Chasing Tornados – Brian Spencer, Ep. 77

Podcast about chasing tornados with storm chaser, Brian Spencer.

Ever thought about chasing tornados? Can you imagine dreaming about doing such a thing? 

Today’s guest, Brian Spencer, sure has. And his story is a great example of how to mix passion and perseverance with patience by living the kind of story that you don’t hear every day.

Whatever it is you’re dreaming of, how willing are you to go into the storm and then wait for what you want? Because that’s exactly what Brian did.

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Known as the “Canadian Storm Chaser,” Brian loves chasing tornadoes. And I don’t mean metaphorical emotional storms (though, like anyone else, he’s been through his share of those too). I mean that, once he discovered he held a fascination with the power and ferocity nature sometimes unleashes in the form of tornadoes, he was determined to get as close to them as possible. Well he has, and you’re going to hear about it today.

Brian is also a successful business person, operator of a company called Streaming Incorporated while also continuing to serve as creator and curator of a very popular website called PearlJamLive.com . I won’t go into too much detail on those things here, because Brian does that in the conversation you’re about to here. Suffice it to say, there seems to me to be a thread of curiosity, passion, connection, challenge, perseverance and patience that run through all aspects of Brian’s story, and the lesson is (I think) that in order to catch our dreams, we sometimes have to be willing to chase a storm or two and also be willing to wait for things to develop – or not – in their own time.

Here are the few key takeaways from my time with Brian:

1. Perseverance – At one point when he was describing how he was reaching out to the storm chasing team without hearing anything back for a period of over 4 years, I asked him, how did you know not to give up? His answer was, “I don’t understand what that means.” He shared about a similar scenario in earning the business of one of his current clients for his streaming company, which took 13 years to finally come together. These are two great examples of the perseverance it takes to finally reach a reward. Things don’t always come quickly. Most often, they don’t.
2. Awe & Respect – Brian’s respect for the power of nature and how he kept using words like “beautiful” and “gorgeous” to describe something that is inherently violent was intriguing to me. Though a tornado is a rather violent thing, it is also a truly natural thing, and I found Brian’s attraction to the natural, powerful side of it quite interesting, as we are all drawn to something for reasons all our own.
3. An Alchemy of Interests – It always fascinates me, how if you dive deeply enough into somebody’s story, you can see the common threads even in things that sound as disjointed as, for instance, chasing tornados, running an online streaming business and a love of rock and roll music. But as you’ll hear, there is an obvious alchemy to all of it as it relates to Brian’s journey, just as there must be to yours, as well.

Here is Brian Spencer, the “Canadian (storm) Chaser”  on Journeys with the No Schedule Man: