Dom Francks joins the show to share the benefits of developing regenerative leadership skills. We discuss the importance of immersion in nature, the role of guides in wilderness experiences, and how to live a nomadic lifestyle that connects with nature. He also offered listeners of this podcast $500 his new regenerative leadership course VIVIFY, which you can learn more about at domfrancks.com/vivify
Dom Francks joins the show to share the benefits of developing regenerative leadership skills. We discuss the importance of immersion in nature, the role of guides in wilderness experiences, and how to live a nomadic lifestyle that connects with nature. He also offered listeners of this podcast $500 his new regenerative leadership course VIVIFY, which you can learn more about at domfrancks.com/vivify
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[00:00:00] Jackson Steger: Hey there, this is Jackson Steger, and you're listening to Campfire, a podcast where we interview leaders imagining new ways of living. Our guests are building new cities and other ways to connect creators, technologists, nomads, remote workers, and more. Today's guest is Dom Franks. Dom is a wilderness guide and a leadership coach.
[00:00:19] He's the founder and lead guide of the Vivify Regenerative Leadership Program, a four month transformative journey for adventurous professionals and leaders who are ready to discover a deeper way of being. Most of the episode is about Vivify and sort of why something like this is important and necessary.
[00:00:36] Blending leadership coaching with a unique off trail wilderness backpacking expedition, Vivify really supports its members in stepping into vibrant aliveness and service. I did a similar program in college. It was very transformative for me and so it was really exciting for me to talk with Dom about this.
[00:00:54] Dom's great. He's led wilderness immersions in remote locations, including Patagonia and Alaska, and his [00:01:00] hell of leadership coaching. roles at all kinds of climate tech companies. He was also in a past life captain of the Stanford University golf team. Which I thought was a pretty interesting biographical fun fact, given his obvious passion for climate.
[00:01:13] And so I asked him about that participation in golf as it pertains to using public space and so much water. Anyway. Dom and I chat extensively about how to foster regenerative leadership and how to do this blending of personal vitality and ecological harmony. I really enjoyed the conversation with Dom, and Dom, I think enjoyed it as well and came back to me a few weeks after we recorded and wanted to offer listeners of this podcast, $500 off of the Vivify program.
[00:01:41] So if after listening you're excited about what he's doing, you'd like to participate, you can visit www.domfranks.com. That's D O M F R A N C K S dot com slash Vivify, V I V I F Y, and if [00:02:00] you tell Dom that you came from Campfire you'll get the 500 bucks off, so pretty cool. Campfire is produced by Cabin, which is a group of internet friends building a network of modern villages.
[00:02:10] For more how to get involved with Cabin, which is also how I met Dom originally, you can visit cabin. city today. Alright, enough talking about wilderness, let's Dom Franks, welcome to Campfire. Awesome to be here, Jackson. Really excited to talk about what you're doing with Vivify. And I've certainly had my own personal experiences that might inform some of the questions that I ask, but would love to just get started with you sharing what is Vivify and who is it for, and then we can talk about regenerative leadership afterwards.
[00:02:39] Cool.
[00:02:39] Dom Francks: So the Vivify regenerative leadership program is a four month deep dive that blends coaching and a week long wilderness trip in the high Sierra. And so it's really a holistic experience that's born from my years as a wilderness guide, taking people into the mountains in Patagonia and Alaska and in the U S and recognizing the power of those experiences.
[00:02:59] But [00:03:00] also the limitations to not have integration around them. And so Vivify is really designed for folks who have found some professional success or on some sort of a path and are really yearning for more adventure. Greater connection to nature and asking the deep question of like, what is our authentic contribution to our regenerative future?
[00:03:19] So there's no backpacking experience required. I love taking people into the mountains for their first time. I love making sure people have the right gear and everything. And it's really, Also designed to have, you have integrated experiences of connection with the natural world throughout the program, right where you are.
[00:03:35] So it's not just one peak experience somewhere off in the mountains, but we really work with you throughout the group and individual coaching throughout the program to make sure that your daily life is really having positive impacts due to just daily practice of connection with the natural world.
[00:03:50] Jackson Steger: I love that.
[00:03:51] And so when we use the word regenerative here, we're not talking about limbs regrowing in this broader solar punk space that cabin plays in, [00:04:00] what does it mean to be building a regenerative future? What does it mean to be? Building regenerative leadership.
[00:04:06] Dom Francks: Yeah, absolutely. So I would say the broad scope of that word regeneration is humans turning into a life enhancing force on the planet, us being allies to the more than human world, the other species of life that we share this planet with.
[00:04:22] Within Vivify, we break regenerative leadership down into two components. There's personal regeneration, which is committing to your own vitality and aliveness and presence. So saying that I'm going to do meaningful work in the world, but I'm not going to burn myself out while I do it. I'm not going to burn out for spending 10 hours a day behind a screen.
[00:04:39] I'm going to make sure that I move my body and build more. Yeah. Vitality and energy throughout the day. So there's personal regeneration and then there's collective regeneration, which is really committing to living a life that your grandchildren would be proud of. I believe and have believed since sixth grade, which I can get.
[00:04:56] More into why I specifically say that date that really the big [00:05:00] project for us at this moment on our planet is to figure out how to be life enhancing and how to be allies to the more than human world. I think our descendants looking back three or four generations from now are going to say like there was one thing that we needed to be focused on and it was our relationship with you.
[00:05:16] The broader ecological world. And so committing to collective regeneration is finding whatever way is most aligned for you in your life to engage with that project. It doesn't have to look like upending your entire life and going and like woofing and being an organic farmer somewhere. But I feel like each of us need to do something, but we can't do it alone.
[00:05:36] So those two are the two pillars of how we define regenerative leadership within Vivify. And we use immersion in the wilderness. As a way to really explore both sides of that.
[00:05:46] Jackson Steger: Yeah. And so digging into the structure a little bit, there's this four month online experience in my understanding, and then this eight day travel experience.
[00:05:57] So maybe just correct [00:06:00] any characterization I just made, but then also share. How does the consistency of coaching and the peak experience of like a wilderness immersion complement each other to drive this kind of regenerative transformation you're alluding to?
[00:06:15] Dom Francks: Yeah, beautiful. You nailed it. That is the structure.
[00:06:17] We do four months of meeting consistently as a group and individual coaching one on one with me. And then we'll spend eight days up in the Sierra, two thirds of the way through the program. And the reason that it's structured that way is. I have found that when we have the opportunity to set intentions and have a really solid context for why and how we're walking into the wilderness, we get a lot more out of it.
[00:06:40] Like, it's very easy to go on, maybe a hike, less so a backpacking trip, but maybe a hike, and be Maybe listening to a podcast or not be fully immersed in the world around you. And not really in a sense of reciprocity, but what we do within Vivify is, so there's the coaching piece, which I'll talk about in a second, but we also had these consistent practices that we support people with.
[00:06:59] So one of [00:07:00] them is, and this is drawn from. The year long program that the conscious leadership group runs is every member is supported to and commits to meditating for 10 minutes a day. And we have a guest meditation instructor that's been meditating and teaching meditation for years and years that comes in and supports each member with their practice.
[00:07:17] And the reason for that is that. Whether you're trying to be most present with the people in your life, whether you're trying to offer yourself fully to the creative work that you're doing, or whether you're trying to be fully present in the natural world, our ability to direct our attention is foundationally only thing that we have.
[00:07:32] And so Vivify really lays the foundation for that. So when we're walking into the wilderness, we're not having phone withdrawals, we're able to really open ourselves fully to the experience. In addition, we really support folks in. Not just preparing for the experience up in the high Sierra, but also making the changes in their lives that they need to make.
[00:07:52] We have people that join this program because they're trying to figure out what their next professional step is. And historically in my one on one coaching practice, I've [00:08:00] supported clients in trying to figure out their authentic next professional step very successfully. We also have people join the program because they are just feeling overly burnt out and overworking themselves and really want to learn better tools for doing work that they love in a way that's actually sustainable.
[00:08:17] So the coaching aspect is partially preparation for the wilderness immersion, but it's also partially just an opportunity for folks to deepen and enhance their lives along the way.
[00:08:27] Jackson Steger: What are some of those better tools for navigating?
[00:08:29] Dom Francks: Yeah. So here I'm really operating based on the teaching of the conscious leadership group.
[00:08:34] They wrote a book called the 15 commitments of conscious leadership. And they have a beautiful and very well explored framework around leading from above the line versus below the line. And above the line is a state of being really committed to curiosity and being really committed to learning. And below the line is a state of being committed to being right and being in a state of fear.
[00:08:53] And without going too much deeper into it, there are a number of practices to essentially notice where you are in each moment. [00:09:00] And be able to shift from below to above the line. And I have found that by using these practices, I'm able to really notice moments in which I'm operating from a place of scarcity, a place of fear.
[00:09:11] Sam Harris talks about this beautifully. It's like, it's very rarely adaptive. To be in a fear or anxiety response. It's important to be able to feel those emotions because they point to something that you need to pay attention to. But when it comes time to actually respond to what is happening in your life, it's very rarely adaptive to be in that state.
[00:09:30] So within Vivify, we dive deep into those tools to be able to shift. And I can talk a little bit more about specifics, but. I'll stop there. So if you want to go deeper.
[00:09:39] Jackson Steger: Yeah, let's come back to it. But I want to also get a sense of like your path to this a little bit. And maybe I'll inject a bit of my journey here.
[00:09:49] But before I started college, my school offered two weeks of this wilderness immersion experience with other freshmen. It was led by a sophomore [00:10:00] and we would go into these crews of 12 people into the forest for two weeks and no phones. Very like amazing experience in my life and has been transformative in a lot of ways.
[00:10:11] And it was modeled after gnolls and after outward bound. So I'm curious, like how inspired are you by those programs and how would you distinguish them from what Vivify is doing? Great
[00:10:25] Dom Francks: question. So I did a month long NOLS course in 2018 at a moment when I was really trying to figure out what How to live a life where I wasn't going to be stuck behind a screen the rest of my life.
[00:10:37] And I just fell completely in love with wilderness education. I mean, a bit about my path. I didn't do any of the sort of knolls and outward bound style trips when I was younger. I had like a decade where I thought I was going to be a professional golfer, but after college, yeah, we could get into that.
[00:10:51] It's very off brand for me now. Uh, yeah, I did a month long course with knolls, totally fell in love with wilderness education and then became an outward bound instructor. So I actually have a background [00:11:00] with both of those schools. And I also completed a year long immersion with the Animus Valley Institute, which is an organization that does more rites of passage focused work.
[00:11:10] So still like wilderness education, but a very, very different lens. And Vivify is really a blend between a lot of these different schools. We had the adventure aspect of Gnolls. Like we want to go stand on top of a mountain. I find that personally, incredibly inspiring to go embrace the physical challenge of being up in the mountains.
[00:11:29] Like those have been some of the most rapturous moments of my life. And so that's something that I really love to offer. And we'll embark on a 24 hour solo where folks really have both the space and are supported in like designing the practices to really give them the opportunity to drop deeper into themselves and into their relationship with the natural world and come out with more clarity.
[00:11:50] So I'd say Vivify is a blend between that Knowles outward bound outdoor education school. And incorporating practices from the Animus [00:12:00] Valley Institute, which is more grounded in like a rites of passage model.
[00:12:03] Jackson Steger: As a part of Knowles, I know that they have these things called solos, which is something that I did as well as like a 36 hour experience where I was completely by myself.
[00:12:14] I was blindfolded and led through a mile of nature in a forest I didn't know and hold to just like stay in an area with no food or tent or anything for 36 hours. I had an amazing experience. It was also at this really important inflection point in my life. It's a bit extreme. I don't know if, you know, everyone needs to be like so immersed, but just speaking of immersion in general, like why is regular immersion in nature?
[00:12:46] Essential rather than nice to have. Yeah.
[00:12:50] Dom Francks: The solo aspect of, I think our bound is actually maybe even a little more known for solos, but it sounds like the program you did was like a blend of those and. I mean, as part of my [00:13:00] Animus Valley training, I did a four day solo fest and can definitely appreciate the power of those more intense experiences alone in the wilderness.
[00:13:09] But yeah, why I'd say it's essential, I actually think the author Michael Easter does a great job of writing about this. I believe it's in the comfort crisis where he talks about these thresholds of immersion in nature that cause different effects on our physiology and mental state. So 20 minutes in nature.
[00:13:25] So just going for a walk near a park where you are without your phone will notably lower your heart rate, lower your stress levels. So that's something you can work in on a daily basis, five hours in nature. So like a longer day hike in, say, a state park near where you live, you're in L. A., so going up to Topanga and going for a walk for half a day will start to allow your mind to slow down and your senses will start to unfold.
[00:13:50] And then three days in the wilderness, there is something very special that starts to happen, particularly when you have like a few more days ahead of you. You're not at the beginning, but you're [00:14:00] not at the end. You start to get into this rhythm of just experiencing life as an animal, really walking across the earth.
[00:14:08] And you shift into a state of mind that's entirely different than what you might be in, in your daily life. And that's part of the reason that the wilderness portion of Vivify is eight days long is I really want people to be able to marinate in that three day effect. Like I always talk about when I'm in the wilderness, I'm not the lead guide.
[00:14:25] Nature is lead guide. I'm just here to try to like create the conditions for you to be impacted by truly spending time in direct connection with the wild. So I really feel that if we're not able to touch into those three thresholds, which obviously is not exhaustive, it's just a model on a fairly regular basis.
[00:14:44] We're not able to like reset. In the foundational truth of like, what we are is animals on this planet. And we are in perpetual relationship with all the other species here. But it's easy to forget that when we're surrounded by humans, talking to humans in [00:15:00] a lot of the social situations that we've created.
[00:15:02] Jackson Steger: I want to go deeper into this broader point of letting nature be the guide, but of course, like, you are also the guide. And this was something I also experienced when I did a version of this, is the guides really tried to let the group lead and make a lot of the decisions, and was there to ask gentle prodding questions, and I imagine you may do something similar, but I don't want to put words in your mouth, so.
[00:15:29] You've led trips in Patagonia and Alaska, two different ends of the earth, and I'm sure others in between. So what makes a good guide both on these wilderness experience trips, but then what are some of those skills that you maybe also bring into your life back here in the more built up world? Yeah. So
[00:15:47] Dom Francks: here I only recently, I think, started to understand why I love wilderness guiding so much.
[00:15:52] And it was when I was listening to someone named Steve March. Talk about the difference between technological attunement and poetic attunement. [00:16:00] And so technological attunement is like attuning to the world around you as a set of technologies, which is essentially tools to allow you to accomplish a job.
[00:16:07] And we relate to people a lot that way. And sometimes we relate to ourselves that way. Like when I was a software engineer, a lot of how I was related to by my company and how I related to myself was as a code production machine, whereas a poetic attunement is more attuning to the world around you and yourself and the other people as.
[00:16:26] Inherently multidimensional poems that are capable of so many different things that don't always have to have a direct output or productive purpose. And what I've realized is when I'm wilderness guiding, and I think when really high quality guides are guiding, we are in a deep state of poetic attunement because we have to be operating on so many different levels at the same time.
[00:16:47] Cause we're thinking about risk management. We're watching those clouds that are rolling in over the horizon. We're navigating group dynamics and making sure that there's not like problematic issues coming up in the group. We're thinking about what we're going to facilitate [00:17:00] tonight based on the way the conversation has been going in the group.
[00:17:03] So far, we're thinking about maybe like the person that has altitude sickness and making sure that we're navigating like the medical concerns that are on the trip. And so there's this like level of processing that I find. Unbelievably engaging. It's my favorite thing to do in the whole world. And I think brings an ability to be poetically attuned to the other people in my life and the other situations in my life, rather than being so focused on a specific output or allowing my vision to sort of become overly narrowed into blinders.
[00:17:34] Jackson Steger: How would you advise someone who. wants to similarly achieve what seems like a flow state of poetic attunement, how would you advise that they work on themself, or what courses should they take? Maybe video fives. But what should they do to better improve their ability to be poetically in tune with the world around them?
[00:17:56] Dom Francks: So I should mention Steve March's project here, which is [00:18:00] Aletheia coaching, which I believe is at integral unfoldment. com. I think they changed names at some point along the way. And their whole model is based around finding clarity about your next step. So it is coaching is action oriented through a sense of unfolding through poetic attunement.
[00:18:15] I'm going to be in the middle of training in this modality. So I'm going to stop there because I don't want to get out ahead of my skis, but that's where I got this from. And probably the best place to go learn. What I can say about a poetic attunement is. Honestly, singing and reading poetry is an amazing place to start.
[00:18:33] Singing is something that has a profound effect when we do it to the natural world. I feel like I'm making many references here, but the Emerald podcast is one of my favorite podcasts in the world. It's a deep dive into mythology. It's really well produced. And the host of that. Podcast that entire episode on enchanted land.
[00:18:52] And it turns out what enchanted land means is land that has been sung to, and so many traditions that have a [00:19:00] relationship to the animate earth have consistent practices of singing particular songs to particular places. Now. I will acknowledge that I don't come from that lineage, and I think that it's better to sing some song to land rather than not to sing.
[00:19:15] And so I'll often be walking through the wilderness and singing to the land around me, and I'm constantly amazed at the state of mind that that shifts me into, which is much more deeply poetic. And it's really something that like other than the sort of personal and social barriers that we have around singing is really accessible to anyone, wherever you are, assuming you're being conscious of the people around you, obviously,
[00:19:40] Jackson Steger: I will admit to also singing when alone in nature, although with the apologies to the land, which has probably heard Miley Cyrus's The climb one too many times.
[00:19:51] You mentioned earlier, making sure you're using the right technology or the right tools to get the job done that you're working on. And that was in a different context, but you're [00:20:00] currently joining this podcast from a mobile recording studio. You're using Starlink to connect. So maybe just, could you share with me how have recent technical innovations enabled you or could enable others to.
[00:20:15] Be immersed in nature while still being a part of 21st century life.
[00:20:20] Dom Francks: Yeah. So I'm recording this podcast from my mobile recording studio here in my van, which is named granny short for granite. And yeah, it's a beautiful question. It's one that I have been thinking about a lot over the past few years. I think.
[00:20:35] I look a lot to the way that. Ancestral humans lived as an inkling for what is likely to lead to a satisfying human life. And it's interesting to look back because we have a lot of history of humans being really grounded in one place and really settled and having a really deep relationship with land.
[00:20:53] And we have histories of humans being nomadic and moving with herds over yes, generally the same biome, but [00:21:00] not necessarily tilling the earth or having a strong relationship with a particular place. So, While I think long term, I would feel more drawn to be more grounded in one spot right now. I feel really excited about the adventure of wandering.
[00:21:17] I do think that there's like a chapter in everyone's life, many people's lives don't want to say everyone where you're really being invited by the world to wander. And we are very fortunate in this world to Have a lot of freedom to be able to continue to do work and stay connected while having the time to explore.
[00:21:33] And this actually ties into a particular thread in Vivify as well, where we really explore building a sophisticated and healthy relationship with our technology. So in my work with my clients and in just conversations, and I'm sure you would agree with this, like our relationship with our technology is universally something that is causing some sort of diminishment in people's lives.
[00:21:53] People's attention is fractured, we're spending too much time on screens. And, like, [00:22:00] I'm recording this via Starlink and I could drive up into the mountains tomorrow and have pretty much the same internet connection and that is a miracle. So I don't think the answer is to disappear and say no to technology.
[00:22:14] I think it's about building an intentional relationship with it. And so, Yeah, within Vivify, we really support people and designing their own relationship with technology and that we hold them accountable to staying in it. But to pull back one layer to the wandering piece, one piece that I have noticed for myself is that so last year or two years ago, I was really feeling this desire to be in one place.
[00:22:36] And I think that was because I felt relationally a little bit up in the air. And right now I'm feeling really stable in both my relationships and really excited about what I'm doing professionally. And I'm noticing that that's like. Opening up more freedom for me to want to move around physically. So I noticed in myself, this desire to have some part of my life that feels really solid and anchored and isn't [00:23:00] changing so that I can then feel the safety and excitement to go explore in some other part.
[00:23:05] Jackson Steger: How does one maintain great relationships while being nomadic? That is a
[00:23:12] Dom Francks: fantastic question. So I have been to some degree nomadic for five or six years now. I think the longest I lived in one place was about a year and there are downsides to that. I think that there's a degree of comfort and depth that Can tend to, to disappear when we don't spend time with people.
[00:23:34] And my experience has been with mutual intention, even if you're not like staying in touch so frequently, if you both have the mutual intention to drop back into a sense of intimacy, when you reconnect, it's still there. So I can think of one friend that I'm going to his wedding next weekend, where we lived together for about a year.
[00:23:53] We were really close. He would have been my best friend in the world at that time. And then we didn't speak for a year and a half and then reconnected last [00:24:00] year. And it was like immediately feeling that sense of connection again. And the other example in my life is a lot of the people that are closest to me are the people that I go to Burning Man with.
[00:24:08] I'm in a camp called the Shire, and many of them live in the Bay Area. And I haven't lived in the Bay in six years, but I've been to Burning Man with that community pretty consistently over that time. And so it's sort of that period of like very intense connection that maintains those relationships over time.
[00:24:26] So I think it's a combination of being able to drop back in quickly and also having sort of touch points along the way, whether it's gatherings. Or other moments in which you continue to maintain that connection that can help really have that sense of community even when you're moving around physically.
[00:24:43] But there are trade offs.
[00:24:45] Jackson Steger: Yeah, I think that largely reflects my experience as well. I want to go back to something you said at the very beginning as we approach close now. You had a moment in sixth grade that sort of prompted your own deep questioning of your relationship with nature. I forget [00:25:00] exactly how you phrased it, but you maybe just share what this experience was for 11 or 12 year old Dom that has set you on the path that you're now on today.
[00:25:08] And maybe with a quick golf detour.
[00:25:12] Dom Francks: Yeah. So when I was in sixth grade, we watched the movie and inconvenient truth in class, which was one of the original climate change documentaries made by Al Gore. And that movie affected me so deeply and really scared me so deeply that I fainted. Like I lost consciousness, fell out of my chair in the middle of the classroom.
[00:25:28] And the way that I understand that now is that my young body just couldn't handle the intensity of the truth of what was going on on our planet. And it was sort of a sense of why don't the adults fix it? This obviously needs to be fixed. And I remember my dad picked me up from school because obviously they sent me home and I said, dad, did you know about this?
[00:25:49] Like, are you aware of what's happening to our planet? And he said, yes. And, and then he said, well, Dominic, if you feel this strongly about it, you should do something about it when you grow up. And for whatever [00:26:00] reason, that moment really stuck with me and I can. pretty clearly say since that day that, you know, if I wasn't going to become a professional golfer, I always knew that I wanted to be committed to, I would have said, then fighting the climate crisis.
[00:26:15] Now I would say healing our relationship with the natural world. Cause I think that's actually upstream. So yeah, that was a really foundational moment. And then I played golf at Stanford and really very grateful for that chapter in my life. Cause I got to experience what it was like to really pursue being.
[00:26:29] One of the best in the world at something. And I ended up stepping away for a variety of reasons. One of which being, I couldn't see myself pursuing professional golf in a world where so many environmental problems were unfolding that just like, wasn't the path for me.
[00:26:41] Jackson Steger: So now I have two followups, one, I'll take them one at a time, but can you explain how healing or relationship with nature is upstream of climate crisis and then I'll come back to the other.
[00:26:53] Dom Francks: Yeah. So lots of nuance here. I think first that what I'll say is we aren't going [00:27:00] to, I think consciousness change our way out of the climate crisis. Like we do have to physically change our infrastructure. We have to change the way we live. We have to emit less methane and emit less carbon and stop deforestation.
[00:27:12] We have to do that. And we make those decisions using the human mind. So really all of this to some degree comes back to the state of mind that we are in. There's a beautiful podcast interview that I then wrote a sub stack piece about, which we can link in the show notes of Christiana Figueres, who was the head of the UN climate committee during the 2015 Paris agreement.
[00:27:33] So she's really like. Been in the room where it happens. She was part of the negotiating table. She was working with heads of state to get the most meaningful climate agreement that we've ever had across the line. And she did an interview with Krista Tippett on being podcast, where she was talking about the spiritual infrastructure that we need to fight climate change and the different way of relating to the natural world that is foundational to us doing something meaningful.
[00:27:58] Like I often run the thought experiment [00:28:00] of, okay, if we could snap our fingers and go back to, Pre industrial carbon concentration. So like 300 parts per million, where would that put us? That'd be great. Cause we wouldn't have climate change, but we would still have massive deforestation issues. We would still have issues with biodiversity loss.
[00:28:17] Like there is a deeper problem here. That's not totally captured just in, you know, how many tenths of a degree we end up warming the planet.
[00:28:25] Jackson Steger: And then as a final follow up that is, but. I'm not the biggest golf fan. I think that the sport uses a lot of land, a lot of times that is exempt from property tax in some States, at least, and is often run by private entities and you'll have these amazing green spaces that are only available to the elite.
[00:28:48] How do you react to that? What do you think that golf's role, if any, should be in connection to this sort of more. healing relationship with nature direction that you've taken.
[00:28:59] Dom Francks: Yeah, I mean, great [00:29:00] question. And yeah, I hear you particularly. We would play a tournament in Palm Springs every year on the Stanford team.
[00:29:06] And every time I flew into Palm Springs, I would almost cry because it's just, it's such a dramatic waste of water. And also having lived in the Owens Valley on the East side of the Sierras, where all that water comes from, it's really tragic to see the Decide to make it bright green in the desert. That doesn't make any sense.
[00:29:22] And on the whole, I agree with you. I think we need to reorient the way that we think about the sport of golf. It does take up a bunch of land. It takes up a ton of water. There are issues around pesticides. I'm not an expert in any of this. I'm really speaking in generalities. And I really hope that there are some people out there that are working on how to leverage golf courses as a force of regeneration in another life.
[00:29:42] Maybe that's what I would do. So if someone out there that's listening knows about a project like that, I would love to hear about it. It'd be really interesting. But the thing that I'll actually say is going back to where golf was invented, which is the Lynx courses on the coast of Scotland. They used land that couldn't really be used for anything else.
[00:29:57] And that was why golf courses ended up on that land [00:30:00] that, it's called Lynx because it's the land that links the ocean to the rest of the world. And they really like, if you've played, I mean, I've played these courses. If you've ever been to the coast of Scotland and seen some of the golf courses, they're gorgeous.
[00:30:11] They're like woven into the land. They don't use bulldozers to move earth. The native grasses are like woven into the course. And like, what I'd say is like golf in the place where it actually emerged is beautifully woven into the natural world. And. I think in the world in general, like the fact that there's all these green golf courses in Dubai is crazy, which we can, it's a whole other topic.
[00:30:37] But we have gotten, I'd say a little off track, but I think the spirit of the game can still be really beautiful.
[00:30:43] Jackson Steger: Yeah. I appreciate that nuance balance answer. Give the audience a call to action. If they would like to better immerse themselves in nature and have practical actionable steps to find more daily connection with nature and inspiration about [00:31:00] the lessons that can be learned in the high mountains of the world.
[00:31:03] Where should we send them?
[00:31:04] Dom Francks: So domfranks. com slash Vivify is the landing page. I also wrote a piece on substack that is sort of a deeper dive into the vision and philosophy of Vivify. And we can link in the show notes and also is in the landing page for Vivify. And yeah, if you feel inspired, please reach out either via the website or directly to me on some other channel, really loving having conversations with folks and whether or not it turns out to be the right fit for you.
[00:31:29] Would love to learn more about you and your.
[00:31:33] Jackson Steger: Awesome. Yeah. We will put all those links in the show notes, including the, the many references you made throughout the episode. So thank you so much, Dom. I really appreciate you having on and good luck with the trip this summer.
[00:31:44] Dom Francks: Awesome. Thanks so much, Jackson.
[00:31:45] Really appreciate being here.
[00:31:55] [00:32:00]