Where It All Started; A "Return" To Pigeon Hill with Dan Vollaro

A single word can open a whole landscape, and today that word is return. We set out along the Pigeon Hill Trail—where this show first began—to see how cycles in nature, story, and daily life shape who we become when we come back. What looks like a loop is actually a spiral: the place may seem familiar, but your eyes are not the same.

We dig into the tension between awakening and routine. Mindfulness is powerful, but it isn’t a finish line to live on forever; it’s a practice that keeps us from sleepwalking through our days. Thomas Merton’s guidance—that reflection should ripple into action—nudges us to bring insight back into ordinary choices, conversations, and commitments. Along the way, we reexamine the Prodigal Son. The father’s love never changes; the son’s capacity to recognize it does. That shift reframes "return" as a moment of seeing rather than a moral about never leaving, while the older brother’s quiet constancy reveals a different kind of growth that rarely gets a party.

We widen the lens with the Odyssey. Hero myths celebrate departure and homecoming, but they also carry the cost of return—the risks, losses, and hard tradeoffs. The lotus eaters tempt us to forget, yet meaning requires friction. We talk about ruts, low seasons, and why resistance is the raw material of growth. Parenting brings it close to home: letting our kids risk, fail, and return is an act of love, not negligence. Nature keeps the score honestly. Forests, seasons, and soil show that decay feeds renewal, and that coming back is less about sameness and more about regeneration.

Walk with us through boulders, stories, and memory to consider where you’re being called to return—and how you might see it differently this time. If this conversation sparked something for you, follow us on Instagram for episode clips, then rate and review the show to help more people find the trail. Subscribe, share with a friend, and tell us: what are you ready to return to now?

Transcript

Back To Pigeon Hill

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Welcome to Deep in the Woods with Andrew McIntyre, where one word and one walk reveal the stories that connect us all. Today we welcome back Dan Bilaro as we return to where it all began. Dan is an English professor, writer, and close friend who is currently working on a collection of essays rooted in Kinesaw Mountain and its history. About three years ago, Dan and I recorded the very first episode of Deep in the Woods on the Pigeon Hill Trail at Kinesaw Mountain. We centered that walk around the word memory. At the time, I had no idea where the episode would lead, nor the people I would meet, or the stories that would be shared along the way. With that in mind, Dan and I felt called to return to Pigeon Hill and take a deeper look at the word return. In this conversation, we explore the cycles found within humanity's stories, our repeated drifting away from awareness, and the rhythms of our own lives. We spend time reflecting on how these patterns appear in the parable of the prodigal son. Before we begin with that story, be sure to follow Deep in the Woods on Instagram for video clips from this episode, and don't forget to rate and review the podcast wherever you listen. So join us now as we walk the backside of Little Kennesault Mountain up the Pigeon Hill Trail and take a deep dive into the word return. Dan, thanks for being here with me again today. This is your third episode, I believe. Yes. Third.

SPEAKER_01 1:24

First one was, I think, your first episode, and that was on memory, and then I think a year later we did another one on walking.

SPEAKER_00 1:33

We did. So it feels like once a year you have to be a guest. So I think you're the recurring guest. Uh well, thanks again for doing this with me. This will be the last episode of this season. Um I want to do things a little different this time. So um my goal is to flip the roles a little bit. So give you a chance to maybe ask me a word to talk about. Um and I'll be okay. I'm happy to do that. I'll let you start there, so let's do that.

SPEAKER_01 1:58

I'll be the interviewer for the day. Not that these are these episodes are purely interview-based.

SPEAKER_00 2:05

That's true, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 2:06

But usually one person sort of taking the lead and driving the conversation, asking questions and follow-up questions. So, what word would you like to dive into?

SPEAKER_00 2:16

So appropriately, I want to talk about the word return. Um, we have returned to the place we started. So we are back on Pigeon Hill, which is um on the little Kinnesaw Mountain in Kinnesaw, well, Marietta, Georgia. Um, I'm hoping some guys can see maybe I'm gonna try to share some videos from this as well so um you can get a chance to see this place, the place we started. Right now we are surrounded by lots of boulders. This is Pigeon Hill specifically.

Setting Intention For The Walk

SPEAKER_00 2:45

Um, but yeah, so the the goal is to really talk about the word return.

SPEAKER_01 2:49

Right, yeah. And I'm excited about doing this because I just published an essay about this place. Well, uh this is was almost a year ago, but uh in North Meridian um uh review. And I come up here a lot. I'm really interested in this place, and the the essay was very much about how you can see the war on nature if you look very closely. The human war on nature, if you look very closely at this place. There was a civil, you know, there was a civil war battle fought here, and um uh but then also this area was deforested several times, and you can see that each time it it's it makes a return.

SPEAKER_00 3:37

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 3:37

Um like that. Yeah, the nature, the trees come back, all the animals come back. So there are these, if you look at the history of this hill uh carefully, carefully, you'll see that there's this sort of series of returns that the natural world makes on this place.

SPEAKER_00 3:54

I think with this word, we're gonna use the word cycle a lot in various ways. Um my goal is to when I thought of this word, I have so much going on, but our goal is to kind of bring everything to a to an end for this season, maybe even bringing some things back from older conversations that we've had. Um one of the goals from this season was to really talk about storytelling. Um, the other aspects, the very first couple episodes really talked about being present and aware. Uh, had a walk with Dr. Rick Diamond, who talked about awakening and how we we come to to realize that there's um you know what's going on in this world, how we can be, we can awake to some of the background of the the magic and mystery of this world and um and still be aware of the of the game almost, the show that's being performed.

SPEAKER_02 4:42

Right.

SPEAKER_00 4:42

I think the way I like he even used like a video game we talked about, but also like a performance. Alan White's, I'll bring him up again, talks about this a lot, but just the idea that um we we are almost like actors and performing, but there's a show, there's a hole behind the scenes occurring, and every once in a while the actor will realize what's happening, and you're like, oh, that's it. But then you return back to the show.

SPEAKER_01 5:06

Right.

SPEAKER_00 5:06

And so that's kind of what I want to bring out from that piece. We talk uh we talked about Native American storytelling. Um we even went and did some exploration with fungus. So how can we bring all that together? I want to return to a point and

Nature’s Cycles And Human Returns

SPEAKER_00 5:20

um see how they all align.

SPEAKER_01 5:22

Well, I mean, you s you alluded to the fact that return is a very flexible term. It's sort of like it's anything with a cycle associated with it, and that's most things, has a return kind of the idea of return and the reality of return built into it. So there's a lot you could do with this. I'm gonna ask you, where where do you want to start with return?

SPEAKER_00 5:47

Well, let's start moving. Okay. We're gonna walk, and that's for this this show. One thing I wanted to return to was the um like I think I kind of strayed away from this, but like return to the essence of why I did this show. I want to start there. That's a good place to start. Um and like with the intention set behind it. Like, and when I I first started it, the two things that I really um that brought me out was because some of my favorite things is hiking, being out in the woods, and I also really like having deep conversations, which is what led to the title Deep in the Woods.

SPEAKER_02 6:21

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 6:21

Um, but part of it I used to say when I started the episode, like you would set the purpose of doing this was to set an intention, a mindset around a word. You would go out into the woods, have these deep, wonderful, thoughtful conversations, and return with something off of the trail that you that you've taken from that conversation. Yeah, something you can do differently. Um, hopefully, even the people who get to experience the podcast can say that after they've enjoyed the conversation, they can return back to their life with something a little different as well. Yeah. But that was the intent of me starting this podcast was a chance to get out in the woods, do something I love while having conversations with people about things that are important to me and others. So that's where I I would say I'd like to start.

SPEAKER_01 7:10

Okay, well, so you know, return the idea of return, it's interesting to me because you can you return is it's a reality, but it's also an intention. And when you intend, when you make it an intention, there's oftentimes the reality that when you come back to something, it's not the same, right? Like I think we were discussing earlier about how uh you know if you if you've been away from your hometown for a long time and and you go back there, you have this sort of nostalgic image in your mind of what it should be, and then if you're paying attention, you realize, oh wow, it's just not that anymore. People have moved on, the culture's moved on. You know. So applying that to this return, how is this different from what you originally thought it would be meeting the podcast uh when you started?

SPEAKER_00 8:14

Oh, that's a that's a really good question. Um, I've I think when you s when I started the podcast, there's this certain level of energy and excitement about something new and novel. And um for anyone who's just started listening, this is the end of my third year making this podcast, which if you'd have told me when I started that I'd be doing this for three years, um, it was just something to experiment and have fun with at first, which is still a lot of what drives this. But the um the craziest part to me is that uh I've actually stuck with it for this long um because I'm not typically a person that does that. Um, I usually get new ideas and they'll pop up and I'll try new things. Right. Yeah. So there's that that that I'm here still doing it.

SPEAKER_01 8:58

So you're surprised that you're even here after three years.

SPEAKER_00 9:01

Yeah, I really am. Um, and uh to be honest, some of the connections and people I've got to speak with and engage with, like I was able to travel to Austin, Texas this year intentionally because of the podcast and speak with some amazing people um about their stories. Um, the pe the um finding new connections like uh and places to go to. So that's something big with it. But also really just I'm I'm someone who tries to live, you know, think about things often in my head space and it kind of plays around with it. This is giving me a chance to explore those thoughts out loud in a way that's almost public, right? Which is you know different. So when you start to um have a public conversations like this, there's that that puts it in a whole nother sphere of um being able to engage with it with other people and get their feedback. So that's been new and different too.

SPEAKER_01 10:00

Yeah. Okay. And so uh when when you think about return in other contexts in your life, what's interesting to you?

SPEAKER_00 10:12

I'm gonna jump into Dr. Rick Diamond's conversation again, and then my own early episode that started this on around time and being present. So I'll start there. So um, when I think about those things, and you and I have

Awakening Versus Everyday Life

SPEAKER_00 10:30

actually had conversations about this often, we did a whole separate podcast around Taoism, and many of these same elements pop up. Yes, but there's this idea that we have to notice, be attuned, and awake, pay attention to what's happening in our world, right? And in a fancier terms, we talked about this with the podcast on awakening. Like we always think of this term of light enlightenment, where you get to this state of understanding or you're awakened to what's actually happening, right? And I felt like all of those things sound like really good thought experiments, and they always kind of you hear about meditation and different things you can do to reach that state where you're mindful and you're intentional. These are all a lot of really good words, and and I just kind of was playing around with like what do people when they hear this who really aren't often in that mind space, what do they think? What can they do with that? And where I landed at was like I would say the majority of people live their lives doing the things they do, the routines of the day, coming home from work, making their food, getting their kids to bed, doing their routines and living those lives. And to be honest, for a long time I almost felt like that was a lessened version of life. Right, right.

SPEAKER_01 11:58

Like a lower, a lower state of being.

SPEAKER_00 12:00

Yeah, almost like it's too shallow, right?

SPEAKER_01 12:02

Yeah, the people who there's the people who are seeking enlightenment and the people who are, yeah, that kind of dichotomy, right?

SPEAKER_00 12:10

Yeah, and um I even thought like the times where I get pulled into the almost the numb, you know, um mindsets of life where I'm just kind of living the routines myself, which we all do. Um go to work, we do our work, job, our jobs, we do all the things we do, was almost like a form of guilt or shame. Like, why can't I stay in this place where I'm aware and attuned to what's happening, and I'm noticing, and I I take in the we'll come over to the side right here, but these can switch. Um, like for example, let's switch over here and say while we're standing, like at this moment, we have the opportunity to pick apart and dig in deep to what we're seeing, right? So we're looking at, you know, a we have a it's like a cedar tree close by, and we can start to get in and see like the the uh the details of that tree. I think I brought up a couple times John Green and his son who were up on top of a overlook like this, and he's like, Look, son, look at this amazing thing. And his son picks up a leaf and is completely in wonder and awe about that leaf, right? So, like you feel this sense of like, why can't I always be in that state? Where I'm like digging in deep to what's happening. And I think that's when I came to the word return. So what I've taken from this is that it's not I don't think we're supposed to be in this state of like constant awareness or enlightenment, or that we have fit we figured out the system and we are kind of living in this state of bliss and peace. And I think that's in our stories, which I think we'll talk about more. Yeah. Um and I think it's just in our I don't I think we are we are not built to be that way, our minds aren't built that way. Um I think it's nice to be able to even in the day find moments to be like, oh, look at this and be aware and notice and do it as much as often. But it shouldn't be a sense of shame or guilt.

SPEAKER_01 14:20

Right.

SPEAKER_00 14:20

That you're not that way.

SPEAKER_01 14:23

Yeah, it's a really that's really interesting. Because I think I in the past, when I was um, you know, taking my own spiritual life very seriously, I would argue, too seriously, because I was taking myself too seriously, right? I was like, what I mean by that, I was like consciously pursuing these things. I was in, I think I mentioned this before, I was in spiritual direction for nine years where I was working with a spiritual director and I was reading about mysticism and all and all this stuff. Um I had a similar similar attitude, which is that there's people who who are on the path to enlightenment and then people who aren't, and most people weren't, and it's this sort of elitist way of thinking about this. But I've really changed my thinking about that a lot over the years. Do you want to let them pass?

SPEAKER_00 15:14

Yeah, we'll let them go in through. Yeah, yeah. But yeah, how are you there? Enjoying the deep conversations of the woods as well. So nothing wrong there. So's it going.

SPEAKER_01 15:25

So um green beer. Yeah, so I I think about things differently now. Um because I think the real value isn't uh of of paying attention, isn't that you're

Reflection Must Lead To Action

SPEAKER_01 15:40

trying to achieve this um this state of bliss or awareness or enlightenment. It's that you're practicing a way of looking at the world that guarantees that you aren't asleep. Yeah, you aren't going through life asleep. Because I think the real danger in human existence is to be lulled into sleep.

SPEAKER_02 16:06

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 16:06

Right? Yeah. So and when you are asleep, you're not um you're just sort of, you know, in a rote way going through life. You're not thinking about things um in any kind of deeper way. You're not thinking about how your life connects up to, you know, broader movements or things going on in the world. And uh, yeah, so anyway, like I I think the goal is to not be asleep.

SPEAKER_00 16:33

Yeah. Well, that's uh uh that's amazing. Yeah, I like that.

SPEAKER_01 16:36

I was thinking about maybe this is a slightly different spiritual gloss on return, on the idea of return, but Thomas Merton, the great um Catholic writer in the 1960s, um said of reflection that the act of reflection uh leads to or should lead to action. So that when you're doing the spiritual work of you know, meditation or prayer, he was thinking about it in terms of living in a uh monastery. Uh he was a member of the Ghsemane community in Atropis Monks in Kentucky. He was thinking about it in that context that you cannot just simply inhabit the act of reflection, spiritual awareness in a permanent way, that you have a duty to return to the world and to do things with what you've learned or gleaned from that.

SPEAKER_00 18:00

Yeah. I think so That would be almost like you're saying like in a constant state of prayer. Yeah, in a religious sense.

SPEAKER_01 18:07

Right, and I think you know, he's not the first he wasn't the first person living in a monastery who um you know who had those anxieties, I guess. Right? I mean I met when I was younger, I met people from different religious communities, nuns, monks and priests who shared with me similar kinds of anxieties, you know, like what is the role of like the idea is that you know, I and I'm speaking through kind of their voice, I committed myself to this monastic life or this life of prayer

The Prodigal Son Reframed

SPEAKER_01 18:50

and spiritual pursuit. Well, what good is that?

SPEAKER_00 18:53

Well, I think that leads me into the example I want to use, which is somewhat of a religious common, very common trope in religion. The the story of Jesus when he's on the I believe he's on the end of the Sermon on the Mount, he finishes with the story of the prodigal son. Um I'll talk about that a little bit. So recently I heard an interview by Pete Holmes, which is a he's a comedian, but he also has a lot of he integrates a lot of philosophical ideas into his thank you into his um interviews and comedy stance. So in in that story, most commonly, and most people know, but I'll kind of hit the high points. You have the son well two sons of a family and a guy who has a little who has kind of you know, a probably a wealthy dad is what it sounds like, and his son wants to leave, take his inheritance and go and spend time out in the real world, you know. Experience life, I guess, and he does all the things many people do and he. Uses all of his money, like many young kids do when they leave home. And um he splurges it all and ends up in a pig pen, you know, at the lowest point. And at that point is when he realizes he needs to return home.

SPEAKER_02 20:17

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 20:18

And he realizes what he had in those moments. So he decides he's gonna head that direction. Before he even gets home, his dad sees him and his dad approaches him. He actually goes towards him and takes him in, kills the fatted calf. There's a story where he gives the biggest thing, you know, has a whole big meal about it, celebrates that his son has returned. The older brother, who's been there the whole time, asks his dad, Well, you've not even killed a goat on my behalf, and I've been here the whole time. And the dad says, Well, you've always had everything the whole time. But we're celebrating because your son has returned. My brother my son has returned.

SPEAKER_01 20:53

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 20:54

So Pete Holmes makes the point that people often get the story wrong. They look at it from the son other son's perspective and said, You should have stayed at home the whole time, right?

SPEAKER_01 21:04

Right.

SPEAKER_00 21:05

But in many of the stories he says in parables, Jesus is saying that the that the point is not, has nothing to do with, you know, staying or going. The point is the realization of what he had, right? And so when he was gone, he would have never realized that he needed to be returned home until he didn't, until he made those choices. So it's almost like saying the point is to actually go out. Like it's like the person who's constantly in prayer, but has no opportunity to go out and experience it. Is it what are we it's not making a judgment because the dad actually loved the son no matter what. When he was in the pig pen, his love didn't change for him. Sure, yeah. When he came home, his love didn't change, but he was happy that he returned. Right. But he would not the it's the realization, is what people miss out on. Is that he make he makes he makes the decision to return um once more he gets to that point of the lowest situation. Right. So he's almost saying you should leave. Right? You need to go out and experience, you need to live in the world for you to have those moments of awakening.

SPEAKER_01 22:18

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 22:20

Because it's almost like he experienced an enlightened point.

SPEAKER_01 22:23

Yeah, and the father's honoring that. Yeah. You know, the father, I don't think he can say and that the father loves the prodigal son more.

unknown 22:34

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 22:34

But he does respect him for doing what the other one didn't.

SPEAKER_02 22:38

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 22:39

But he also respects the and that's that's the way I read it. He reads he also respects the son who stayed.

SPEAKER_02 22:45

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 22:46

Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 22:48

Yeah, I think you're right in that.

SPEAKER_01 22:49

That's yeah, that's an interesting story. Like there's a kind of there's a lesson in it about both? Yeah well, about how we um how we treat the ordinary versus the extraordinary. You know, in some ways, the son who stays, you know, he's not getting the celebration of his everyday um you know commitment to their shared life, right? I mean, that's the son who's slopping out the pig stalls and you know, like getting up at 4 30 in the morning to feed the animals, like um but it's the it's the novel unusual thing that gets the celebration, right? It's like the son returning home who hasn't who's been gone for a long time. And yeah, you know, is that right? Yeah, I mean like how because how you can understand the the um the son who stayed, you can understand his uh sort of grievance there because it's a grievance we all have on some level, those of us who like stick to things and commit ourselves to to people and like some kind of regular life, where's the where's the party for us?

SPEAKER_00 24:24

Yes, right?

SPEAKER_01 24:25

Yeah you know it's very human. I love that parable.

SPEAKER_00 24:29

Yeah, it's a it's one that connects really well to anyone, you know, that um and and it's got a lot of depth to it.

SPEAKER_01 24:36

Yeah, it really does have a lot of that's that's a good way to say it. You know,

Nostalgia, Hometowns, And Perspective

SPEAKER_01 24:40

but the the return, like the prodigal son's return, I mean one of the things I was just thinking about, because I haven't thought about that in a long time, is how the return kind of opens opens up old wounds, right? It kind of takes the lid off of that whole family dynamic. So that you know, one thing about returning or making a return is the thing you see with new eyes. Right? If you're able to see things more clearly, it's like you know, when you return to your hometown after being gone for 20 years, you're seeing things about like you you enter into it with this sort of rosy nostalgic view, you want it to be the same, you expect it to be the same, but then you quickly see that it isn't, and then you're seeing things about the town that were there all along, also that you never noticed, right? Yeah, you have a healthy perspective. Or how sort of parochial some people are, whereas when you were younger you thought they were this these sort of wise world, that kind of thing, right?

SPEAKER_00 26:09

Like yeah, I think it's almost like in a realignment. Um maybe a recalibration is another good word that you could use there, but because I think because it can go both ways. Like when I was young growing up, I grew up in a small town, you know, in North Georgia. Many people who listen to this probably are from there. Um and I had this sense almost like that big fish syndrome, where I was like, this town's too small for me. You know, the the I'd my mindset didn't often align with those that were already there. Yeah. You know, whether it be the way I saw the world or I almost was my own way that's um had a perspective like I need to do more than this. Almost like the way that prodigal son said, I gotta get out of this place.

SPEAKER_01 26:55

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 26:56

See the world, or whatever you want to call that. And um at one point I was like, I think 19, I took this trip out west. And um I think it's a good idea for anybody to do back at that age to go out and explore and see things. But it took like a month off where I went out and visited like the West Coast and um saw a lot of the sites you're supposed to see, like Old Faithful and San Francisco and all that. And I remember on the way home when we were returning. Um, I had this little journal I was writing in the whole time, and I still have it up in my attic. I don't know. I'm gonna come over to the side here. Um the um, I wrote this little I don't know if it was a poem, a song, or just a couple little pieces that basically was a little tribute to home about like how when I was gone for a month, yeah, all I wanted to do was to be back home. And whether that was the to get back into the routines or the comfortable life or what that would be, but there was something that was pulling me back. It says returning. And now I as a grown-up looking back at my hometown, and not just say that that one event changed my whole perspective, I look differently at that town almost in a positive.

SPEAKER_01 28:24

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 28:24

So I have a new perspective that pulls it to the what a small community can bring. You know, there's always drama and small the you know, the the cons exist there. But a small community of people who get together who, when you know somebody who's struggling, you've find a way to work with your local church or a community to help. You know, in a larger city, you don't always have that same tight-knit feel. Yeah, right. Um so there is something at least the whole point I'm saying is is as a young child, I had a very negative view of my home and my community, right? It felt small, it felt backwards. Yeah, sure, yeah. Right? Like they think this way, like that that's wrong. That's yeah, um, it was a very negative view.

SPEAKER_01 29:10

Right, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 29:11

But now I see the beauty in it.

SPEAKER_01 29:13

Yeah. I guess you have more respect for the son who stayed, right? Like, because that's really what you're there. There's the few there with with small towns there, the people who leave and the people who stay, right?

SPEAKER_00 29:23

Like I guess what I'm maybe what I'm thinking is like, would I have known like the this the realization moment, yeah, right? Like, would I have the perspective I have now if I didn't leave?

SPEAKER_01 29:37

You probably not, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 29:38

Yeah, like it takes right, it takes the leaving. It takes and I didn't say I'm I'm ever kidding to a a down point like the prodigal son. Like I wasn't in the right, right. There were times they were always tough whenever you leave home. I think that's an important thing. But many kids leave home and they hit this point where they're like, oh shoot, I wish I didn't realize how much my parents did for me. Yeah, yeah. I didn't realize how nice it was to be.

SPEAKER_01 29:58

That's gonna be our daughters when they got home.

SPEAKER_00 29:59

Yeah, right. But it's gonna be necessary. I feel like they need that perspective to be able to say, Oh, now I understand. So I guess the whole point of the return is not just the return, it's that moment. Yeah. So let's I want to pull this into storytelling because I think this is really connected to this point, and it'll help bridge it over. So we you and I both have an English background of some form. You probably being a professor and teaching it have much more depth here than I do. But Joseph Campbell and the hero cycle and our kids, both their daughters, are about to journey into the Odyssey. Yeah. Um, which is a hero cycled story, but it's also one about someone who returns back home.

SPEAKER_02 30:42

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 30:43

And so tell me, what's your perspective on that story and the and why why is it our stories always tend to just go? Why do you think the archetypes exist? That our stories tend to do this cycle where they leave, go into a state of like challenge or underworld or a tough situation, and then return.

SPEAKER_01 31:07

Well, that's what you know, Campbell's, Joseph

Hero’s Journey And Its Costs

SPEAKER_01 31:10

Campbell's cycle of the hero myth, or cycle of the hero, um is a lens that he he put on many, many myths and legends and stories from different cultures. So I want to be careful not to say that there's necessarily a universal behind it, right? Because I think he did a lot of misinterpreting and um sort of projection of his own ideas onto myths and legends. Um but anyway, but it but but there I think there's also something to it, right? And uh which which I i one of the reasons it's so popular is that people were able to look into to use that cycle of the you know the hero's myth and see it in history and see it in politics and see it in other places, right? So I think that that really that forward projection of the cycle is um, you know, I think it's it's important to note that. But anyway, like um, you know, let's let's assume that there's value in it. Uh I think human beings are always it it it it touches on a constant in human the human experience of going out and coming back, right? Like leaving, adventuring, um going to war, right? Um, emigrating. There's a um I I I I think there's an there's there's like a lot of that kind of activity in the human story. And so we oftentimes as humans find ourselves like having gone out into the world to take risks or take chances and then coming back longing to come back. It could either be because there's a tremendous amount of longing in the Odyssey, right, until he finally does return, and there's some doubt throughout the whole um story as to whether or not he can make it back, right? So there's the longing to return, and that can you can see that in nostalgia, for example, right? Yeah. There's an element of nostalgia in in uh or there's an element of wanting to return in nostalgia. And um and then there's the actual return, which is um not never quite what you expected. It's full of like its own um like challenges and that that have to be overcome. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 33:52

But you're built differently. Right. Because of I think what it's saying many times is because of the wars or challenges or obstacles that you came through when you left, when you return, it gives you a different either perspective or a different set of um whether skills or mindsets to be able to take on those challenges.

SPEAKER_01 34:13

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 34:13

Um, maybe that's not universal in all of them, but I do feel I guess that's where I connected it back over to real life and even what we said earlier, like it is that moment of longing. Right? So let's say, for example, you said there's that point where Odysseus is almost longing to get back home, even though we know later that it's not the same place when he returns, there's this point where he's says uh the realization occurs that he's got to get back, like he's got to return. Um I th I think there's something special in that moment.

SPEAKER_01 34:51

Yeah, yeah. And it but I also think that like there's a tremendous cost to other people for Odysseus getting home. He sets out with I forget how many ships um shiploads of men, and he end they all end up dying. And they're they're men under his command. Yeah. Also women, like they took women captives in um when they sacked Troy, and so the the text never says what happened to them, but like they were all killed too, right? So, you know, and like I think about this in terms of the I don't know if you remember in in the story the lotus eat the lotus eaters, they stop at this community where um you know the the the people who live there are they take this sort of it must be a narcotic plant that makes people forget.

SPEAKER_00 35:40

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 35:40

Right? And so there's uh always like a question, like I didn't think of this the first time I read it, but in subsequent readings I I I began to think maybe some of those because what happens in the story is like he he has to drag his men back to the ships because they're eating this lotus.

SPEAKER_00 35:58

They don't want to leave.

SPEAKER_01 35:59

And they yeah, and they don't they don't want to leave, and like the they're forgetting home, right? And he sort of forces them all back onto the boats and then they all die. Right? So like would they have been better off if they stayed?

SPEAKER_00 36:12

That's a good point. Yeah, almost in a state of bliss.

SPEAKER_01 36:16

Right, yeah. Yeah, yeah. So the return, I mean the return is triumphant for Odysseus, but for all of those other people, there were they might have been better off stopping and staying where they where you know, where they found shelter or whatever. So it's a good point. Yeah. So I guess like I don't know, you can look at that story through the eyes of other some of the other characters in there. Right. Uh yeah. Yeah, I mean But like what so what what are you thinking about Beodyssey in return?

SPEAKER_00 36:50

Well, I don't know. I think, and maybe I was looking only on the bright side of things. Um, but I do think like just Well, it is Odysseus' story, right?

SPEAKER_01 36:59

Yeah, that's true.

SPEAKER_00 37:00

He's the main character. Yeah. Um but the um I don't know. I think I I kind of took it as, you know, he he he leaves from the very beginning in a state of being called to to the war, you know, and then and leaving and so forth. And then on that way back, like the moment that you said like he's coming, he wants to get back home. Um that at in all of those things, the return, like even you know, every single island they come across, or the sirens, or yeah, every single obstacle that comes across them was like a refining moments. Um the same as the moment that the prodigal son is laying in there with the pigs, and and he's making those realizations and and saying, I have to get through this. Um whatever that return and obstacles that exist in it, that it's a necessary pull.

SPEAKER_01 38:00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 38:02

Well, and maybe not necessary, but just like there is a pull that brings people back to a state. Um, whether that's a physical act or like coming home or whether it's like a mental situation where um I think

Growth, Resistance, And Modern Perfectionism

SPEAKER_00 38:20

I'm gonna bring it back to that to make it make sense. So for me, where I'm at is like I think we go through a consistent refinement of leaving and returning, leaving and returning when it comes to our mindsets. And I say that in I am not the same version of myself I was five years ago, ten years ago, thirty years ago.

SPEAKER_01 38:45

Yeah, right.

SPEAKER_00 38:46

And it's a constant cycle of going through experiences, even in my headspace, and that kind of brings me back to where we started from with this reasoning of doing the podcast, was allowing me to get some of these thoughts out that I can then take. Let's let's come over here and we can we'll actually finish up. I think we've kind of hit most of the high points. Um look at that. There we go. This is spectacular, you hope they get to see that. Um let's finish here. So I think what I'm trying to say is like I think our stories give us this kind of pattern, but I also think it's something we do in our brains and in ours in our beings, where we um cycle through our own challenges in our brain and our thought processes and the way we our viewpoints of life, where we almost have to go through something, or go even go through a situation of going uh living life in a certain way and experiencing it and understanding whether I don't like that, I do like that, maybe I should think this way. So a refinement of our our Our being exists somewhat in that pattern too, where we allow ourselves to be brought into a situation like I'm gonna give a very fast scenario, then I want you to kind of get your perspective on this. Like there are times where I go through periods of um I wouldn't say like it's the depression, but then you just go through some ruts, right? Yeah. Where you just kind of feel low and feel down, and you're like, why am I doing these things? Or you're questioning, you know, experiences or whatever. And I think those are necessary. Yeah right? Almost I say like that is the the um pull away from the state of equilibrium where things are good and nice and smooth, right? And you start to you have to kind of wrestle with those things to be able to bring yourself back to another place where you are different. So if it's if we follow that same cycle, your your brain cycle, you come to a new place where you're able to take on that process in a way you weren't able to before.

SPEAKER_01 41:11

We're part of these like regenerative cycles because we're you know we're we are natural beings. And um so there's this constant cycles of like life, like birth, life, death, rebirth. You know, the sea that's that's what we learn from the seasons. I like how they're and I think human beings used to be much more in tune with those cycles and modern industrial and post-industrial civilization just completely removes us from those like any kind of like n like intimate knowledge of those cycles. And I think it's one of the reasons why these even though these societies we live in are really um you know, there there's a tremendous amount of scientific and technological achievement, uh there's an emptiness at the heart of all of it. Um the kind of spiritual rift. And um, you know, I think back to the idea of return. It the the we're better off if we understand that we we are we are living these cycles and they're they sort of permeate every everything we do. And an important part of that cycle is the return.

SPEAKER_00 42:41

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 42:42

And the return always leads to some kind of regeneration, right? We were talking about it in spiritual terms, like um being able to see more clearly, um, you know, having uh the ability to kind of understand something that you couldn't understand before.

SPEAKER_00 43:05

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 43:05

But on a very like sort of like physical, biological level, um, you know, we we make a return to the earth. Right? And that's that's a like an important part of life. Um, you know, I just I don't know where I'm going with this.

SPEAKER_00 43:24

No, I think that I actually like that because I almost it made me think of like cells. Like when you start looking at how cells form and how some of that process is to to create to get the creation of the cell versus then when it dies and replication of it. And so there's it sounds like so much. I mean, everything in nature and so much of our world is built on cycles of birth and death and regeneration and yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 43:51

And I guess I I don't know. I think we have lost that.

SPEAKER_00 43:55

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 43:56

Um we've lost as humans. We really that used to be an intimate, it used to be woven into that knowledge was woven into everything, our religions. Um our worldview, our community life. But it's mostly mostly gone, you know. Like we don't we the modern humans don't really tend to think of themselves as having to be beholden to those cycles. Right?

SPEAKER_00 44:25

Um almost makes me feel like one word we haven't used, but really kind of has been laying there around the whole side is growth. Yeah. And I think really what it to me is is saying is like in nature and in the stories we've been telling, and even in a spiritual sense, like growth, part of it is requiring um and to leave a state where things are um stable. Right. Right. And it is the the almost a requirement that things have to provide some level of friction or um challenge or resistance, I think is a good word, yeah, to be able to grow. Um and maybe it's different for everybody else. Like I keep going back to that story now that you brought it up. Maybe the son who stayed home didn't need that realization

Parenting, Risk, And Letting Go

SPEAKER_00 45:30

to grow.

SPEAKER_01 45:31

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 45:31

Maybe he had like a and maybe he needed his brother to leave and come back and have that treatment to understand something new as well. Yeah. Right? Like he needed to know that his dad loved him, even if he stays to the same degree that he loves his brother.

SPEAKER_01 45:52

Right, that's interesting.

SPEAKER_00 45:53

Yeah. It was a different growth for both.

SPEAKER_01 45:57

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 45:57

Like both sons had a different take from that experience, but I think they both learned and grew.

SPEAKER_01 46:04

Right. Yeah. I don't know. I was I was reading an article recently about the title was I think like Millennial Perfectionism. Oh, yeah, yeah. And the whole premise of the article was about how millennials, and I mean this is not this goes beyond that generation, but that a lot of times millennials get married and start a family, and they have this notion of like being able to achieve this level of perfection in parenting and lifestyle and all of these other things.

SPEAKER_00 46:42

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 46:43

And it's a really delusional way of thinking about the world. And I I think it's e it's easier to um to sort of maintain that fantasy if you if you live in a society that's removed you from um the lived reality of the cyclical nature of things. Yeah. Right. Because if you're if you have that understanding of the world, you know that you do have to struggle more than not in order to gain any kind of like forward motion in life, right? Like because you think about the the journey of the hero, yeah, most of that is struggle. Right?

SPEAKER_02 47:35

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 47:35

Most of that is struggle. Um, so yeah, I don't know.

SPEAKER_00 47:41

I think we know intuitively that like if you stay in like a bubble and you protect yourself and don't take risk and you know, don't ex have have a chance for failure. Like, we hear those things and it gets taught. And I didn't, but I think in reality, it's people are even myself, like you try to like manage risk to a certain degree, right? You like almost like okay, I don't want to rock the bubble enough to where it's too much. Um, because then if I fail too bad, it's gonna take too long to get back. You have like a fear of losing that which you've obtained, right?

SPEAKER_01 48:16

Instead of embracing the idea that mostly that you will there will be a lot of suffering in life. The Buddha taught us that.

SPEAKER_00 48:24

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 48:25

And uh there's gonna be a lot of failure too. Like most of the things you're gonna set out to do, you will not be successful at.

SPEAKER_00 48:32

So that's the thing. Like we go back to the idea of awakening, right? But you can't receive a level of understanding about how things are and be attuned to what's happening unless you had these experiences and suffering and had a chance to be part of the show, right?

SPEAKER_01 48:49

Right, be part of the show a lot.

SPEAKER_00 48:51

Yeah. Um, I know I saw something yesterday, it's hit me, it came up three different times in the last few days. In fact, the Queen song, I'm reading a book that it came up in, and it was in a football game where they said the show must go on. Yeah. You know that phrase is used often, but that's the thing is like you have to live your life. You can't just like live in a state of bliss and try to buffer everything. Um, I even think about my that's I think about my kids as they're about my you know, they're about to start driving soon, and that's already put anxieties on me. And and then I think about like where they're gonna be when they're a little older and all of the possibilities, but that's gonna be a beautiful opportunity for them to make mistakes and screw up, and then I could be that bother to say, I'm here if you need me, no matter which route you go. Yeah, you can stay at home, you can leave, and you can screw it all up. But you know what? I'm gonna try to be here for you when that happens. I want you to make those mistakes. I want you to try. Oh man, look at that.

SPEAKER_01 50:04

Wow, that is a beautiful you don't get that view when you come up here when the leaf with the leaves

Final Views And Takeaways

SPEAKER_01 50:10

are on the trees.

SPEAKER_00 50:10

Yeah, this is awesome. Yeah, it's straight ahead up there's Cartersville. You can see that mountain that's I don't know if you see a little bit of a hilly mountain. Yeah, that's Pine Mountain where I was hiking the other day. If you should keep going, you'll hit Chattanoogan, Tennessee.

SPEAKER_01 50:26

I think you can almost see it.

SPEAKER_00 50:28

Yeah, I think way, way out there you see a mountain that's probably it could be um the Lookout Mountain.

SPEAKER_01 50:34

Could be, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 50:35

It's way out there though.

SPEAKER_01 50:36

Wow, I love that. This is spectacular.

SPEAKER_00 50:40

Well, let's finish up. I mean, I let's we'll get tell me your final thoughts. I know um I don't know if I'll let you be the interviewer the whole time as much as I do.

SPEAKER_01 50:47

No, it's fine. As usual, it was a great conversation.

SPEAKER_00 50:51

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 50:51

It doesn't matter who was like who was holding the microphone out.

SPEAKER_00 50:55

Well, let's go to my original concept here. When we return from this hike, what are we going to take away? Okay. How are we be different than we were when we started?

SPEAKER_01 51:06

Yeah, well, I don't know. I I feel like I've been thinking about like this conversation has me thinking about um the way we come back to things and paying attention to the way we the way we return to things. Right? That return is something that we're always doing. Yeah. And it's um not always something that I want to be aware of or think about because there's a certain amount of pain that comes along with the reflection on returning.

SPEAKER_02 51:45

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 51:45

Right. Um, you know, like my each time I I return to my parents, they live in the Adirondack Mountains, they're both in the 80s, their 80s, um, I see that they're older and frailer. You know, like that only that that's a revelation that only comes from making a return. Because if I were there, if I were living with them or near them and seeing them all the time, I wouldn't notice. So the the the the seeing that would not be so profound because I would be sort of living with this sort of day-to-day aging. It wouldn't be it wouldn't make such an impact on me, right? So uh I don't know. I guess I'm thinking about um being just being more aware of what I what I learn and what I experience from making returns, right? To things.

SPEAKER_00 52:46

I like that. I think it if for me, and it kind of goes back, I think what I held on to the whole time was who would the prodigal son been if he stayed at home?

SPEAKER_01 52:57

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 52:58

Like if he dead never had the chance to leave, would he have felt a certain level of resentment? Would he have made the realization about that he did about his father and his family? Um, like would his eyes have been opened? Would he have been awakened to what his realization was if he came back, if he didn't make that choice? And I guess what I'm trying to say is like we often will we we're very safety conscious, we're very fear-based in our decisions in life, and I think it is an attempt to avoid suffering and pain.

SPEAKER_01 53:33

Absolutely, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 53:34

And I think if there's anything I'll take away from this conversation is not that we I mean you'd live wild and live without abandon and you know, just go do crazy things just because you now you can go learn from it. That's not the way we function. But I do think hiding ourself or overprotecting ourselves from um life and not making decisions that could be risky in any way

Gratitude, Credits, And Closing

SPEAKER_00 54:00

is a barrier to being able to be to grow, um, to be able to evolve and become, you know.

SPEAKER_01 54:08

Yeah, right, right. Every every every like little smidgen of evolution is hard won. Like it's people don't just sort of naturally become more aware or conscious or better people are better at anything just sort of naturally. Like there's always the headwind, the struggle, the pain, the loss, you know. Yeah, it takes a lot. You don't you don't experience near the volume of that if you don't if you don't go out and then return, right? Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 54:46

Well, let's finish here. Thanks again for doing this the third time. Yeah, you know, yeah, I think this is amazing. So we get to hear the a horn in the background. I think somebody's gonna make it whistle. Um but thanks again for doing this with me again. Sure, I didn't thank you.

SPEAKER_01 55:02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 55:03

This is awesome. So well, I enjoy it every time, but thanks again. Thank you for listening to this episode of Deep in the Woods with Dan Bellaro. I couldn't end this episode with Dan without turning to Henry David Thoreau, who once wrote, We must learn to reawaken and keep ourselves awake, not by mechanical aids, but by an infinite expectation of the dawn. I want to offer a heartfelt thank you to Dan for always being willing to return to these places, to these questions, and to the deep, thoughtful conversations. Thank you as well to Ryan Cherry for the music in this episode, and to my daughter Applin, whose creativity continues to inspire the design of the Deep in the Woods logo. And most of all, thank you for listening. I hope you'll join me again next time as we take one word and one walk deep in the woods.