Letter to Self

A lot of people keep journals. They're a nice way to capture emotional and intellectual experiences, to freeze-frame the process of growth. Every now and then I find myself returning to certain journals and reliving certain times of my life. It's great to be reminded of what is important to me and why it has become important, especially after the excitement and emotion of an experience has faded.

At Beyond, we try to one-up the habit of journaling. It has been our experience that Beyond trips can be a tremendous time of spiritual and emotional maturing. It's pretty easy, though, to return from a Beyond trip and have all of those character fortifying moments turn into nothing but sentimental memories. So some guides like to take a freeze-frame of the emotional and spiritual experience of Beyond and have it pop back up in campers lives when they least expect it. We call it "Letter to Self," because that's what it is. Guides have participants sit down at the summit or the end of the trip and write a letter to themselves about what they experienced that week. Then we send the letters out later in the year, usually around New Years. It's kind of a double whammy of awesomeness. First, you get a letter in the mail; who doesn't like that? Then you get this random trip back to a time when the distractions of life had been stripped away and it was easier to see what was important. It's better than just keeping a journal because you are guaranteed to read it. The whole thing is pretty neat.

The picture above is from Joey Leppien. He went on a Sea Kayaking trip this past summer. When he received his letter in the mail this week, he liked it so much that he posted it to Facebook. I like it because it's proof that we really do send out those letters. If you want to receive a letter from an awesome version of yourself next New Years, you should sign up for a Beyond trip now.