Dave English | Inner Art of Airmanship Blog

Ageless aviator wisdom

AOPA Pilot magazine magazine has a great article by Dave Hirschman in the April edition about the Mavericks, four Florida pilots who fly formation aerobatics together. They are mostly in their mid-70’s. With long backgrounds in all kinds of flying. Ageless aviators with wisdom to spare: Just like artists or musicians, we’re constantly striving to master our craft, to try new things, to improve. Bob Gandt, 75, US Navy, Pan Am & Delta. I still get a rush of adrenaline whenever we fly. Ron Keilin, 78, thirty-five years of airshow aerobatic experience. No two flights are exactly the same. And … Continue reading Ageless aviator wisdom

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Monomaniacal focus

Monomaniacal focus and ridiculous levels of practice are the tools ordinary performers use to reach mastery.

Robin Sharma.

What is a pilot’s job?

By Dave English

[Mark Vanhoenacker] says his job is not “flying planes”, but “flying planes safely.” Skyfaring: A Journey with a Pilot is a new book on the magic of flight by a British Airways 747 pilot. It’s out now in the UK, coming to the US in June. Quote from story in New Statesman.

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I have everything to make me glad I am alive

Published in 1913, John Barleycorn is an autobiographical novel by Jack London. Chapter 36 has these wonderful lines. He was ‘bestride’ a horse, but in an airplane the inner game seems the same:

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Japanese running monks

“Enlightenment, the monk says, isn’t a point where everything stops and you’ve made it, forever surrounded by a halo of bliss. It is something alive, something that pushes you on every day, whether you are a Daigyoman Ajari on Mount Hiei or a data-management assistant in an office in Hounslow.”

Article in The Guardian on Japanese monks who run long-distance every day for 1000 days.