What does an adventurous life feel like?

from tragic skiing accidents to eating grapes off the vine, making the connection

note: this letter is the farthest thing from AI-created imaginable. love it or leave it.

Photo by Jesus Jimenez

Hi friends, starting today with this piece by my husband, Andrea Bizzocchi (written on September 16, 2025):

Yesterday afternoon, skier Matteo Franzoso passed away in a clinic in Santiago de Chile after two days in a coma. The Italian athlete, a handsome and vital 25 year old, was in Chile preparing for the season with other national teammates and fell last Saturday during a training session on the slopes of La Parva.

A little less than a year ago, the same fate befell 19-year-old. Matilde Lorenzi (as fate would have it, they both trained at the same Sestriere ski club, but that's beside the point). The girl's sister commented "angrily" that "you can't go skiing and not come home" and that "there's no such thing as fate or misfortune" for a professional.

Aside from the obvious sadness at the loss of a young life and the grief the family members must endure, I honestly can't understand.

Skiing is a dangerous sport. You descend on two 10-cm-wide boards at speeds of over 150 km/h to shave a fraction of a second off your time. You are at the limit and even the slightest irregularity in the terrain (do we want to blame the terrain for being uneven?) or error by the athlete (in life, errors also exist) can be fatal.

This must be anticipated, and I believe every athlete (skiers, drivers, motorcyclists, mountain climbers, etc.) is perfectly aware that while performing their activity (especially if potentially dangerous) they can lose their lives…

“I go to the mountains for an adventure and each time I pray I will get up and down again.” - Reinhold Messner

just as a truck driver or a construction worker can die at work, or any of us can be hit by a car while crossing a pedestrian crossing.

And if we go for a hike in the mountains, we can fall into a ravine or be caught in bad weather. And if we go for a walk in the woods, a viper can bite us or a wolf can eat us. At any moment and in any situation in life (especially in civil and urban life, given what our cities have become today), we can lose our lives because, like it or not, this is life.

You can't eliminate risk, not just from skiing or any other physical activity, but from Life itself. Being alive puts us at risk of dying. And it's an absurd, even anti-life, claim to do so.

But when I write these things, I'm talking about Life and Nature; I understand that a modernized, urbanized, techno-idiotized society is incapable of understanding this. Most people don't see the daily, moment to moment risks they take as humans just living like most humans do today.¹

---

a moment of reflection

1. In our ordinary lives, what extraordinary risks do we normally take and accept as normal, and what normal risks (of life) do we experience as extraordinary?

2. How does our perception of what is normal and what is extraordinary affect the way we live our lives?

I dream of a world where being a winner means being the best at ‘doing’ and ‘being’ love.

the pressures of sports today, the pressure of being the best, and fear

I find it crazy that in a world like ours people still seek popularity and success. How is it possible that most of us still want to be the best, that we want to win (in the way that it means that someone else has to lose)?

I am not the right human to speak about this. I do not have a competitive bone in my body. Well, a small one between me and myself - but with others, zero. Because honestly, if it is gonna make you happy, I want you to take me down.

When

Shannon Bindler

wrote: “You can't compete with me. I want you to win too.” - I restacked with the comment: So me, too.

I also find it insane, unexplainable, and every other word to say absurd, that life coaches motivating us to create lots of money and fame, still have jobs.

Money, fame, popularity, the best…. ???? - for what, when the world is burning down and loneliness, depression, and anxiety have become global epidemics.

I mean the world needs the exact opposite right now. We need human-to-human support systems in place. We need core values. We need love. We need healthier goals. Without them, we truly risk everything, including really living, really loving. We risk dying slowly inside - actually from my humble view, I see that we are dying really quickly.

We are being enveloped by speed and fear. Everyone. All ages.

What does this have to do with Matteo and his tragic accident? Am I getting off point? Not really. I have always said that we need a 360 degree view of the situation; we need to connect the dots.

In this world, the goal for athletes and every other human seeking success is to train towards a body and mind that can keep going and going and never runs out - remember the Energizer Bunny? - to train oneself out of being anything similar to human, someday battery operated?

“We live in a world that rewards toughness — detachment, irony, coolness under pressure.” -

Susan Cain

another moment of reflection

1. What does it mean to really live our lives? Only you can answer this for you, but are you?

“You answer texts and make dentist appointments and still care about how many steps you walked. That’s Olympic-level coping. Impressive stuff.

They don’t give medals for surviving late-stage capitalism with your soul semi-intact, but they should… -

Karen Salmansohn

(think. think. think. connect.)

So back to Matteo Franzoso’s death…

“It is a tragedy for the family and for our sport," FISI President Flavio Roda said in a statement. A drama that brings us back to the state of mind of just under a year ago, when Matilde Lorenzi passed away. It is absolutely necessary to do everything possible to ensure that such episodes do not happen again."

And Kristian Ghedina, another great skier says regarding Franzoso's tragedy: “Modern skiing is too fast; it is time for change.”

I wonder, is this really possible, in a world like ours? Because what is the goal of sports today, especially if it is connected with everything else?

underlying question: What are we being told sold as the main goal of life?

I have my personal opinions about dangerous sports (briefly, I am not a fan. Not because I do not believe in personal choice, but with all the ways they are conditioned and pressured (and this includes competitive school athletics (and our kids)), are athletes choosing for themselves?

Time for change…

This echos in my heart, along with these questions:

1. Are any of us choosing for ourselves?

2. How many people actually slow down and take the time to know themselves intimately enough to know what THEY want, REALLY? What they need to feel alive, REALLY?

3. Why don’t they we?

Many of my family’s life changes (which began in 2004 when I was preganant with my first daughter, Kenia, but probably even before that) were made to move towards simpler and definitely slower. My husband and I were extremely deliberate about this - we didn't want to risk missing life, missing time with our daughters, our parents, our people… we didn’t want to miss our passions. We have become very self-yes! about our time.

However, I admit that with how quickly everything changes, even for us, it is getting more and more challenging to stay in this healthy zone.

Funny (not funny) how technology is promoted as a time-saver when our time is being completely and increasingly consumed by technology.

I could go on and on about this need to slow down, to re-find equilibrium, to make thinking with one’s own mind a daily focus. I could explain my ideas better and my thinking process…

… but… it is your work

I am not here to spell it all out, to create a full picture. I am purposely offering you fragments and pieces. A little because I will never claim to have the answers to life (or anything except maybe that love is truly the answer to everything) And a lot because I really do want you to formulate your own thoughts.

Connecting the dots requires each one of us to do our own work. Growth requires this too. This is how my husband and I parent our daughters. This is how we re-parent ourselves. And this is one of the main goals of our living practice: To rediscover our own mind and sweetly stretch it like we are slowly, but steadily pulling homemade taffy all day long.

“Daily practice looks small. Most mornings, or in between meetings, I still sit formally, scanning every inch of my body. Other days I don’t.

Some days it comes walking the streets of Lisbon, noticing air on my face. Or simply stirring a bowl of food, catching the spark of irritation when it spills. The form shifts.” -

Bryan Kramer

what does your daily practice look like? please share

I have been hearing a lot of fear around me these past days - hearing, observing, sensing - about so many things - local violence, bullying in school, marital difficulties, parenting, illness, getting to the end of the month financially (and emotionally), the speed of everything, complicated systems, injustice, isolation and separation everywhere, the world, the talk of civil war in the U.S….

valid issues.

What is the solution? Because as

Cody Taymore

wrote in Notes last week: How the f*ck are we still coping? to which many basically replied: we aren’t.

We aren’t coping when we are afraid of almost everything and almost everything does not feel like our choice. When it feels like life is racing by and we lost our safety belt.

The practice is small. It is simple. It is slow.

It is a starting again and again and again.

“Start again. Start again. Not a scolding, but an invitation. Start again when you drift. Start again when you fail. Start again when you forget.” -

Bryan Kramer

(from the essay, When The Noise Devours You)

restart here

When we lose our way, we are losing it because we are fearing more than we are loving: ourselves, our passions, our dreams, our desires, our lives.

I have voice inside of me luring me to just love life. Nothing big. Nothing impressive. Nothing to grow or show. Small, simple being and loving. This is the greatest adventure you seek.

We are fearing more than we are loving when we choose to speed through life, when we choose to take the risks that do not add to the adventure of life, when we follow someone else’s rules because we need to prove ourselves in this life, because we need proof of life.

When we need this type of proof of life, we are not living. We are fearing a life that does not involve accomplishments and acknowledgement for those accomplishments. We are always chasing something, but it doesn’t resemble the free feeling of adventure.

Maybe we have forgotten (or haven't understood yet) that the only thing we need to do is to truly love who we are, what we are doing, and where we are right now.

Living a life where we do not have to prove anything can feel uncomfortable and risky; there is adventure in simply being comfortable with your ordinary, not flashy, extremely messy at times life.

Reminder: Moving out of a comfort zone can look like going over a speed bump: slowing down to almost 0/km

The daily practice is simple. The daily practice is simple. The daily practice is simple.

Start again; start from a place of love, maybe with just a question like this one:

(a prompt) suggestion: do this with pen and paper.

If I could let go of my fear, if I could trust that what I feel in my heart is right for me, then what could I hold space for, what would grow, what would be given space to unfold?

(you may be surprised with the answer. I was.)

Fear is a life-sucker. It tells you to follow others because you cannot trust yourself. Love, trust, connection, compassion, joy, beauty, true natural adventure… and all the other core values are life-saviors, life-responders, life-bloomers.

If I let go of my worries, my fears about what I am not doing and the things that I cannot possibly control, what extra energy would I have, what kind of energy would I have, what has room to unfold in it's place?

last words

Fear feeds on regret. Regret grows from not being true to yourself. When you love yourself, you are balanced enough to make the best choices for your life; you know where to put your energy, you know that this is all the proof you need. And you arrive at the end of your life - no matter when it arrives - feeling satisfied and fearless.

this all to say… know the sources of your fear…

the extreme adventure, the extreme sports, the extreme need to be validated, the extreme world events, constantly looking outside of ourselves for solutions,

Glovo! - anything delivered, anywhere, anytime (this!),

our constant consumption of material things, food/alcohol, drugs, tv, thoughts and opinions, noise, modified air, artificial light, images, clips & stories, information… so many distractions…

---

(I recently read (sorry, I can't remember where) that maybe - just maybe - we are not supposed to receive moment to moment information from around the world…

(bless those who only knew what was going on in their little village and maybe the one right next to them 20 miles away)

we were not created to be always on and available, traceable… we were not created to live in overwhelm. not maybe: we were not created for this.)

---

anything that requires us to live at unnatural speed…

(I can so get into an AI conversation here…

as I replied to

Don Boivin

in a Note:

..to think, I still think that I should be writing on paper and that the computer stole from us as reflective writers. I don’t want to write quickly or perfectly. AI… 😟😓😫

but I won’t add this now)

it is all connected.

It is all connected.

Know the sources of your fear and eliminate as many as you can from your life.

Life is risky. Truly living and feeling alive requires us to risk. However, if your risks are being made to create an identity and from a need to be seen, if they are an attempt to fill some form of emptiness, if they are being forced upon you, you are risking for the wrong reasons.

An adventurous, vital life has nothing to do with fast and extreme living. It has nothing to do with anyone else but you and you doing what feels necessary for you to love your life.

These things are usually smaller, slower, and more simple than the system wants us to believe.

I know that this letter is all over the place. AI would have probably been very useful here - properly positioned and polished (me) up. But friends, I prefer the mess. I am willing to risk the unsubscribes and you not reading this. But if you are here, please share some thoughts with me.

From Notes: We are all grieving a world that is no longer here. For our choices, greatly without our choice. If you don't know why you are feeling low on energy, lost, lonely… this is grief.

Our lives are always more anti-Life. I know this is such a incredibly strong statement. Feel free to disagree please. But if you do agree…

an invitation/reminders

1. keep trying to connect it all together. It will eventually bring you to a deeper sense of connection and clarity.

2. reach out human to human, human to what is alive… as often as possible. commit yourself to touching real life.

3. once a day write for only you. and write it on paper.

4. slow down, turn off the information, get to know yourself intimately (this is the only thing you truly need to be knowledgeable about), get to know what you need - what (place your beautiful name here) needs - and make your intention to feel love-full, wonderfully full… not perfect, not the best, not to receive anything from anyone. just for you. with time, notice how this calms your nervous system and soothes the fear.

5. we can't do anything about the world going crazy, but each one of us can do everything possible to make our little part of the world sane. let’s do this.

6. take care of beautifully human you, please!

   ---

From Notes: I need a break from words. Too much information everywhere. If you are feeling this too, I am reminding us that it is healthy and necessary to step away and stop consuming. Love to you.

a confession

as I was writing this letter, my mind felt like it was on fire several times. the every cell burning to ash kind. I had to stop and get away from my screens (I often work on both laptop and smartphone at the same time) and be a human doing nothing. I had to just breathe and be.

I had to remember what is enough because all of the rest is too much.

I had to touch grass and look at trees, watch my dog lick her paw. I had to eat grapes straight from the vine. I am so thankful for grape season. I had to remind myself that this was healthy and normal. I had to. I just had to… because going back to invitation #6: we are beautifully human before all else - Nature worth protecting and preserving, worth truly connecting with…

beautiful human me: something that I do not want to risk losing ever.

my (very human) heart reaching out towards yours, xo Danni

ps If you feel like listening to more, here is a very spontaneous conversation with my husband about fast sports and fast living:

---

some of my favorites this week to stretch our minds and/or lighten our hearts

• Listeners Can’t Remember The Names Of Their Favorite Songs and Artists by

  Ted Gioia

• Last Week Broke America. Then I Remembered Why I Teach by

  Summer Koester

• What Substack Needs More Than Anything by

  Linda Caroll

• You know that charming story about the two wolves? It's a lie. by

  Linda Caroll

• A Great Longing Is Upon Us, To Live Again In A World Made Of Gifts by

  Justyna Teresa Cyrankiewicz

• Feeling Safe In A World That Isn’t by

  Diamond-Michael Scott

• No Small Thing by

  James Crews

• This Note by

  Amanda Saint

  and if you missed these by me

  A pause for the heart: keeping it sweet, but also real

  Feeling anxious is not a flaw

  a sunday mind, heart & soul scroll

1. essay by Andrea Bizzocchi, original title: by Andrea Bizzocchi, original title: LA NON ACCETTAZIONE DELLA MORTE È UNO DEI GRANDI DRAMMI DELLA MODERNITÀ, published on his Telegram group, LIVE WITH BIZZO.