The Moody Area Chamber of Commerce hosted Kent Stewart as their guest speaker on Thursday, March 14, who spoke about the Power of Insane Goals. 

Stewart, Birmingham resident and CEO of Reli Title, shared how he and his wife had never done anything spectacular and had not traveled very much.  He was interviewed one time and the interviewer titled the session, “The Power of Insane Goals.” He later adopted the title for his speaking engagements. 

At that time, Stewart really didn’t know what an insane goal was.  “An insane goal is any goal you set that is so ridiculous that you think it is impossible to reach,” said Stewart. He learned by accident and encourages others to set one insane goal that could change your life.

“Life’s too short to concentrate on goals that are not life-changing,” says Stewart. 

If Stewart had found a genie in 2005 who said, “Ok, Kent, in ten years you would be climbing Mount Everest, the highest mountain in the world,” he would have thought you were crazy.  In April 2013, Stewart was almost killed in an earthquake that caused an avalanche and explosion.  Eighteen people were killed and others injured, but he was spared as he was preparing his second attempt to conquer the mountain. 

How this revolutionary decision came about:  Stewart and his wife were at a party and heard people talking about mountain climbing.  His wife said, “We need to do something crazy like that.”  With their history of never traveling, she planned a trip for them to climb a small mountain.  When, the pictures came back, they forgot about the excessive cold temperatures and pain.  Later, Stewart happened to be in a book store and picked up a book on mountain climbing.  The couple then began their mountain climbing journey with the goal to climb all seven summits.  To date, he has climbed the highest mountain on six different continents including Russia, Antarctica, Australia, Argentina, China and India with two failed attempts for Mount Everest. 

Stewart shared details about the first time the couple hired tour guides earlier in their journeys.  They had never worn ropes or been on a glacier before and hired two guides who spoke no English, except for the words “Easter Bunny.”  Every decision on the trip was wrong. They wanted to quit, but couldn’t communicate to their guides so they took it day by day, still trying to quit daily.  The climb was eventually accomplished and the Stewarts were so glad they endured.  This taught them a valuable life principle that you don’t have to have a perfect plan.  You just have to take your first step. 

It’s very interesting that Kent has a fear of heights and has never been on a Ferris wheel.  He’s also never been on a ladder to get on the roof, yet he came to the place in his climbing career that he didn’t have a choice with ladders on the mountains. 

“The bigger the goal, the bigger the commitment has to be.  Most people fail, not for lack of desire or ability, but due to a lack of commitment,” says Stewart.

One of the highlights of their journey during one of their climbs, the Stewarts were the two highest people on the planet in one moment of time.  After five of the seven summits while Kent was in Denali, he realized that some things require self-discipline in addition to motivation.  He then discovered the difference between motivation and self-discipline. 

“Motivation makes you think you can burst through walls, but without self-discipline one soon fizzles out,” said Stewart.  “Motivation is designed to get you started, but it doesn’t keep you going. Self-discipline is developing good daily habits which equals more success.  A lot of people are motivated, but haven’t developed the habits.  Self-discipline means doing what you don’t want to do when you don’t want to do it.  Keep doing those small things that you don’t want to do and keep going to develop good daily habits so they become so automatic that you don’t have to think about them.  It just becomes autopilot.”

Stewart realized that he had to train to be successful in his climbing.  He gets up now and automatically goes to the gym.  He no longer has to wrestle with the decision.  “Good habits need to be automatic so there is no decision to make,” says Stewart.

Stewart also recommends an accountability partner and says, “Accountability is the glue between a goal. Don’t waste your failures, but learn from them.”  

Each time he failed a goal, he tried to learn from the experience, took time to evaluate what went wrong and used that knowledge on the next goal.  He almost sabotaged himself at Denali so he wouldn’t have to go on to Mount Everest.  Stewart thinks we do this all the time and sabotage our successes. 

“Most people regret what they didn’t do and not the things they actually did when looking back on regrets,” said Stewart.

His journey to climb Mount Everest included work to be really, really ready.  He slept in an oxygen tent at home in 2014 in preparation to climb Mount Everest, when 30 minutes prior to the climb, a huge block of ice had broken and killed two people.  Stewart returned in 2015 and thought this was going to be the year, but the earthquake happened and the summit was cancelled.  In 2016, he was about to attempt the summit when he began having chest pains and was taken to the hospital where he underwent open-heart surgery to repair three major heart blockages.  Stewart was very disappointed about missing his goal of Mount Everest, but even after surgery he kept up his training even though he had nothing to train for.

Stewart didn’t give up and is leaving in a few short weeks to see what happens this year.  Even if he doesn’t reach the goal, he would not have traveled, met so many people, traveled 64 countries, helped with rescue efforts, wouldn’t have known he had heart blockages and might have dropped dead of a heart attack, he told the crowed at the MACC luncheon.

He realizes that most people don’t reach their goals because their goals are too big, but because their goals are too small.  Stewart encourages everyone to set just one unrealistic insane goal and work to achieve it and see how life changes. 

“Commit fully and completely.  Don’t wait for the perfect plan and just get rolling,” Stewart said. “Develop your daily habits, get an accountability partner and never waste a failure.  Until we decide to do the impossible, we will never know what our limits are.”

For more information about Kent Stewart, please visit his Facebook page, Kent Stewart – Seven Summits.  If you would like more information about Moody Area Chamber of Commerce, please visit www.moodyalchamber.com.