Craig Childs

Immersion as the pathway to truth

• Why Craig must be in a place, feeling the ground, light, wind, for the story to reveal itself

• How walking ancient routes or biking across deserts becomes a form of listening

• The difference between reading landscape through photographs vs. letting it enter your body

Hemingway's house and the ghost of influence

• Craig’s three-week writing residency in Ernest Hemingway’s preserved home in Idaho

• The strange, creative tension of living where Hemingway lived and even feeling watched

• How inhabiting another writer’s space reshaped Craig’s awareness of language and simplicity

Energy, memory, and mystery in the natural world

• The ineffable sensations some landscapes hold: ritual sites, ancient paths, places marked by loss

• How intention sharpens awareness of what we cannot explain

• Rebecca’s story of biking 1,200 miles along the Ho Chi Minh Trail to reach her father’s crash site and the unexpected peace she found there

  
  

The wild dark: riding into the night

• Craig’s decision to bike (not hike or drive) from the brightest sky (Las Vegas) to the darkest sky in Nevada

• Understanding the Bortle Scale and how each night revealed an entirely different sky

• What humanity loses when we stop looking upward, and the questions the night sky asks of us

Creative curiosity and how stories choose us

• How Craig selects each new book subject: serendipity, timing, emotional bandwidth, personal readiness

• Why some stories, such as those rooted in trauma, demand discernment and why he sometimes says no

• Moving from archaeology to animals to geology and now to mountain lions

Internal exploration and the dialogue within

• The constant internal conversations that unfold when moving across landscapes

• How physical exertion becomes a gateway to reflection, memory, and presence

• Why writing is the spark, not the purpose, behind many of Craig’s journeys

Modern disconnection and what we're losing

• Craig’s experience witnessing a death on a transatlantic flight and realizing how few people noticed

• The shrinking spaces for eye contact, curiosity, and shared humanity

• The closing-in effect of modern life compared to the expansive awareness offered by nature

Transformative insights

• Immersion creates understanding; arrival alone does not.

• Landscapes hold memory and meaning that reveal themselves when we’re quiet enough to notice.

• Awe is not optional; it is a human requirement.

• The night sky is one of our oldest teachers, and losing it means losing half our questions.

• Serendipity is often guidance if we’re paying attention.

Vulnerable moments

• Rebecca shares the emotional unraveling of reaching her father’s crash site after a long bike journey.

• Craig opens up about choosing not to pursue certain book topics because the emotional toll would be too great.

• Both explore the discomfort of modern loneliness and the desire for deeper connection.

• Craig reflects on being swept into the rush of freelance life and how he finds his way back to slower rhythms.

Practical wisdom

• Use nature as your reset; it requires no preparation or perfection, only presence.

• Let your curiosity, not your agenda, shape your explorations.

• Build spaciousness into your life: dawn light, unstructured time, long walks, quiet moments.

• Notice what your senses are telling you; they’re often wiser than your plans.

• When life feels rushed, create friction by slowing down; sit on a boulder, look at the sky, breathe.

Personal growth

• Craig’s evolution from writing about ancient worlds to exploring the immediate, living stories around him

• Rebecca’s ongoing shift from rusher to someone who seeks and protects stillness

• The power of long journeys—literal and internal—to peel away armor

• How exploration helps us remember our humanity and place in the larger world