thousand people. And so, let's also give a hand to all those employees, our events, and our creative teams that put so many hours into making this a fantastic event.

And, to finally close, you are we're gonna watch me do this. You are all now members of the You got it. I got it. Right? Ecological Exploration Society. We'll see you all next year. Thank you, everybody.