The Seed and the Crucible

For a tree to one day stand, first a seed must be planted.

To care for that seed is an incredible responsibility.

I didn't come to this work in an easy way. I found myself in a numb place, where every day and everything felt about the same. Nothing moved me, even amid the rapid pace of technological innovation of our time. I knew then that something was wrong.

I came to this work because of a wound that still gushes forth, something I can't quite heal — a pain caused by questions as evasive as they are ever-present. What if it didn't have to be this way?

Across the stages of my life, I've sought the truth. Those experiences taught me a humility and a respect for the experiences of other men. Like snowflakes, no two lives are the same — each one is a universe unto itself, a constellation of experiences, emotions, and motivations. To move through life without sharing these things is to miss the one extraordinary thing we can have right now: each other.

From that place came an idea. I would sit down with men in my life who have achieved success and search their hearts for what inspired their ethical persistence. A persistence that didn't seem to rest on motivation or technique. It rested on something deeper: a bedrock of conviction, formed slowly over time through experiences that belonged to them alone. 

Turns out, each man had passed through his own crucible. And the heat of it had forged in him a reason for living the way he did.

As a man still in search of that same persistence — in my career, in my family, in my health — I created this show.

I hope you'll find in it lessons you can carry into your own crucible moments. I hope it makes you feel less alone when you meet them. And I hope it can be a light on your path, whatever stage you're walking through.

Steve