The Équipe Solitaire Podcast

This podcast originally aired in October 2022 but recent texts with Ian about music and dogs and life reminded me of how good this is and that it merits re-release. Since the original broadcast Ian, who is an underwater cinematographer, has worked on "Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny", "Shogun", "Wednesday" (a Tim Burton offering) and "Last Breath", which premiers in February 2025. Ian and I have spent a good amount of time working on a documentary together and perhaps in the next chapter, the one titled "Whatever Comes Next", we might see if a logical conclusion exists and can push it to the finish line.

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Ian Seabrook returns to the podcast after a three-year hiatus. Ian is an award winning Underwater Director of Photography in the motion picture and television industry who first appeared on Episode 55. At that time he was in Utah to document the production and release of REFUGE, the first large book produced by NonProphet. This year Ian's return coincided with the printing of POISON so we strong-armed him into making a short film about that.

Ian's underwater credits include “Batman v Superman”, “Deadpool 2” and “Jungle Cruise”, five episodes of the TV series, "See", and he was also the second unit cinematographer for Zack Snyder's "Army Of The Dead". More recently his work on "The Rescue" earned several cinematography awards, which we discuss intensively in this current episode.

We start this talk with an in-depth review of the underwater shots in "Man of Steel", and simple behind-the-scenes things like how to keep personnel safe in the tank while the SFX crew sets the water on fire. Ian also discusses about the necessity of appropriate clothing, nutrition and fitness for long shooting days in water that is constantly extracting heat from one's body. 

The conversation shifts towards the current state of filmmaking and how it feels like cinema is a disposable medium these days (very different than in the 70s) and the sheer volume of output is shocking ... quantity vs quality diluted by frequency. We do a drive-by on the unreality of Reality TV and the difference between true documentary film and docu-drama or docu-fiction projects that are "dramatized" to "improve" the story. In an unusual twist, Michael brings up some of the positive aspects of new and social media but don't blink or you'll miss them.

In review, Ian's descriptions of shooting underwater sequences for "The Rescue" are riveting, and easily worth the price of a listen.

Ian's website:

https://www.dorsalfin.net/

This is a reboot of Episode 20, recorded in 2018 with my dear friend, Brian Enos. He published a new book on July 17th, 2024 so I figured it would be a nice means of sharing some of the history of the NonProphet podcast (formerly known as The Dissect Podcast) and helping listeners understand why they might very well be interested in the new book titled, "Practical Living". You may learn a bit more about the book by surfing to the Journal section of the NonProphet site.

In the first mobile recording of the Dissect podcast, Mark sits down with friend and mentor, Brian Enos, to talk about shooting, Zen, temperament, road tripping, psychedelics and thinking about how to think. Brian is the author of “Practical Shooting — Beyond Fundamentals”. It is considered one of the best books on the subject, and certainly the deepest. During his career, he won multiple Area and National titles and despite this success—or maybe because of it—one day he quit cold turkey, which also comes up during the conversation.

When I signed a copy of Extreme Alpinism for Pete in 1999 I wrote, "The moment of terror is the beginning of life. Be scared." I signed the book to a reputation—to hearsay—instead of signing it to the actual man. Years later, having become friends, he reminded me of the inscription. The phrase was my response to hearing a story of him bolting routes in Hyalite Canyon, sacrilege to me at the time; reducing risk to pursue purely technical difficulty and permanently altering the resource by chasing that grail. We had a good laugh 25 years after the fact ... we are both still alive to do so.

In the moment of our early encounters I couldn't see the similarities between us. I focused on the hot-button issue in my own philosophical pursuits so I missed what could have been an influential and powerful relationship.

What I couldn't see then was that Pete strove to connect with nature through adventure, exposing himself to great risk in exchange for the promise of great reward. That individual reward, when communicated and shared, becomes inspiration, becomes progression ... reinforcing the interconnectedness of the community, the climbers seeing and seeking and pushing limits out on the edge.

Now that we are on the backside of the arc, the offramp so to speak, and still alive to be wondering, "What now? What next?" we sat down for a conversation.

We spoke about the influence of music on climbing as an activity and attitude in that era, when there was a soundtrack to everything. The punk rock cry was "no future" and that might seem claustrophobic or oppressive but our interpretation of it was that, "If I have no future then I am utterly free to act in the present, to do what I want to do right now because I'm going to die anyway." But there was no map, no guideposts; we had to manufacture our own rites of passage into adulthood because the rites that were culturally common before no longer existed. Without a map, with only casual insight from brief exposure to mentors, we followed what we could, imitated what seemed appropriate, and struck out into a wild world where those who tried the hardest seems to live the shortest lives but we went there anyway. And somewhere out there we learned that fear is not a barrier, it's just good information.

Mark sits down with Raymond Ansotegui to learn about sheep, cows, Basque culture and bullfighting (and there's not a red cape in sight). We discuss the philosophical side of moving energy and keeping the flow, the somatotypes and psychological make-up required by the job. These are farm boys, ranch kids, good athletes who understand the movement of the animal and also have a particular temperament; maybe not the guy being cheered but the guy being thanked for the protecting the guy being cheered. Raymond's experience as a bullfighter gives him a unique opportunity to dispel misconceptions about rodeo, and bull riding, in particular. There isn’t any actual “fighting” in western rodeo bullfighting, rather it is a dance of grit and grace involving extreme focus, humility and respect for the animals and the athletes.

Raymond describes some lessons from the arena — commit, slow down, get closer than you want to, and well, "it turns out that those same lessons applied to me helping my father live with Alzheimer's for the seven years before it took him."

Later, when we were speaking about storytelling (it's how we met), and he said, "If we can find sameness then we can explore difference because we can always find our way back," which is a beautiful and universal lesson. We also dive into the concept of facilitation and conflict resolution, mediation and collaboration, and eventually the notion of a bullfighter not actually fighting the bull but rather steering and guiding its attention, another concept that has near-universal application. 

Raymond was born and raised in Livingston, Montana, earned his undergraduate degree from Montana State University where his father was a professor of animal science for thirty years. After attending higher education at Arizona State University (Masters degree in land reclamation, and plant and soil science) and working at the Nevada Test Site, he returned to Montana.

"We learn to believe in ourselves, commit to our goals and when we get knocked down, to get back up again and again."

Michael and Kegan sit down to talk about physiology and the gulf that language builds between knowing and understanding. They go deep into new thoughts on strength training and how much of what we have done might of worked but is also wrong, “all models are wrong, some are useful.” They bring up relevant topics such as the disconnect between performing exercises versus establishing a training stimulus. They ask questions about the common cultural assumption that “bad” technique causes injury. They meet at an understanding that the body’s posture is an early pull to the grave because of how it affects a fundamental process like subconscious breathing can lead to an inability to control your state.

The idea must be poisoned before the activity itself can become toxic. It is precisely the misunderstanding of what the term "fitness" means that leads many away from the true, original concept and towards the quick fix, the momentary, and ultimately, the detrimental. Michael and Kegan kick off by discussing the common practice of sacrificing health for wealth, and later trying to use the wealth to unfuck what was done to earn it. The youthful notion of invincibility makes all manner of physical damage acceptable if the result is wealth or notoriety but/and "athletic longevity" doesn't make sense to someone who can't yet define actual longevity for themselves. Once physical condition or performance begins to decline (through overuse, injury or simple aging) repeating what was done a decade or more prior can be very seductive but the training that got one to a peak won't reproduce that peak after one is moving down the back-slope of that peak; none of us are 20 years old any more. At some point it is important to know and understand when to quit ... without becoming a quitter.

Michael admits, "when I was younger I had to prove I wasn't lazy but as I get older I want to prove I'm not stupid. I know I don't avoid hard things, I've proven it to myself, which means it's time to learn how to take care of myself." He and Kegan observe that childhood/adolescent programming affects behavior decades later, and that maintaining a relationship with physical activity can stall or counter age-related cognitive decline; vigor in the body directly supports vitality in the mind. Understanding the true and real "how" of fitness has become more important in this era where everything has a hack or shortcut, and physical appearance often belies serious, underlying health issues.

Back in 2018 Nate Pack, who at the time was the "Undisputed King of The Airdyne" joined us for a conversation (Ep. 53) and this is the Intro we wrote for that episode:

"The guys speak with Nate Pack about capacity and tolerance, about the engine and its gas tank, and get down in the weeds about numbers, which is no surprise as Nate holds a PhD in bio-engineering and is a self-described “smart guy”. He also has a high degree of mastery in extensive effort. During the conversation they divulge the secret workout everyone has been asking for, and the dietary pairings used to amplify its effect. Finally—since this is an exercise and fitness podcast—they analyze the numbers in order to coronate the undisputed king of the Airdyne, and discuss how to plot the linear progression curves of power and time to expose truth."

Those numbers, achieved on the AD4 fan bike, which was the standard at the time, are:

10 minutes = 412 calories

20 minutes = 705 calories

30 minutes = 1002 calories

60 minutes = 1935 calories

Nate returns to the podcast to discuss the many years of growth and change that has occurred since. We started by discussing how easily we can trick ourselves into believing that more and harder effort can overcome other poor choices, generally those of the dietary kind but when that doesn't work it's time for wholesale change. After having realized that he had gained more weight than he could tolerate or overcome with power, and along the way lost much of his aerobic fitness, Nate made a change.

"Sometimes the mirror reflects the image we want to see and not the truth."

He started training base (intensity) only for 15-18 hours a week, some on bike but also a lot of walking. He dropped 40 pounds in 15 weeks, 3-4 pounds per week on average, and then consciously slowed it down, taking advantage of the positive feedback but also realizing he needed to turn conscious behavior into a habit, which is more or less automatic. He took another ten pounds off over eight weeks, and slowed the weight loss down even more, while not losing focus. By the time the Logan-to-Jackson (LOTOJA) bike race was held in early-September of 2023 he had lost sixty+ pounds and rebuilt his long endurance and long threshold fitness back.

This was the first time on our podcast when the following phrase was spoken, "without going into the biochemistry of PGC-1 Alpha ...", which relates to mitochondrial biogenisis and "promotes the remodeling of muscle tissue to a fiber-type composition that is metabolically more oxidative and less glycolytic in nature, and it participates in the regulation of both carbohydrate and lipid metabolism."

It's a fitness podcast and sometimes complex details are discussed so a detailed description of training intensity ensues, referencing mitochondrial biogenesis, work/rest ratios for intervals, effort that produces 2.5 mmol/l lactate but would produce 5 if sustained but it isn't, etc. Yes, down in the weeds a bit but we didn't stay there, shifting instead to the concept of sustainability and the necessity of a big volume of consistency; measuring progress in years, not merely weeks or months.

Once the topic of physical training is exhausted we moved on to the psychological, to freeing himself of 'expectations of outcome' while never questioning the expectation of the effort he is willing to make ... and 'will I give all that I am willing to give? Not able but willing ...' What are we willing to give to achieve our objectives, and what do we hold in reserve to apply to other activities or relationships?

We hit the offramp with an exchange about learning to be kind to oneself in the midst of the unfairness of the universe, "This is the lesson I was searching for: not more watts but more growth."

It's a long and powerful conversation, and sometimes quite in a niche—not every moment will be for every listener—but the high points are universally applicable, and understandable to anyone who is paying attention to the long journey called life we are all taking.

Nahko is a singer/songwriter — a musician — who truly journeys between genres and manages to reinvent his style with each successive expression. He sits down with Michael and returning guest, Adam St. Simons in the middle of their North American tour to discuss the creative process, his humble beginnings of farm work, and how great trials are often opportunities to make great music. Nahko can be found here and his tour dates here.

Mark and Michael sit down for a an old school rant that begins with Michael asking the very serious question, "Did government, Illuminati, secret society light up Burning Man with ebola so that they could off all of the people who might be able to make psychedelics legal?"

Clearly, this is a very serious conversation, wherein we discuss camping, capitalism, bartering and freedom (as it relates to the presence and function of the tent city that pops up in front of the NonProphet Event Center with some regularity), accepting or abdicating responsibility, and the influence of drugs on self-appreciation and value. Michael describes the remarkable difference between 'associative' vs. disassociative behavior and that perhaps, in order to steer oneself towards better life experiences, towards a 'higher plane' so to speak, one must actively associate with reality instead of evading it, and open oneself to feeling and sensing and being aware, and that may begin with a basic premise of making different decisions regarding the food one consumes. Change on the most fundamental, dare I ay mundane, level can influence an entire cascade of different outcomes.

In the moment of fulfillment, after a good and healthy meal that doesn't make you feel like shit, shared with a loved one, people feel satisfied, but society — as it is set up here — can't handle folks who are satisfied because they aren't seeking and they're not consuming and they're not indulging ... they are appreciating where they are, in the moment. That's a good thing for the species but not necessarily for the frenzied socio-economic system we find ourselves within ... because whosoever is satisfied won't fall for the advertising.

And then we turned the focus to business and marketing and Michael helped me realize that continual growth of cells in the body is cancer but continual growth in business is expected and if it doesn't happen the business is considered a failure. Or at minimum unsuccessful.

So how do businesses keep growing, keep increasing market share and brand awareness? Which leads to us addressing social engineering as a mechanism to turn profit on the back of predictable human behavior ... ugh, the manipulation is at an all time high while the resources, the open-to-buy of the potential customers, is rapidly declining. That said, money changes everything, and those who have it don't have to spend time or energy getting what they believe they want; they can change the outcome without actually changing their behavior. And that is very seductive ... but also a dead end.

Finally, when it comes to marketing for NonProphet, we agree that we should be careful about putting the business name and logo on such cheap shit as might quickly end up in a landfill ... is that how we want to be remembered in the present and in the future? Yeah, picking through useless NonProphet tchotchkes at the dump ... that sounds good. So go ahead, acquire stuff, let it weigh you down, because carrying weight is good training, and this podcast is about fitness.

This was originally recorded in 2019 and appeared as Episode 67, when this was sill The Dissect Podcast. Currently we are deep in print, digital, and construction projects that prevent us recording with the frequency we once insisted upon. However, as we went through the archives we discovered some real gems of conversations that merit revisiting.

Hoby Darling made us feel like under-achievers once we learned his background. His law degree is from Northwestern, his graduate degrees in business from UC Berkeley and Columbia, and he worked for Volcom and Nike before becoming CEO of Skullcandy, then executive director of Jaybird/Logitech. He has raced Ironman events, competed in CrossFit, and coached a number of top performing athletes. This impressive resumé pales beside his mission, as a founding member of the Liminal Collective, "to advance the limitless potential of humans, preparing and supporting those who take pioneering steps in extreme, unexplored, and unknown spaces." During the podcast we spoke about the Logitech Cognitive Performer Summit, where in 2019, Mark joined a panel to discuss the influence of the natural environment on creative output.

The initial impetus of that first summit came from asking, "What does the science of performance look like? And how do you fill a room with people who think alternatively about these theories to discuss and advance ideas derived from but not yet proven by science?" Many scientific positions are old; the experiments were done years ago, and it takes time to peer-review, publish, and then apply the conclusions in the real world to demonstrate actual utility. Besides, "the science" often shuts down (public or common) inquiry by declaring definitive conclusions … which places a box around an idea thus defines the boundaries of future exploration.

Traditionally, when it comes to scientific or casual inquiry, attention has focused on physical performance (in sport) because it is visible, but at the highest levels the bodies and capabilities are similar so why are some athletes or performers great? This drives some to examine the influence of cognitive ability on physical performance and oddly enough, as test and analytical capabilities have improved, we've seen that the top performers in E-Sports are making the fastest decisions on the planet under highest cognitive load. This psychological performance used to be invisible — it’s only in the last years that we could begin to observe it, and analyze it. If we agree that, "desire is the highest octane fuel that there is," the next question must be, "How do we quantify or measure or reproduce the desire that affects high performance in any arena?"

This path of inquiry requires new eyes, new ideas, a conceptual openness disassociated from from the steps and positions previously taken or used. Michael and Hoby used a simple analogy in the conversation regarding the shift away from plastic bottles to contain and transport water towards aluminum cans, which are far more reusable and recyclable ... that's all well and good but also self-limiting. What’s the moonshot here? Instead of going from 1 to 1.1 we should be going from the plastic bottle to not needing a container or vessel at all … let’s return to 0 and discover a new and different solution.

We must be more creative when seeking modern solutions to age-old understanding and the problems those conclusions caused; when you no longer have a hammer you must find a different way to drive the nail … or … you have to become the nail. Our physical experiences have led us to examine the influence of psychological ‘fitness’ on performance, learning, and exploration but it's clear that understanding the utility of fitness in the context of such inquiry is lacking.

We use the process of developing fitness to teach people how to change behavior … if they learn to control a single aspect of their condition it opens them to the idea that there are other parts of life and behavior one might consciously influence or change.

"I don’t know how to be the person that I want to be so I sought a guide … I looked for a situation within which there was no judgement about my current condition yet much opportunity to change that condition existed.”

Deeper into the conversation we addressed how poorly we as human beings are able to select the right person for a particular task or position; when it comes to choosing quarterbacks, CEOs at start-ups, or the right individual to augment an existing team, "you’re better off flipping a coin."

Concepts like emotional self-regulation, compassion for others, self-efficacy, the willingness and desire to be curious, resilience and grit do not present during interviews or result from psychometric test … so how do we make better selections? If we can eventually understand that then the outcomes will be more predictable, and better for our species as well as the spinning orb we inhabit.

Dig in, this is a good one.

https://www.liminalcollective.co/who-we-are