This is the Leadership and Adventure blog written personally by Alastair Macartney.
I’ve got a lot going on this year and, as a result, I’m having to slow down the rate at which I’m blogging – apologies. This is temporary. I will continue to blog and I will get back to a regular schedule. In the mean time I’ll keep new content coming, just not as frequently, and please do check out the archives.
I’d still love to hear from you so please leave comments and I’ll make sure that I attend to them personally.
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Posted by Alastair Macartney on 08:06 in Adventure, Challenge, Comfort Zone, Leadership | Comments Off on 4 Life Lessons From A 4-Year-Old Skydiver
My 4-year-old niece went skydiving. Sounds mad doesn’t it? In my life I’ve taken a whole range of risks, be it while serving in the military in Afghanistan or flying a wingsuit formation from the north face of the Eiger. But letting my four-year-old niece jump from a plane is probably a bit too far. Not because jumping from a plane is that dangerous but at the age of four she wouldn’t be able to analyze the risks fully herself. I take calculated risks and that means understanding the risks, minimizing and mitigating them. So...
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Posted by Alastair Macartney on 14:30 in Adventure, Challenge, Comfort Zone, Risk | Comments Off on Are Trackers Going To Fill The BASE Fatality List in 2016?
Moving at high speed close to a stationary object is an incredibly intense experience. When you’re doing that while flying your body it’s an almost insane experience. But is it worth the risks? I’ve only got a few hundred wingsuit jumps in the mountains. My tracking experience is much more limited. Before I flew a wingsuit, most of my tracking was done slick (in street gear). I remember turning up to a heli-boogie one year and looked around the mountain top at about 60 other BASE jumpers. I was the only person up there to...
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Posted by Alastair Macartney on 06:30 in Challenge, Leadership | Comments Off on Impossible Leaps: Celebrating The Freedom Of The World War One Centenary
Impossible Leaps: Celebrating The Freedom Of The World War One Centenary I stepped up on the edge. I was nervous. I tried not to be. I wanted to appear cool, calm and collected. I needed to. But inwardly, my heart was racing. It quickened further. My breaths were shallow and fast. I knew precisely what to do. I’d been in these situations many times before. I smiled – try it, it works. My confidence returned, my heart beat started to slow and I regained my composure. But then I looked down. My toes were over the edge. It was...
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Posted by Alastair Macartney on 06:31 in Adventure, Challenge, Comfort Zone, Leadership | Comments Off on Behind The Scenes At TEDx Houses Of Parliament
Behind The Scenes At TEDx Houses Of Parliament It was almost exactly 12 months ago that my legs were shaking and my heart was pounding. My mouth had suddenly turned dry. I looked up to see a huge audience all staring at me, waiting for me to speak. It doesn’t matter how many times I leap out of planes, from the top of buildings or off the side of mountains, fear still hits you. Standing in front of an audience is one of those times. “I believe I can fly,” I half spurted out. The audience took one look at me and...
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Posted by Alastair Macartney on 04:50 in Adventure, Challenge, Comfort Zone, Risk | 5 comments
How Can Dogs Really Fly? Dogs really can fly. They’ve actually been doing it for years with a bit of human help. Earlier this week one of the National Geographic Adventurers of the Year Dean Potter released a video of his dog, Whisper, flying. Whisper is a 4-year-old mini Australian cattle dog and has accompanied Dean on many of his climbing adventures. Whisper now has about a dozen wingsuit BASE jumps to her name. But how ethical is taking a dog BASE jumping? While it’s ok for some humans to risk their own lives,...
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Posted by Alastair Macartney on 05:44 in Leadership | Comments Off on Memorial Day: What Does Freedom Mean To You?
What Does Freedom Mean To You? Leaping from mountains, flying my Jedei winguit through valleys, soaring past the circling birds and glancing across at my team mates just inches away is an almost indescribable experience. An experience that I live for. For me, it provides the ability to escape. Suddenly, I’m free from the stresses that life piles high upon my shoulders. It’s my personal form of meditation. The ultimate state of mindfulness that I have found. While flying my wingsuit, the truest form of human flight currently...
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Posted by Alastair Macartney on 12:02 in Adventure, Challenge, Leadership | Comments Off on Three Life Lessons I Learned By Leaping From the Eiger
Three Life Lessons I Learned By Leaping From the Eiger I was stood right on the very edge of the Eiger, the infamous mountain in the Swiss Alps. As I looked down, there was a plunging vertical drop of thousands of feet. I was perched above the north face – the sun didn’t penetrate here. The jagged rock below had that dark, menacing look. I took my final deep breath in, bent my knees and jumped. As a human flight specialist and wingsuit BASE jumper, leaping from the Eiger was like a dream come true. It had been an incredible...
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Posted by Alastair Macartney on 19:49 in Leadership | Comments Off on Does The Journey Count?
Does The Journey Count? At the end of last week we had 2 full days of snow. I then went to hike to the exit point for a BASE jump, cutting a new trail. I had my mini crampons on but I found myself, at times, chest deep in the snow. It made for slightly slow going. In BASE jumping, sometimes the journey is more important than the jump itself. While I love working in a dynamic team, sometimes time on your own, in isolation, in a beautiful place, with nothing else around you is priceless. For the first time in a long, long time I was...
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Posted by Alastair Macartney on 20:03 in Challenge | Comments Off on Beyond Impossible – Hover Boards and Back To The Future
Beyond Impossible – Hover Boards and Back To The Future Remember the Hover Board in Back To The Future Part II and Part III? Well now you can actually get one. A start-up company called HUVR CORP have invented the first real life Hover board, or so that say. They have some amazing people involved including the real Dr. Emmett Brown from the movie, Moby, Mark Cuban and others. Real Or Hoax? Their video (shown below) shows a bunch of clips of the HUVr board in action and it looks impressive. But is it real? I’m...
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Posted by Alastair Macartney on 17:00 in Challenge, Comfort Zone, Leadership, Risk | Comments Off on The Knowledge Protocol
The Knowledge Protocol Last month, at the British Parachute Association AGM, I shared The Knowledge Protocol. It’s a philosophy that I use as part of my plan to stay alive. In fact, I use it in all walks of life. The Knowledge Protocol is my philosophy, my theory and my approach to life. It took a while for me to understand it and even longer before I could deflate my over-inflated ego, suck it up and start to apply it. To this day, I still don’t always get it right, but by trying to apply it makes a large step...
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