A Tribute to Live Your Legend’s Scott Dinsmore

When I received an email from a friend letting me know that Scott Dinsmore died in a climbing accident, I was in disbelief. I receive his Live Your Legend email newsletters and had been tracking his yearlong journey around the world. He and his wife had been meeting with local Live Your Legend groups and were taking a break to climb Mt. Kilimanjaro. I had just read his newsletter describing his struggle to give himself permission to take a break from work to go on this climbing adventure.

Scott was young and had accomplished more than most people will in their lifetimes. He gave a wildly successful TEDx talk and created courses and materials that reached people across the globe. It is sad to think of how much more he could have done to change people’s lives, and how much more he had to experience in his own.

What made the news difficult for me to believe was that Scott had a huge persona and had impacted so many people that he seemed immortal. I thought about his work and his passion and couldn’t imagine that he is no longer writing, creating and posting pictures of himself looking straight into the camera with a wide, genuine smile.

In the past few days I’ve been reading messages posted by his friends and followers on a Facebook page that was created to pay respects to him and his family. The messages were sincere and heartfelt. People who met him in person considered him a friend and those who knew him virtually also expressed personal feelings of warmth and gratitude for what they learned from him.

For me, Scott both inspired and in some small ways irritated me! He was relentless in his pursuit of living a meaningful life and I deeply admire that. He bravely quit a job that wasn’t aligned to his values to create a business that he enjoyed and benefited others’ lives. In my much smaller way, I strive to do the same.

Where we differed was that he seemed to have boundless energy for exploring, meeting and interacting with people, and he comfortably lived out of a backpack while soaking in the stimulation of new experiences. I just…don’t. While I enjoy people and adventures, I need a lot of alone time as a counter-balance. The thought of interacting face-to-face with as many people as Scott met with open arms and focused attention makes me feel frazzled. I’m a firm believer in resting and taking breaks when my body tells me I need it, and then push harder to achieve my goals when I’m restored. Feeling grounded and at peace with my life is more important to me than achieving traditional measures of success – like strong book sales when I’m finally published or growing my business rapidly.

I imagine if I had ever met Scott in person and described this, he would have listened to me with curiosity and said something like “You do you – it’s your legend to live!”

His TEDx video will live on YouTube for as long as any of those videos remain. His website and programs may continue in some form or not. It may not be immortality, but his impact on me and others will last a long time.

Scott, you lived with intention and showed us how it can be done. Thanks for the inspiration.