Our Quest

‘‘Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—

I took the one less traveled by,

And that has made all the difference.’

--Robert Frost 

My lovely, incredible wife, Victoria and I have been thinking and dreaming about a virtual, scalable, education based business for a few years.  I knew we could provide valuable services and content in the virtual world, and I knew it was the only way to get our message in front of a larger audience.  We are both born to teach and we have always had to keep a waiting list for clients, and I am very grateful for that.  But the big elusive goal, the holy grail, was to stop trading time for money.  When I realized we could have a greater impact with less, burn out inducing, 1-1 client hours it was a major AHA moment.  However,  I kept using the excuse that I was too spread out, had too many ideas, too many in-person, active businesses to run, too many appointments every week, our 3 kids needed any extra time and attention we had; and besides, we had too many bills to pivot.  Even if I scaled the idea down to a side hustle, I wasn’t sure there was time for that either.  Not to mention, I didn’t know anything about content production, digital marketing, or the online space!  I was losing the sense of security that I could pull this off at all actually.  My AHA idea was turning into a big, flat: uh-oh!

‘The base of security is safety.  The base of growth is exploration.”  S.B. Kaufman

It’s not like we are lacking in subjects to teach.  We are both dedicated to our crafts and have put in decades of deep education, including our respective college degrees.  But more authentically, and more rarely, we are both devoted to time-tested authentic lineage based learning systems in our respective disciplines.   We are not talking about idle study either, we have put in 10’s of thousands of hours of personal practice, running businesses, and serving clients, each.  We worked HARD to get good, and neither of us ever stops because real learning never stops, we crave the deep waters of knowledge and art.  I think one of the things that drew Victoria and I together is our admiration for each other's dedication to learning, and a love of the process of mastering skills.  That old school lineage based learning method referenced earlier, that's the path that doesn’t have shortcuts.  

“Always two there are.  No more, no less.  A master and an apprentice.” - Yoda.  

Our eclectic and varied skill sets, collectively, are based around the many facets of horsemanship, teaching kids growth mindset, exercise and massage therapy, Classical Indian Music, and Meditation.  We have pursued these topics obsessively and relentlessly, some since we were kids.  Regardless of our expertise, back in the real, day to day world, considering the path of rebranding and going virtual, the overwhelm and self-doubt kept looping like a scratched record.  No one cares what you know if you can’t get your message out.  I just kept saying to myself, I had too many things pulling me in opposite directions to really go there.  It’s the treadmill to nowhere, I think a lot of us feel like we are constantly on.  

My treadmill of life was pretty comfy, we had an awesome place, got to go on trips, our businesses were rocking, we had freedom and control to make decisions, we worked hard our whole life to get things set up like this for ourselves and our kids.  To my surprise, and even dismay, questions kept popping into my head:  “where was it going?”,  “what's it all for?”,  “what's the deep truth and meaning behind each day?”  Perhaps more importantly and impossible to ignore, was this gnawing sense that there is more to my story to be found than just being cozy, or ‘rocking it’, by society's mores and norms.  It felt like I was missing something.  I’m talking about big picture stuff here. These questions kept coming to me, whispering and haunting me.   

“Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?” - Mary Oliver  

It was really through the love, acceptance, and support of my wife that I was able to recognize those stories and scripts stopping me from creating our virtual education vision, were all a big lie, just varieties of excuses, forming a powerful resistance to the truth of a higher calling; they were coming from feelings that lived in the shadows of fear, shame, rejection, guilt, inadequacy, and a loss of spiritual being-ness, inside.  Outside, our pervasive consumeristic, go-go-go-society structure saturates everything, its a strong current and we all just sort of go with it…..and it all but shames those for eschewing the traditional path of success.  Together, we just decided it’s time to move away from all of those self limiting beliefs.  We believe we have something special to bring to the world, something life changing, and our hearts are called to serve.  We found energy and peace through developing a mission based mindset.  Our kids were entering teenagerdom at this time, I wanted them to see us do something outside the narrow boxes of the normal, I wanted to show them that bold action and forward momentum towards your truth is the way forward, and real impact can be found there.  We said, “what if we focused on what we want and not fear what we don’t want?  Let's figure out how we can best serve others using our unique skills and experiences.  Let’s dig deep into the WHY of it all, and not be afraid to go against the grain.  Let’s change our paradigm 180 degrees.”  After all, what’s the purpose of this ‘wild and precious life’, after all?

Well, we did that, we took massive, uncomfortable action.  We gave up everything, our overpriced house, my office, and our Horse School’s commercial facility.  We began to homeschool the kids and we walked away from our busy spread-out hustle and bustle lifestyle; we moved to a remote off grid canyon…. I”m talking about no other house or road in sight, no running water, barely a road in, no electricity, and no septic system; rattlesnakes, coyotes, and extreme weather events….yeah we went there!  We moved ourselves, our 3 teenagers, our 4 horses, two ponies, mini-donkey, and 3 dogs down to this wild rugged wilderness; there was no going back, and we leaned into the discomfort and dug deep within.  At that stage, we had no choice.  

“If you want to take the island, burn the boats” --Julius Caesar  

The road that eventually led us here really started when I asked my wife:  “What if we really got serious, let a LOT of things go, and just focus on doing our greater life's quest together?  Build a foundation together on that ground, in love, business, home, family, all of it; with a single minded focus on that, putting us first, less running around like chickens, less confusion and fear, less ‘putting on’, honestly.  And from that foundation, build our mission, serve humanity, share our gifts and talents, and see our truest dreams come true one brick at a time.”  I said to her, “I’m ready, I’m tired of suffering and feeling lost and confused. I believe in you, I believe in us.  Rather than feeling powerless to change, let's be empowered.  Let's be dedicated to being open and loving.  This is the path I see and honestly it haunts me, it keeps me up at night because I am not walking it, I am failing my own hero’s journey.  I'd rather embrace the responsibility of being a light for everyone around me and a source of inspiration and connection than just going along in my various roles haphazardly, doing my best, but not embracing my destiny.  I want a Mamba Mentality, I want to live an extraordinary life!” 

‘A lot of leaders fail because they don’t have the bravery to touch that nerve or strike that chord.’ -Kobe Bryant 

Look, I live in the real world, I’m not totally insane, I recognized this AHA moment is something that can feel really high one second and next thing you know, the reality of life hits like a ton of bricks….. Financially, NONE of this really makes sense.  But the road we were going down before, didn’t really make sense either, in other ways.  It’s all perspective, it’s all about priorities.  ‘What will you do with this one wild and precious life?’  Is life all about being secure and comfortable?  NO!  Not if you want to grow.  That’s the thing!  

“Train yourself to let go of everything you fear to lose.” - Yoda

I told Victoria, “I’ll have fears and weaknesses if we choose this path, those are there, and they are all based on insecurity,  and maybe so will you sometimes, but we can be stronger together.”  Things can get hard with kids, family pressures, bills, expectations of society, judgments from others; but what if we could just create the world we want around us, create situations where everyone thrives and connects and the air literally vibrates with authentic power and joy?”  THAT'S the Way of the Herd, what the horses teach our kids and students, we KNOW this is true, we’ve seen it, we believe in it, we preach it, it is a natural law.

“You must be the change you wish to see in the world” - Gandhi

I went on as she listened, “What if we created a virtual, international, community, to share the path of horse wisdom, and became thought leaders in this way?  We are already doing just that in our horse school, we are already leaders, topmost experts in our various fields, from the horse barns, to my wellness practice, in my music and artistic community; and what always lights us up the most ? -  when we are connecting, and serving, and being in our full awesomeness!” I said to her “I think we can really do this in life and feel amazing and fulfilled.... The odds are definitely stacked against us.  Even if we crash and burn, even if everyone laughs at us and thinks we are stupid and ridiculous, I think we need to try...let's go for it!”  

“A life spent making mistakes is not only more honorable, but more useful than a life spent doing nothing.” - George Berhard Shaw

And here is one of the many reasons I love my wife so much.  She really is a leader and she really is fearless; I have learned so much from her example,  and you know what….. she thought about it, most people would have thought I was insane, they would have wondered if I was on drugs!  Are you high, man?!  It’s true and I get why most people would think that.  I wasn’t, on drugs, by the way.  But, I really wasn’t sure how she’d react.  She looked at me deeply, her rich brown eyes unflinching, thinking, feeling…..then her eyes twinkled, and she said, (it didn’t even take her that long), “yeah, let's do it!!!” 

“Do or do not, there is no try.” - Yoda

The two divergent paths in the woods that Robert Frost so eloquently spoke of, speak to my personal mythology.  There have always been only two roads:  Love, and Fear.  Everything, and I mean literally everything, can be distilled down to that choice.  This isn't only true for life’s big decisions, it is true, literally, in each moment: Love or Fear.  The quest is the choice, the hero's journey is facing that choice, and sticking with it.  In that moment, for us, we chose love; the herd was calling, and we listened.   

"If you do follow your bliss you put yourself on a kind of track that has been there all the while, waiting for you, and the life that you ought to be living is the one you are living….’--Joseph Campbell

So our big life change wasn’t a Covid pivot at all, our discussion, indeed, awakening, was about a year prior to that, the original course we set was quite different!  Without the pandemic’s repercussions, I never would have thought about moving into teepees in the canyon.  Pre-covid, I was inspired and felt radical, but not that radical!   The growth I sought, the path I asked for, the road I am now traveling, has been a LOT harder than I imagined it.  It hasn’t been all unicorns and rainbows.  Frodo did have to scale Mt. Doom in Morder to destroy the Ring and complete his quest.  The suffering and trials is where the marrow of the story comes from after all.  Sometimes, I really wish it was all unicorns and rainbows…..  However, that feeling comes from a confused place, it’s like debating if the glass is half full or half empty, all the while a pitcher full of water is next to the glass.  Focus on the pitcher.  

My Horse Club isn’t a small idea, a way to get some horse fact PDFs online, or a quick course on tack and horse anatomy. It’s not a side hustle.  It’s a humongous idea, it’s an integral part of our quest for truth, I hope it eventually inspires a movement; either way, it's our path and I’m grateful to be traveling it, my family at my side, it's the path less taken, and it is filled with Love.  

‘....I say, follow your bliss and don't be afraid, and doors will open where you didn't know they were going to be.  If you follow your bliss, doors will open for you that wouldn't have opened for anyone else.”  --Joseph Campbell

Thank you for reading, and May the Horse Be With You.  

- Joshua Williams