M&R Episode 014: Designing a life around Surfing For Change.

In Episode 014 I spoke to Kyle Thiermann the founder of the Surfing For Change youtube series. Kyle is a young man who has designed a life around documenting social/environmental issues while on his surfing adventures around the world. He is best known for shedding light on the fact that big banks fund big projects like coal power plants using the money you give them for safekeeping. In this episode we go into how he designed this life and some of the projects he is most passionate about. Enjoy!

Show notes: Kyle.surf, Surfing for Change, Seeker, Vlogging, Mavericks, Mind Mapping, Patagonia, Yvon Chouinard, Support Misfits and Rejects on Patreon, Get a Misfits and Rejects T-shirt or Tank

Welcome to Misfits and Rejects, a podcast about the lifestyle design of expatriates,

travelers, entrepreneurs, and adventurers. I'm your host, Chapin . Enjoy.

I didn't fit in America. With cocaine, there's just always too many guns and too many bad

attitudes. I quit the limiting stories. Really try to overcome that fear. And right there,

for any of your listeners, a lot of what I was to do in the rest of my life was formulated by

the fact I just went and did it. Welcome to another episode of Misfits and Rejects. Today,

we're sitting with Kyle Thiermann, the young man I had the pleasure meeting on my travels through

Nicaragua, who was kind enough to actually hire me one day to take him around and show him the

ropes through the environment that I knew and loved, wave wise. And then he turned me on to

a whole new side of this world, which are individuals who go around and selflessly

try to make changes, really positive changes for the world. And Kyle is one of those young men who

actually puts his money where his mouth is and makes those changes and does it in a really

interesting way, in a way that he's designed by himself. And with that said, I'd like to introduce

Kyle to show and we're going to hear a lot of really cool stuff here, folks. So Kyle, welcome

to the show. Thanks for having me. Super happy to have you, dude. I think that you represent

a population of a little bit younger generation. You're a little younger than me. I don't know.

How old are you, Kyle? 26. 26. You're a lot younger than me, but who are very conscious of the world

and where we stand today with climate change, social injustice, so forth and so on, who's taken

it upon themselves to go out and shed some light on it, number one, and then do it in a unique way

that actually makes huge changes. I know you've had some very big wins in your career, which I'd

love to get into as we continue to talk, but why don't we just start with a little bit of where

you grew up, Kyle, and a little bit about your upbringing. Sure. I grew up in Santa Cruz,

California and grew up surfing. Youngest of five, all my older brothers and sisters surf.

So it was kind of like a skateboard in the left hand and a surfboard in the right hand.

So grew up surfing steamer lane. And when I was a junior in high school,

I made a decision in my life that profoundly shifted the direction of it. I decided to stop

going to Santa Cruz public high school, which I really disliked. I had a lot of good friends there,

but really struggled with test taking. I was the guy who would work really hard to get a B minus,

except when I would get to give a presentation in front of the class. That was something that

I was always really naturally good at. I always really enjoyed delivering information in a way

that was fun for people to listen to, ultimately. It's like, all right, how can I make this

fun for you to to pay attention? And sadly, in public school, that was something that I

didn't get to do very often. And I made a switch to go to a home school for junior and senior year,

which was a wide open playing field. And I remember the teacher, one of the first weeks

that I went there is basically like, all right, what is it that you're really interested in

learning about? And man, like for a little while, it actually took me some time to come up with it,

because I would say that my self confidence was at an all time low. I mean, a lot of people say that

the worst years of their life were in high school. And I would say that that was true for me. I mean,

it wasn't, it was still pretty good, right? I was surfing and had a good group of friends, but like,

like really kind of thought I was stupid because I wasn't a good test taker. But I,

I remember I made, I drew a mind map was my name in the center and a circle around it on a white

board. And I drew kind of out like in a sun shape, like all the things that I knew I really enjoyed

doing and things that I was interested in learning about. So surfing, traveling,

I was always really interested in video and media. And I also was, I think from a really young age,

aware of my position in this world, as a young white man, born into a nice place like Santa Cruz,

California, you know, upper middle class family and was aware that that is a highly unique position

to be in. So I wanted to do something that would that would help really. I was also around that I

was my mom and my dad are both documentary filmmakers who have done stories on social change

in the past. So I think that a lot of it was being exposed to that at a young age. And yeah, just

like, I mean, my mom, for example, was like, the type of person who, if I would get to go on

a surf trip somewhere, like, for example, I went to Chile at one point, and my mom said, Oh,

you're going to Chile? Well, you need to read a book on Chile, because you need to understand

how America has influenced Chile, because most people don't know that Pinochet, one of the most

infamous dictators in the world, was put into power by the United States by the Chicago boys

as their experiment on how this new dictator would rule Chile. So I was

interested in that. And my mom made sure that I would be interested in that. So I wanted to

have some kind of life where I could combine all of that as fluidly as possible, I would say,

and it really all started in that junior year of high school, when I made that mind map on a

whiteboard of just all these things that I was interested in, and then figured out how I can

make an education out of that. And luckily, I had some great teachers who were really willing to

allow me to follow that curiosity. I think that one of the most sad things that I see today are

high school students who I talked to, college students who I talked to, who

seem to have lost their curiosity. And that is that's something that's just always been

kind of heartbreaking for me, because for me, at this point, I feel like I'm more curious than

ever. I feel like I know that I will never learn a fraction of what there is to learn out there in

the world. And I now have such a voracious appetite for learning that that's really sad for me.

So I started this thing where we did a mind map and really kind of formed a lot of my education

around that and said like, okay, you're interested in surfing, let's learn about the ocean. Let's

learn about how the tides work. Let's learn about the biology of the sea creatures right near the

shore. Let's start making YouTube videos. I started making YouTube videos when I was a senior in high

school. And then my first year in college, made a video that probably in large part, people kind

of describe me and defines me by where I started doing research on how coal power plants happen,

started getting really curious about really, we hear about all this shitty stuff that happens in

the world. And I was just really curious as to how it happens. How does the money work behind it

to actually make something like a coal power plant go in? And I learned that a lot of projects,

whether it be a home that you want to buy, a business that you want to start, or a coal power

plant that you want to build, get funded by banks. So I started learning a lot about the banking system

and that the banks really do hold the key in a lot of ways to what ends up happening. I mean,

a lot of people might be aware of what's happening right now in Standing Rock. And there's a big

movement to take money out of Bank of America and Citigroup. And I believe Wells Fargo is the third

bank that are underwriting the Standing Rock pipeline and to put their money into local credit

unions. So that was really exciting for me at a young age to kind of just dig in and have the

freedom to dig into these random subjects. And I ended up going down to Chile and coming up with

the idea to make a little five minute video about a proposed coal power plant going in on the beach

of a Chilean fishing town and learned that it was being underwritten by Bank of America and that

when we put our money into banks, that money doesn't stay there, that banks will lend out our

money. And there's this thing called fractional reserve lending. So any dollar that you put into

a bank is multiplied by about 10. So it's a really leveraged action that we can take is to have our

money in local credit unions and banks and not have it be sucked out to fund a bunch of horrible

shit around the world. So I made this little video and a lot of people thought that it was cool.

So they started sharing it around and got a lot of media and press around it. I was able to give a

TEDx talk about it. I gave a TED talk on it a number of years later about, it's pretty funny,

looking back at it as like, what was I thinking? But I did it in a wetsuit and we ended up getting

a lot of money moved and we ended up getting around 360 million dollars of lending power moved

out of B of A and into local banks and credit unions around the world. Because of your video.

I think that was what we documented. That was like what from businesses and

um yeah mostly like we got a bunch of big businesses to move their money.

Who's we? Like who are you working with? Well I was uh kind of me. So yeah you did this on

your own from my understanding. I mean you you kind of went down there with this idea

and made a video put it on YouTube and it blew up. Is that kind of how it went? Yeah I mean um

to a degree I think that it also um I got a lot of help um throughout the way. I mean again

my mom and dad were major um helpers in that. As well as like look maybe if someone's listening

to this right now and they're like oh maybe I'll move my money into a local credit union. Chances

are they're not going to hit me up and be like oh I moved you know a hundred thousand dollars

or something like that. So um I actually didn't do the best job uh tracking all of that. But

360 is what we track. Which is 36 million um total. So that's 360 million of lending power.

Of all that lending power being moved out of the event. But anyway that's like that was the first

movie that I did. I mean you can go back and watch it on YouTube. It's pretty bad and embarrassing

now that I really see it because I was kind of just thrown into the frying pan and and made a

movie. But it did get a lot it I mean I think that the subject was unique enough that people

were interested in it and they were sharing it around even though the quality of it wasn't

very good. Um and that also got me kind of the spark under me to realize that this is something

that I could do. Um can I stop you quick and just yeah just so I kind of go down the sequence

of events. So you're in high school and you kind of start becoming more aware of the social

things that are happening in the world because your parents influenced you decided to go to

Chile. Was this like a school trip like or is this a surf trip you're going to? Like how did you fund

this? How'd you how'd you figure Chile was the place to go to do all this? Um well I I had been

doing a bunch of research on what I thought was would have been a good place to kind of

like I understood the bank the banking system at least to that degree. It was like all right I

think that we could do a cool story um where we have a surf trip somewhere and show a project

that's being funded by a bank like B of A is one of the largest funders in coal power worldwide.

So I kind of wanted to pick on them but I ended up actually going to um I ended up reaching out

to Patagonia and it's kind of a funny little little side story but I had a friend of a friend

who was who knew Yvonne Chouinard who's the founder of Patagonia and um got an email forwarded to him

and I ended up getting a call back. So this was uh my first this was uh yeah I think end of

graduating year um in high school and I did the movie I believe in the spring of the next year

but Yvonne Chouinard ends up calling me back and like hey what's up Kyle like I'm I'm really

interested in this banking stuff that you're talking about like super random I was going and

I was surfing the lane the lane I'm like founder of Patagonia is calling me right now so I um

end up going to to get to hang with him at his house at the ranch for a few days and like

lay out what um kind of this project that I wanted to do and he was like oh that's that's

super cool like let me put you in touch with our team manager because they just started their surf

team and that's actually how I got sponsored by Patagonia but I went to I went to Patagonia

and first I was like all right like I want you to fund this story and like you know it's I think

it's going to be like ten thousand dollars to like do all this stuff and like you know go down

there with a shooter and like make it all happen you know edit costs on the back end blah blah blah

and um they ended up being like well uh like you really haven't proved anything like that you can

pull this off like you're an 18 year old kid like here's some board shorts and some stickers and

like get back to us in a little while um so I was like damn it all right like well I'm going to

figure out how to write a grant so I figured out how to write a grant um to an environmental

organization that gave that was giving away like youth environmental grants um and I ended up

getting seven thousand dollars to go down and do this story and then I did this story and then

kind of like came back to Patagonia nine months later and was like hey yeah like we got all this

money moved and I think that they were like oh like whoa you're you're legit and um are actually

doing some really good stuff you know I mean a lot of people reach out to Patagonia you're like

hey sponsor me and um to their credit I think they they really focus on people who who are legitimate

and you know doing good work not just someone who is a good surfer so that was that was really cool

and that was kind of like the beginning of my relationship with Patagonia they're still my

my sponsor until this day um and then I started yeah making making youtube movies man about all

kinds of stuff um from the clothing industry in Sri Lanka kind of like how a t-shirt made in Santa

Cruz can be tracked back to Sri Lanka and fair trade um did one on plastic pollution in Hawaii

did one on um trash epidemic in Indonesia did one you know with you in Nicaragua on um the positive

and negative impacts on tourism in Nicaragua and what people are trying to do about that

and it was man just kind of like just kept going really and uh I mean now more than ever if you

want to make if you want to do video and you want to have a lifestyle where you don't need to work

that nine to five office job I do think that media is a really cool career to get into and there

aren't the same costs associated with it that the that there used to be so like if I would have gone

back and done it all over again I would have made way more movies because I think that one

thing that a lot of people don't understand is that if you're going to get into media and

you're going to start making movies you're just going to be bad at it for probably the first

couple years like it your movies are probably just going to kind of suck and then you're they're

going to get a little bit better I think it's like like that with anything but unfortunately a lot of

people will like I'll get emails all the time from from kids who are like I like want to make

these this movie and like they put all this effort into making one movie and it sucked

because it's their first one or you know I mean I don't want to be mean but like you just learn

things along the way and I think that one big mistake that I made along the way was that I

didn't make enough like I was so then I decided to go to this alternative college and and I started

the surfing for change um like youtube series where I would go to the premise was I was I would

go to a surf destination somewhere around the world and I would cover an environmental or social

issue and um I mean it was awesome for me because I got to learn I get to get like these little

micro degrees and all kinds of um issues and you know 19 20 year old kid like let's face it I was

also super stoked to be able to travel and kind of uh combine the two of of going to awesome places

get surfing amazing waves meeting cool people and learning about issues and talking about these

stories but um but I think that a big mistake that I made along the way was I didn't make enough

movies so to actually get a movie fun like you know write a grant I also like you know my

relationship with my sponsors in Patagonia like they've been super supportive but the amount of

costs that go into making a mini documentary are usually pretty substantial um if you want to like

make a full-on mini doc which is kind of what I wanted to do I was watching a lot of vice a lot

of like discovery around that time like watching how these people would do it not understanding

that they had a crew of of three or four people with producers and shooters and editors um and

I was kind of trying to do it on that level like hi I'm Kyle I'm in this crazy spot I'm going to

tell this crazy story and do it a lot of it myself um and I think that I got really overwhelmed at

the time and I and I didn't get as good as quickly as I could have gotten if I would have just made

a ton of YouTube videos locally um I mean there's this thing called vlogging now that a lot of

people are doing where it's you know they just turn the camera back on themselves and they

do a video log of like their day and I would recommend to people if they're getting into video

like start doing something like that it's just super low impact low cost and then you're going

to get all those mistakes out of the way and then you can go on to the bigger the bigger story

so I mean if I could have done it all over again I probably would have done it the opposite way

because now I'm kind of just learning that and now I'm doing way more videos like now I'll make a

new video every couple weeks and they're not all these um you know like big stories but they're

like hey what's up we're going to go surf mavericks and this is our day at maps um and I'll learn

something just through making that that movie and I try and keep them original and fun I hate the

amount of perfunctory that's in the web's uh media sphere now of people just like doing something

that's that's unoriginal and uninspiring so I feel like just now I'm finding that balance after all

these years of being surfing for change videos and then being like I need to do all these videos

like one after another one after another and now I'm finding this balance where I do my fun little

youtube videos and I also work as now a correspondent for uh discovery digital network

it's called seeker network um as an oceans correspondent where I finally feel now like I

have that support like the difference between being able to sit down and ask someone questions

and have to constantly be thinking like all right is the light good on the camera are we recording

are we in focus what was the last question to just being able to to be the person asking the

question and also have a producer behind me and being like hey like maybe think about asking this

question to him like oh yeah wow good good idea is it's a world of a difference so being able to

have that kind of support has um has really opened them opened my eyes to um to like how to the it

it really does take a group mind a lot of times to tell these more in-depth stories yeah man I mean

sounds like it like my question is you've been doing this since you're 18 you've produced

approximately how many youtube videos at this point um maybe like

somewhere around 100 I would say under the under the banner surf for change um no no I would say

that um in terms of like a full mini documentary about an issue I've produced maybe like 10 or 12

and that's again like I think that a big mistake that I made early on like from from ages like

I think that what happened was with that the first video that I made the chili video it was such a

success and again I was like still this kind of youth so the amount of attention that you can get

as like a youth activist is is kind of crazy so I was like winning all these awards for youth

activism and for like that one piece that I did in that story because we're tracking again we're

tracking this money moving in it's like that it's a great story so I felt so much pressure

to have every video after that be a home run yeah that I I really didn't hone my skills as a

filmmaker as much as I should have just making movies I think that now I'm I'm just now learning

that in the you know being a documentary filmmaker being um anyone in media like you can't hit a

home run every time like you need to constantly be hitting singles and doubles and then sooner

or later you're going to hit a home run but just getting on base constantly is more important than

looking for that one big story and I think that that that pressure that I put on myself early on

kind of hindered my my progression growth from like 19 to to 24 until I just realized like look

that's not realistic that I'm going to hit a home run every time and I just started making more

movies and had a lot a lot more fun as a result so when you struck up this relationship with

Patagonia after getting that grant I mean was that a relationship you said you said sponsors

as in multiple people support you multiple different companies is that enough like are

you making a living since 18 to 26 like have you ever gone to a nine to five job or is this kind

of supporting your lifestyle travel style surfing everything um it is I don't I'm not making um

enough money that I don't need to do other things like I do public speaking um that's that's been a

really good way for me to make money um because universities will pay um pay really good money to

have you come speak there um and I'm lucky enough to have a speaking agent um but that's man like

if you look at a lot of people in media or a lot of um you know just characters where they're like

you know public figures or whatever and you're like huh I wonder like how they actually monetize

what they're doing public speaking is the golden ticket man for a lot of them because

you can make I just you can make a lot of money um doing that if you if you're doing it consistently

um so I will constantly balance um doing documentary film uh with with public speaking

because I think that also like in the like media like in the youtube world right as well like a

lot of it's about subscribers so like certain youtubers are making a lot of money um with

by having big subscriber numbers because that means that every video they make is

probably going to get a certain amount of views so if you're a youtuber where every video you're

making is getting a hundred thousand hits a couple hundred thousand hits the advertisers come to you

and they will uh they'll want to advertise on it and some of these kids man who figure that formula

out quick and early on and now have millions of subscribers are absolutely killing it like

disgusting amounts of money but I think that I mean another big mistake that I made early on was

that I didn't focus on the on that base of like making movies consistently and I wasn't putting

movies out on youtube consistently didn't realize the importance of that whereas now I'm kind of

figuring that out and like understanding the subscriber base of of things and I don't have a

high a big enough subscriber base to really be making a lot of money on youtube at this point

but that is another way that you can that you can do it kind of like get out of that nine to five

world and then yes I do get paid by Patagonia and and sector nine um and a new jump rope company I

just got sponsored by called RPM jump ropes but even like all of that is not not something where

I'm going to be able to like buy a house with that money it's it's more been supplemental income

that then I can go like do speaking gigs or you know making more youtube videos and I think that

that's something that's for people who are looking to kind of ditch the nine to five life um that's

usually the way it works like it's really rare that you have just one source of income that that

pays for everything um and I think that more and more today like we want to hop around from careers

like we want to be versatile and specialization is for insects like like being able to have three or

four things going on um is something that I really enjoy so for example with with the documentaries

that I do like I've never really made money off of that like I would I would write grants but the

amount of costs that would be associated with that would um would usually eat it all up but

then like luckily I had speaking so then I could I could make some money here and there and it's

it's a dance man I mean I think that the reason more people don't do it is because it's it's a

scary world and um you know like my girlfriend works a nine to five and she leaves in the morning

and there's usually a million things for me to be able to do while I'm home but there are certain

days when I when I wake up and I'm like oh like all right like what like what are we doing today

you know like let's let's make a pitch like to a company or let's do it but I I'm self-motivated

and I think that I have um I've developed enough tools for when I am feeling kind of like down in

the dumps that I can be like I need to move my body like if I'm not feeling it right now I'm

gonna go work out like keep keep my body really healthy keeping my body really healthy has helped

my mind also stay healthy uh but yeah man I mean I think that's the reason more people don't do it

but then like on the on the flip side right like I I also I have the freedom to be able to go

see all these amazing places and meet all these amazing people and like man it's just like I'm

still I feel like pretty young and like the amount of experiences and issues and subjects

that I've been able to dive into um it makes me feel like I'm I'm living a very full life

which is something that I wouldn't trade anything for so yeah it sounds like you've kind of made a

conscious decision to live frugally um live paycheck to paycheck in order to have that time

to really go after those topics and that lifestyle that you really want for yourself is that accurate?

Yeah and I think that like one thing to consider right is that so like I have a lot of friends who

are um who are pro surfers and and they that's just like that's what they do right like they're

just they're pro surfers and they rely on one paycheck from one company and they live frugally

um and they surf and they have a great lifestyle they get to go get barreled all over the world

but they're not really building skills that are going to prepare them for when that company calls

and says hey you're not getting paid anymore and that's a really scary feeling for a lot of people

so for me I've always felt like okay like in your 20s you you learn in your 30s you earn like I've

just always kind of told myself that look as long as I'm gaining skills I don't need to be

making a ton of money now for and sacrificing my freedom for security as long as I'm learning

the second that I feel like I'm stagnating and I'm just like just kind of going through the motions

doing it and living paycheck to paycheck then it's then I'm not down with that then I will I will go

and get you know another job because it's it can be I think a really frightening feeling for for a

lot of people like having that kind of financial stress but for me like I so like for example you

know I just started my own podcast and I'm not making money at that yet but the amount that I'm

learning as a result of having a chance to sit down with people for an hour interviewing a scientist

or a pro surfer or a filmmaker like I just did one with um someone who's a correspondent for for

discovery and I was asking him all about how they pitch their stories like what what are the biggest

mistakes that they've made when they're pitching a story in the room and like if you know anything

about media like pitching the story is what gets it funded you ultimately have to show up in the

room and say hey I believe in this story I want you to believe in it too and put money behind it

and there are a lot of tricks and tips and tools that can make those experience those those

experiences go over more smoothly so by me sitting down with this guy I'm not making any

money off of that experience on the podcast but I'm learning so much from him that I and I'm

confident that that experience will behoove me in the future right because I'm gaining that skill

now so I'm constantly looking at my life through that lens more than the like like oh I'm just

going to like cruise now and then hope it never runs out yeah I mean that's profound Mike mine

is blowing I love it so it's uh in your 20s you learn and in your 30s you earn I love it I've

never heard that before um so you have four more years of learning it sounds like before you start

maybe stressing about uh financial security yeah and I mean I think again like living smart too like

I yeah I mean this the stress and the financial security thing again like it's it's one that's

constantly evolving and I'm also learning how to um yeah how to not have a ton of bills over your

head man like I see people who are making a ton of money but they they're spending it all every

single month on things that they don't really care about and like man for me like I got my surfboards

I got my wetsuits I got my dive equipment like I I have a healthy body and I'm learning a ton

the the skills that I have today I I know are valuable um in the world and and I I think also

unfortunately a lot of people go for go for financial security early on and they specialize

in one thing and then a robot's going to take their job in 10 years right but just I mean like for

for you like your ability to have a conversation with someone your ability like from the first time

I met you down in Nicaragua I was like oh this guy is awesome like I would I would hire you to

do anything because you're you're competent you are going to show up and I know that and I think

those kinds of life skills are so invaluable and so few people have actually developed those through

experience that it actually makes you a lot a lot more valuable um with whatever it is that you

want to that you that you want to go after next right well yeah thank you for the compliment that

so it's nice to hear and I think you're absolutely right I mean by getting out there and mixing up

in those situations that we find ourselves in that are especially when you're traveling are

extremely uncomfortable you're constantly day to day facing things you've never seen before never

had to deal with in languages that you're probably never going to learn and you get to know yourself

really well really quick the things that you're good at and the things that you're not good at

and you start to build those skills to make things that you're not good at a bit better

that you're right you know I can come back from pretty much anywhere after a certain amount of

years and feel confident that someone would hire me because the life skills that I had or or lever

or like you're leveraging what it is that you're really good at too like that that's that's another

thing that um like I feel like I'm just going through like all these mistakes that I made early

on so I'll just just like for everyone listening like we were supposed to do this call like two

hours ago and I totally spaced on it because my friend uh just opened a sensory deprivation

tank center and I was like oh absolutely like I'll go he's like hey I have a free a free tank

like float for you I'm like oh great totally spaced on our podcast but through but while I

was doing that float session I was just thinking about all these mistakes that I've made over my

life like from a very compassionate and observing point of view because all of your senses are

turned off and it's a good time to think about why but um I was thinking about a big mistake

that I made early on was I thought that I could do it all and I tried to do it all everything from

editing to to shooting to being on camera and it turns out that like I knew back in high school

that I enjoyed presenting and I've always been a presenter and that's that's been my thing is

trying to figure out how to distill down and information distill distill down information like

the banking system into something that that you'll want to listen to and now I'm I'm focusing on that

so much more and I'm experiencing successes in my career now that I never experienced over the last

eight years because I'm focusing now on what it is that I'm good at and it was this kind of like

oh yeah like just do what you're best at and yeah like become proficient at the other things right

like if you're living in Nicaragua you gotta learn some Spanish right yeah right like there

are very there are basic things that we need to learn but there are also things that we can

leverage right and sorry this this one is actually a sticking point for me because I think about it a

lot with myself and these endeavors that I've taken on in the last years my podcast and trying

to transition my life online so I can be location independent from work and you know you hear this

a lot where people are like you know just outsource outsource outsource you know leverage the things

that you're good at and and like give the stuff you can't do to have it somebody else and I find

myself not even knowing the direction to give those people if I were to outsource it you know

like I wouldn't know the verbiage vocabulary the terminology to say like hey build me a website

because I need this type of landing page and this type of form this this that like I had to go

through the motions of trying to build my own website to realize one I was terrible at it

two the vocabulary that I acquired from the time spent was so valuable for when I did finally pass

it off to somebody I could say this is what I want boom boom boom they had it done in like a month

you know right yeah um I think that's a great point and um I've I've experienced that a ton too

because I think that you can also get really ripped off by by people who like if you don't

understand that that verbiage if you don't understand at least the basics kind of stuff

it's like the um it's like taking your car to mechanic and you don't know anything about your

car they're gonna they're gonna charge you way more yeah so I do think that there is an element

I found like with the best results of working with people is is having that basic framework

for like all right how much is it that I should charge what are some good questions that I should

ask so that the person who I end up hiring is like oh this guy knows what the fuck he's talking

about right like I'm gonna do a good job and um I think that but it but it doesn't take that

much to like go on and watch a few youtube videos about um building a website or or

whatever you know um but I I find that yeah you get you get ripped off less when you do that

yeah so you also mentioned you have a podcast can you talk a little about that and that

recent project that you've taken on sure well I mean it was like all great things it was born

out of frustration it was uh so I I recently got back from Hawaii where I uh I did a story

with um with secret network on um land-based impacts of coral reef and uh it's turns out

that on the big island um a major cause for destruction of coral reefs is wild pig feral

they have a huge pig problem out there um you know female pigs the sows can breed um twice a

year and have to 10 babies in a in a litter so one one pig and have 20 babies in a year they

populations explode they go into uh watersheds and they basically rummage around they they rummage

for grubs and their hooved animals so they dig up all of the native vegetation and then when it rains

the um the water flows down and it creates these big mud rivers which blanket the reef um

coral is a living organism and it needs sunlight to grow so when it blankets the reef it kills the

reef um and people are trying to kill the pig and um create fences around these sensitive areas to

keep them out to protect the coral so we went to uh big island we did a story on that and um it

turned it was a five minute video i'm really proud of it you guys can all check it out um my

website kyle.surf we'll link it up sure yeah but but it was one of those things also where i was

like damn like this is such a complex subject like like it's it's really there are a lot of moving

parts you know whether it be that like i you know people who don't like hunters uh for for hunting

the pig um you know if hunting really does enough to impact the pig populations um you know invasive

species all around the world and those stories like i just dove into this world where i i knew

that there was so much more to tell than just that five minute video but the medium of the five minute

video was that's again i'm proud of the story that we told but after that i was like i want to

interview some scientists and i'm like i want to i want to just have long conversations with them

and learn more about this and i want to learn more about um people who i come into contact with

all over the world i mean like again i'm lucky enough to be on a surf team where um there are

a ton of fascinating characters who i'm in touch with all all the time um i'm in touch with

filmmakers like all the time like so so i'm going to sit down with them and interview them

and so far i've had the chance to sit down with vice correspondents like cause larceny is a war

correspondent um did one with a production designer in in hollywood he's the production

designer on avatar talks about creating new worlds pro surfers just all kinds of stuff but

but again like the the theme is um surfing movies film activism but really it's just diving a little

bit deeper than i've ever been able to dive um with my youtube videos and it's been so much fun

so much fun no that's great man it's called a kyle tierman show is that correct the kyle tierman show

and it's just your life on the road interviewing the most interesting people that you meet along

the way huh yeah i mean again with podcasting you know i mean man talk about doing something

mobile i got a couple microphones you know i think i just told you before the podcast like

sat down with the pro skater andy mcdonald in a coffee shop the other day and just wrapped out

for an hour so that's been that's been really fun that's great definitely the it feels like a new

a new level of energy in my life that i haven't felt um in a little while which which is great

that is great i mean you've designed a pretty amazing life for yourself and i commend you for

that and i think that you've been at it now it sounds like almost 10 years or 26 what like seven

eight years yep yeah you know with that amount of experience and people out there who might

want to try the same thing like what would you tell them how how could they get started

to kind of start designing something like yourself um i would recommend everyone reads the four hour

work week by tim ferris that book and that guy has been so influential in my life in terms of

getting the clutter out of the way and actually having the tools and the tactics to handle

situations in a way whether it be negotiation skills or meditation and morning routines

um to diet and fitness um i i highly recommend everything that he is doing because i've benefited

so much from that and from that i think that also um man really like i i find that a lot of people

are in jobs that they hate or in lives that they hate because they haven't done the reflection

to um to really think about what it is that they really like to do um you know i i was listening

to a joe rogan podcast the other day and he was talking about how like he's had this incredible

incredibly successful life like was on fear factor did a bunch of tv then doing stand-up comedy now

he has his podcast and he said you know it wasn't really until i was in my 40s that i realized what

i like to do because a lot of times you think you know what you like to do like oh i i like to

do tv i want to like go get famous and be on tv but then you get there and you're like man this

isn't actually what i thought it would be like like this isn't what i really like to do and he's been

really successful in being able to hone a life and design a life for himself where now he's

doing what he likes to do like he's doing stand-up comedy he's doing podcasts and he says that he

says no to almost everything else but um that's a big one i think that getting really good at

saying no has has helped me um because i do think again like i said earlier like there are things

that i found in my life that are that really benefit me whether it be um public speaking

for the uh the financial reasons and for um just the joy that i get out of talking to people um

there have been uh the podcast which i'm really enjoying for for all kinds of reasons but like

i'm being able to i'm able to hone in now on what it is that i'm at what i actually enjoy doing i

think better than i better than i did before so maybe that in a um realistic level for people

just just means like sitting down like i did and doing a whiteboard session writing their names

the center yeah do a mind map and um write down all the things that you really enjoy

doing um and you know if you give yourself a half an hour to think about it you might um

you might be surprised there might be some some topics that come come to the front of your mind

that you never really gave yourself time to to think about i love that's great advice kyle before

we go just out of my curiosity because i've been thinking about this since you said it

why did you get a jump rope company to sponsor you what is that about dude all right shameless

plug to rpm jump ropes it's like the most next level jump ropes that are out there like i i've

had jump ropes all the time because i will travel with a jump rope when i'm on surf trips or on

uh production trips i think that they're a really good way to just get get the heart rate up and be

like all right like i've been sitting for too long i gotta go do a set of 100 and these things

are like they're like the i mean i'm trying to think of a a good analogy for it but like

i met the guy who um who's like the manager of it and he's a competitive jump roper and there's

this whole world of like competitive jump roping where it's like rpms like around like how fast can

you go in a certain amount of time and then there's also like gymnastic jump roping where

people do flips and they're jump roping throughout the flips this is the whole world that i had no

idea about but um they're just like they're super solid high quality jump ropes they're like the

yeti coolers of jump ropes right like just high quality stuff and um and they're they're santa

cruz based so they were like hey like let's let's do something i'm like hell yeah man this sounds

awesome and again like that's i think that the jump rope is kind of like a good analogy for

the like a lot of the things that i take on my trips and a lot of the ways that i've designed

my life are very lightweight and versatile things in my life um like i don't own a lot of stuff i

i take out as much clutter as possible i simplify simplify simplify and and the jump rope is i don't

bring any any other workout equipment on trips except the jump rope and that's the one thing that

i use and i i get so much benefit out of it beautiful way to close this conversation

kyle i love it man you're an awesome human being thank you for sitting down with me and sharing

your story man um so everyone can find kyle at uh his website what is that website kyle it's just

kyle.surf it's uh not.com just .surf my my housemate is a mega geek who's super awesome and

was like you know kyle you can you can just get .surf urls now that's what all the cool kids

are doing so all right that's what i'm doing yeah well yeah check out kyle tierman at surf for change

kyle.surf or uh at kyle tierman show and where does that host it on itunes itunes skitcher um

all the all the usual places all right kyle thank you for joining you have a good evening

yeah man thank you thank you for listening to miss this and rejects i hope this inspire you to

think about your life situation where you're at and possibly make a big decision to choose

something different for yourself if you're unhappy with where you're at in life i hope these people

that i interview inspire you to go out spread your wings and try something new to live a different

lifestyle that maybe your whole life people were telling me was the wrong one but when in fact it

it's the perfect one for you and i'll see you next time