I have a bunch of stories from back in the day when I used to guide trout fishermen. In these letters, you've probably read a few already.

Although I wasn't guiding this particular day, I was fishing with my buddy Chad and we stopped at an island in the middle of the river to try and catch a few rainbow trout.

We took my boat. When we got to this island, I let out a bunch of anchor line and put the anchor on the bank behind a rock. Totally secure.

First misjudgment.

I walked upstream—second bad idea—while Chad walked to the bottom of the island. His dog sat on the cooler we had near the bow of the driftboat and watched us.

Soon the dog watched Chad as she floated down the river past him. I tossed my rod and my pack on the island as I saw my boat bobbing slowly down river. I started running—hard to do in waders and boots in the middle of a river.

Soon, I couldn't touch. I started swimming—terrible idea, really.

I almost grabbed the anchor line. Missed.

Should I have drowned? Many people think so. But I'm still here to tell the tale...

With me freestyling after the boat, some other anglers saw me and rowed after me to save me, I guess. Chad already hitched a ride with them.

I grabbed on to the starboard gunwale of this boat, but couldn't pull myself up.

My waders had filled up with water and I probably weighed close to double my normal weight. Plus I was gassed. I'm a terrible swimmer and I was doing my best Hasselhoff impression.

So I just hung on.

My boat, with the dog still on board and still sitting attentively on the cooler, had come to rest in a back-eddy probably a mile or two down stream. The anchor had probably slowed it down and steered it enough so that it didn't capsize or keep on going further downriver.

The nice fellows dropped us off near the boat. I emptied my waders, got the boat and anchored it—properly. I made Chad stay with the boat this time. I walked about forever to go back and get the tackle I had thrown on to the island.

Up the bank, crossed. Had to swim again.

Found my rod and my tackle pack, but also lost a bunch of fly boxes with probably $300 or more worth of trout flies and the boxes themselves. I had no idea where I threw them. Somebody probably got a nice treat.

I swam back across the channel to the bank. Walked back down to the boat. "We're done fishing for the day," I said and then rowed it several more miles down to the boat ramp.

All ended up fine. I got my exercise and I learned a few valuable lessons.

I didn't drown.

Comes an old piece of wisdom:

So, we keep on moving.

In my case, I had to swim. Perhaps that's my aversion to even getting in the pool much these days?

PTSD or something like that.

The key was that I didn't stay there in the water. I didn't even consider that an option.

Such it is with life. Forward momentum. That's what we're doing in O'Leary's Inner Sphere—a series of virtual masterminds we're developing for folks who want to focus on their passion and make it profitable.

And thanks to a couple technical snafus of my own, I'm keeping the signup page open until tomorrow evening.

Sign up to be notified when registration is opening. (There are a few more technical things for me to deal with before we're full speed ahead.)

No risk, plus I'll send you a bonus guide on identifying if you are an "expert" or not. You'd be surprised... you probably are one.

As always,

Brian

P.S. — I forgot to mention that I ran out of fuel on the way back home that night. What a delicious cherry on top of that sundae.