…something about the painful combination of triumph and tragedy, of loss and spectacular gain, of progress and its cost. Something about the promise of our democratic ideals, a promise put to the test in the wilderness just beyond what was then our country. Something about friendship and trust and love. Something about a beginning and an ending all at the same time. Lewis and Clark get under your skin.” — Storytellers and filmmakers Dayton Duncan and Ken Burns

Trailblazing happens in a plethora of contexts — marriage, parenthood, profession, leadership, community, innovation and entrepreneurship, and all forms of discovery. We are designed to be curious, to seek what lays beyond the horizon, to be enthralled by questions that begin with “what if,” to take risks, deal with uncertainty.  

My experience has pointed to the need to identify legends, models and authentic heroes to show the way. Beginning with the lessons from a middle school teacher, I have found inspiration from the journey of Lewis and Clark. Theirs was an epic adventure undertaken with great hope and without certainty of success. They had to know that the experience would be fraught with challenge and danger; nonetheless, the risks were overshadowed by the possibilities. Their 28-month odyssey offers many lessons to contemporary trailblazers. I point you to five in particular:

Go against the current. Their journey was not a float trip, but a struggle against a current that wanted to push them back to the banks of perceived safety. The Corps of Discovery encountered resistance on nearly every step of that 8,000-mile experience. I have wondered so often what was going on inside each of them — those private thoughts of doubt, a desire to be freed from the effort, elements, extreme circumstances and the reckoning with oneself to find the determination to keep moving. The magnetism of their story and of ours is rooted in the capacity to embrace the grind.

Don’t underestimate the bears. In April 1804, after killing a grizzly bear, Lewis journaled, “in the hands of a skilled rifleman, they are by no means as formidable or dangerous as they have been represented.”  

However, as Duncan and Burns pointed out, “Over the next two months, grizzlies would chase the explorers across prairies, through willow thickets, and back into the river again and again.” Every worthy quest will be dotted with danger, and can only be completed by acknowledging the real risks and learning to deal with them.

The planned route will only take you so far. Lewis planned and operated from the incorrect belief there was a waterway that would take them all the way to the Pacific. The day came when they ran out of water and had to find a new way. While disappointing, the need to pivot, correct course and find creative solutions is necessary to the process of discovery.

Assistance will come from unexpected sources. The men who composed Lewis and Clark’s expeditionary team were hearty and experienced outdoorsmen. However, they would on many occasions be assisted and, in several situations, saved by the generous efforts of native people. Lewis and Clark operated from the philosophy that achieving their mission was to build relationships and to do their level best to avoid burning bridges. This is a monumental lesson with deep value in our time.

There will be mountains. On many occasions the expedition was confident that an easier path to the Pacific lay just around the corner or past the next ridge, only to be greeted with the sight of more formidable terrain. Those were times of intense discouragement, as were the seasons when the descent of winter brought their progress to a standstill. It was the power of stoic fortitude, patience and nearly superhuman resilience that sustained them.

While we might never pick up an oar on a keelboat headed north on the Missouri, whatever undertaking we have chosen can be informed by the undaunted courage of those who first blazed the trail.  

Editor’s note: Tom Field is a rancher from Parlin, Colo., and the director of the Engler Agribusiness Entrepreneurship Program at the University of Nebraska–Lincoln.