Choose The Woods with Shaun Ridder

·1 hr 24 min·5 clips

Shaun Ridder reveals how a near-fatal kayak fishing accident forced him to completely reevaluate his non-stop, content-driven life.

The episode features an interview with Shaun Ridder, a media professional and avid outdoorsman. Host Eric Clark welcomes Shaun, noting his past role hosting 'Campo Chaos' on the network. Shaun recounts a September incident on the Wisconsin River during a kayak fishing tournament. After mechanical issues, he was loading his kayak when his foot slipped, causing his F-150 to roll backward into the water, running over his leg. He swam to retrieve his phone, called 911 and his wife, and was taken to the hospital but broke nothing. The truck and his MacBook were lost. Shaun explains this near-death experience forced him to stop his go-go lifestyle. He began medication for anxiety, which he describes as quieting the noise without changing his identity. He took the entire following hunting and fishing season off, which helped him detach his identity from those activities. Shaun discusses prioritizing intentional time with his family, like using 'garbage time' car rides for connection. He advocates for a '1% better' daily improvement philosophy. The conversation also covers hunting anecdotes, including a windy day where he missed a buck and a story about jumping from a tree to avoid a dangerous climb. Shaun talks about his renewed approach to fishing tournaments and a new initiative with St. Jude Children's Research Hospital called 'Love Bass, Stop Cancer.' The episode concludes with reflections on avoiding gatekeeping in hunting knowledge and the value of analog moments in a digital world.

As heard by us

A relaxed hunting conversation about the outdoors, compass sense, and getting back home.

Sean Ritter comes across as someone who has chosen the pull of the outdoors and, with it, a quieter life when he is not out in the woods. The conversation works best when it settles into useful, human-scale details: shaky navigation after dark, the reassurance of a compass, the…

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Why you'd press play

Press play for nighttime land nav, homebody honesty, and a marsh-side compass-versus-apps conversation.

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