ABOUT

Hi, I’m Duane Nelson

I created this site to share insights essential to living our best life. The core question I explore through my work is, “How can we come alive?” 

When my father died in 2022, I came across a letter written to me from my grandfather on May 25, 1958. He didn’t realize it would be his last. It is a call to the great adventure of being alive. I share this letter with you with the same call and feeling.

Black and white photo of a modern wooden house on a grassy hill with a lake and mountains in the background.
A black and white landscape with a stone pathway, large rocks, bushes, a distant fence, rolling hills, and a mountain range in the background.

A LETTER FROM MY GRANDFATHER

Dear Duane: 

I’m so glad you arrived a year ago last October. From that moment on you began to give your mother and father an incomparable feeling of pride and happiness, and this feeling will never end. 

You are living in a home and a world that wants you, needs you, and loves you. It is a great adventure, being alive, for this is a wondrous world – beautiful, exciting, mysterious, challenging… 

This world is your oyster, lad. It will keep you busy, for yours must be a never-ending quest for love, for beauty, for dignity, and pride.

These things are your birthright, Duane – but you must seek them out. It is this quest which will fill your life, your mind. It will be an exciting one, and in the questing you will make this a better place in which to be alive. Congratulations upon your fine start in life. And thanks, too.

From Your Grandfather.

Clarence J. Walk

FAQ

Black and white landscape of a lake surrounded by rolling hills and mountain ranges in the background.

  • “People say that we are seeking a meaning of life. I don’t think this is what we’re really seeking. I think what we’re seeking is an experience of being alive, so that our life experiences on the purely physical plane will have resonances with our own innermost being and reality, so that we actually feel the rapture of being alive.” —Joseph Campbell

    The key discovery from my experimentation is that everything evolves. Our consciousness and wisdom evolve throughout our lives. Transformative experiments, flywheels, and habits are essential tools to the evolution of consciousness. This evolution is the opportunity for what Joseph Campbell calls the “Hero’s Journey” in his book, The Hero With a Thousand Faces. The hero’s journey is the adventure quest to come alive through wholehearted living and flourish through the storms of life. It describes every hero and every individual in terms of their evolution of consciousness.

    Campbell explores the hero’s journey across all world cultures and identifies three primary phases: Departure, Initiation, and Return

  • For the departure phase, the hero experiences the call to adventure by some spark of curiosity and begins their quest to escape the cave of ignorance and lead an extraordinary life of joy.

  • The initiation phase presents the hero with the “road of trials” which tests the hero’s mettle and results in new understanding and a higher level of feeling alive once they escape the cave.

  • The return phase involves the hero being transformed by the experience and returning to the cave to share their insights with their loved ones and friends.

  • The hero does not initially have the wisdom and skills to navigate each phase. Personal experimentation is required to discover the transformative paradigms, flywheels, and habits necessary. However, the hero does have the essential DNA (Deoxyribonucleic Acid) to learn and grow. DNA is a double helix molecule essential for development, functioning, and growth of all organisms. Similar to molecular DNA, Ultrajourney Hero DNA is a conceptual construct that contains the essential tools for the hero’s journey.

  • Books changed my life and are fundamental to life-long learning. The Hero’s Ultrajourney Guide contains three books. They contain epic secrets of the sages in the form of simple & vital habits to ignite the adventure of a lifetime. Readers customize these habits to their unique lives through transformative experiments, flywheels, and tools.

    Book 1: Published in 2023, The Hero’s Ultrajourney Into Your Soul provides six simple & vital habits for igniting the adventure of a lifetime during the departure phase of the hero’s journey. Transformative experiments, flywheels, and tools specific to this phase help you customize habits unique to your path.

    Book 2: Published in 2025, Ultrajourney Insight: Seven Habits to Escape Plato’s Cave, will help you to navigate the road of trials, escape the cave of ignorance, and live the life you designed.

    Book 3: The third Hero’s Ultrajourney Guide book is under development and contains key habits in the return phase. The experiments in the last book will help you share your transformation insights with loved ones and friends from your personal hero’s journey.

    If you are intrigued about proven experiments to discover what helps you come alive and design your best life, The Hero’s Ultrajourney Guide will be a powerful life-enhancing tool for you.