Recently a good friend said to me, “You have a unique ability to hold your breath in an upside-down kayak.” He’s not wrong. I’ve spent some time underwater.

In 2006, on a kayaking expedition in South America, I had an experience in which I came out of my kayak on a notorious stretch of river—a stretch I later learned had claimed the lives of others before me. It was sobering and scary, and when I emerged from the river I thought it would be a while before I got into a kayak again. But the next day, when I walked back to look at the roiling, flood-stage section of water that nearly took my life, I sensed that I had somehow been carried. The phenomenal message was clear: You are capable of much more; you can go bigger. It was a deep moment of spiritual knowing that stayed with me.