EPISODE NOTES
In this soulful and scenic episode, recorded amidst mountain winds coming off of Lake McLeod in the Eastern Sierra, host Bob Preston sits down with longtime friend and nature photographer Alan Kassan. In retirement, Alan traded his career and office life for wide-open skies, rugged alpine trails, and a custom Sprinter van built for adventure. Together, they explore what it means to retire with intention and purpose —not away from something, but boldly toward a life filled with passion, creativity, and connection to the natural world. From the Sierra Nevada to Yosemite to the eastern edge of Highway 395, Alan shares how the road became his teacher, his retreat, photography studio, and his canvas.
Themes:
1. Retiring Toward Something Meaningful Alan’s journey illustrates the mindset shift that makes retirement transformative: choosing purpose over pause, exploration over stagnation, and curiosity over comfort.
2. The Sierra Nevada as a Source of Healing and Identity With time spent in Mammoth, Yosemite Valley, Tuolumne Meadows, and Mono Lake, Alan reflects on how the mountains, alpine lakes, and desert light shaped his sense of self in this chapter of life.
3. Roaming with a Purpose Alan dives into nature while traveling in his customized Sprinter van—off-grid camping, favorite routes along Highway 395, the challenges behind the scenic Instagram moments, and the incredible payoff of waking up exactly where inspiration strikes.
4. Photography as a Passion Photography became more than a hobby—it became a new identity that gave Alan structure, creativity, and personal meaning in retirement. He shares how being behind the camera helped him slow down, pay attention, and live more mindfully.
5. Beginning a Creative Journey at Any Age For listeners dreaming about writing, painting, photographing, or building something new, Alan offers grounded, heartfelt advice: Start small. Start messy. Just start.
Key Takeaways:
1. Retirement Is a Beginning, Not an Ending Letting go of a career opens space for reinvention, self-discovery, and ambitious personal adventures.
2. Purpose Lives in the Things That Light You Up Your passion—whether photography or something entirely different—isn’t frivolous. It’s fuel.
3. Nature Can Reset Your Compass The solitude of the Sierras offered Alan clarity, grounding, and joy—reminding us that reconnecting with the outdoors often reconnects us with ourselves.
4. Freedom Has Both Challenges and Rewards Off-grid camping demands resilience, planning, and adaptability. But the payoff—still mornings, quiet forests, star-filled skies—is worth every obstacle.
5. Creativity Thrives When You Give It Space Retirement can finally give you the time your creative pursuits always deserved. Let that be an invitation, not an intimidation.
Notable Moments:
- Alan’s “aha” moment that pushed him toward retirement
- Designing a Sprinter van to stay off-grid in the Eastern Sierra
- Navigating Highway 395 seasonally for wildlife and weather
- Alan’s favorite campsite stories (without giving away his secret spots!)
- How photography became a spiritual and emotional practice
- The eternal debate: sunrise or sunset?
- The one photo he still dreams of capturing
Call to Action:
If this episode inspires you, take an intentional step toward something that sparks curiosity or joy. Whether it’s a creative pursuit, a new outdoor habit, or simply exploring a passion you’ve put off—start today.
Check out Alan’s photography: https://www.aklightplay.com
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TRANSCRIPT
Bob: 0:28
Welcome to the Retired Mindset Podcast, where soul meets body. Hosted by me, Bob Preston. Embrace the retirement journey of transformative insights, inspiring conversations, with new episodes produced weekly. This episode of the Retired Mindset is brought to you by Find the Good, a cool lifestyle clothing brand that celebrates exactly what retirement is all about. Being in the moment, presence, optimism, gratitude, and choosing to live fully wherever you happen to be in your journey. I love this brand so much because it perfectly matches what we talk about here. Slowing down, noticing beauty around you. I’ve got one of their cool sweatshirts on now, getting outside, traveling, trying new things, and embracing mindset that says there is good everywhere if you go look for it. Whether you’re on the trail, on the road, or just enjoying a quiet morning coffee, their gear is made to remind you and everyone around you to find the good in every single moment of life. You can check out their hats, shirts, hoodies, and all their lifestyle apparel at findthegood.com. And don’t forget, because you’re part of Mindsetter’s community, you can use my special promo code BOBPRESTON, all caps, which is Bob Preston, and you’ll get exclusive savings on anything you order. So head to findthegood.com, grab something that speaks to your journey, and wear the message proudly for FindTheGo. Back to our episode.
Bob: 2:03
Hi, Mindsetters, Bobby P here with a new full episode of The Retired Mindset. I’m here at beautiful Twin Lakes near Mammoth, California. Today’s episode is such a special one because it’s the perfect example of what happens when someone steps into retirement with intention and a whole lot of heart. My long-term friend Alan Caston spent decades as a respected attorney in Los Angeles, guiding clients through some of life’s biggest challenges by assisting them in collecting insurance funds that they were due to them from their policies to move forward when the unthinkable tragedies and things happened in their lives. But when it came time for his next chapter in retirement, he made a very bold choice. He traded litigation for spending more time with his amazing family, canvassing nature through his camera lens in the Sierra Nevada, touring around, looking for interesting scenery to shoot in his sprinter van, and truly reinventing himself fully into something that’s always lit him up: nature photography. In retirement for Alan, that passion has become his purpose. His images from Yosemite, Big Sur, The Desert, the Eastern Sierra, and beyond truly speak for themselves. You can see his work at aKLightplay.com. That’s the letters AK followed by lightplay.com. I’ll put that in my episode notes. So today on the Retired Mindset, we dive into how Alan reinvented his life through creativity, photography, adventure, and following the light, literally. This episode is called Roaming with Purpose, featuring my good friend, photographer Alan Cassen. I think you’re going to enjoy it. So have a listen.
Bob: 3:51
Alan, welcome to the Retired Mindset. Hey Bob, thanks for watching. How are you doing? Yep, but we are. We just hiked about a mile to get up here. Forgive us if we’re a little out of breath. What’s the name of the lake? McLeod Lake. In Mammoth, California. Spectacular. The ski mountains right here. We got, you know, this beautiful mountain structure behind us, still some snow out there. Let’s not go in the water, though. It’ll be freezing.
Alan Kassan: 4:11
Yeah, a little too cold. So it’s probably 50, 45 degrees right now. I know. We’re kind of freezing here. We’re a little out of breath.
Bob: 4:17
So anyway, hey, you and I have known each other for gosh, probably 50 years, I think. Yeah, just about pushing 50. And I know you really well before our listeners. I’m hoping that you’ll introduce yourself, tell us a little bit about your background, your career, your family, the things you’re doing in retirement. Just bring us up to speed. You want to roll with that? How much time do you have?
Alan Kassan: 4:36
Love it. Yeah, okay. I’ll I’ll do as best I can as quickly as I can. So Bobby and I went to UC Santa Barbara together. We were both experimental psychology majors, took a couple classes together, one in particular, seated on our memory, but we won’t go into that. You can tell the story. No, you can tell the story later.
Bob: 4:52
Oh no, we were we had a rat. We had a rat we were given for an experiment and it died. And we got in a lot of trouble, almost fucked the class, but the teacher didn’t.
Alan Kassan: 5:00
Bobby blamed it on me. I blamed my hands. Anyway, long story. Reasonable doubt. Yeah. So anyway, after after college, uh I wasn’t sure that a career in psychology was really what I want to do. So I went to law school in San Diego. I practiced law in San Diego for a little while with a large firm, mostly business litigation. And then I moved up to Los Angeles where my family, my brothers, moved, where I grew up, cousins in the valley. Yes, I’ve met Valley. And uh practiced law there. Uh, continued doing business and real estate law for another, I don’t know, 15 years. And then, sort of randomly, a good friend of mine who practiced a completely different area of law was going in, creating his own new partnership, and asked me to join him. And so it was a complete segue. What he did and what I did for the last 20 plus years of my career is it was really gratifying. What we did is we sued insurance companies when they did not pay people’s health-related insurance benefits. So health insurance, life insurance, disability insurance, and long-term care insurance.
Bob: 6:08
Housing and their house insurance, right? We’re seeing a lot of that.
Alan Kassan: 6:13
We got some, but we mostly did health related. And people, and I really liked the the life insurance because it was the most interesting. And people always say, Why is there litigation over life insurance? Somebody dies and then they get paid. My husband dies, I want to I want to. But it’s crazy. Insurance companies love collecting premiums and they hate paying claims. So they find loopholes in those contracts, they find reasons, exclusions, whatever they can they can hang a hat on, they’ll find a reason not to pay benefits, and we we make them pay. Okay. Yeah. So that was great. And and and then a couple years ago, I decided it was time to segue into not working, or at least not working as much. I still do a little bit with one of my ex-partners, but most of the time I’m out here doing things I enjoy and call it semi-retir.
Bob: 7:01
Alan is one of the best family men I know, so you gotta tell us about your family, right? I know you got a lot of kids, a lot of grandkids.
Alan Kassan: 7:08
Yeah, so I um I raised four sons, and I now have three amazing daughters-in-law, and hopefully soon we’ll have a fourth. And those three that are married have produced six grandchildren, four girls and two little boys from ages seven to two almost. And another one on the way, so seven pretty soon. And I’m hoping my third son gets married and has some more kids. So I’m looking at nine, ten grandkids.
Bob: 7:36
Oh my god, yeah, I’ve got four, and I think that’s a lot. Now, our sons, I always they’re all J names. My oldest son, Jason. Jason, okay, I was gonna say Jared, and I always get them mixed up, so sorry about that. But they were in the Sigma Kai house together at UCSP for pre-right. Jason was a little older. Before they got kicked, that was the last pledge bus, and they got kicked off. They got kicked off, right? Right. Oh my god. Yeah. Okay, that’s fantastic. Well, okay, take us back to that moment where you decided, hey, it’s time for me to step away from working and step into retirement. You know, how did you start that chapter? What was involved? Tell us about that.
Alan Kassan: 8:10
You know, it’s obviously something you start thinking about when you get into your 60s. And and I think what the catalyst for me was I I lost my parents and my mother-in-law the last couple years. And uh I’ve even lost a couple really good friends, some a little older, some a little younger than me. And it seemed like mortality was kind of slapping me in the face. The the real catalyst though, I think was my mom took ill in early 2024, and she was hospitalized, and we weren’t sure she was gonna make it, and sadly she didn’t. And I just kind of said to myself at that point, you know, it’s time. It’s time to start putting more life in my ears, and and made the decision to step away from work.
Bob: 8:58
You know, those tragic moments in one’s life, if there’s a silver lining, it’s the wake-up call. Yeah, right? Yeah. That reminds us that life is short. It could happen.
Alan Kassan: 9:09
That’s exactly right. I you know, you don’t know how many more years you have. Right. So I just want to cram as much activity and enjoyment and and fun in the years I have and uh do what I love doing. And I’m I I’m a really curious guy. I have lots of hobbies. Obviously, big family, I I which is number one, I like to spend a lot of time with them. So no no loss for things to do. Yeah, for sure. Yeah. I mean, what the one of the funniest things is people uh when I started talking about retiring, people say, What are you gonna do? What do you do?
Bob: 9:40
I get that all I still get that all my time.
Alan Kassan: 9:41
My response to every single one of them, you it’s not what am I gonna do, it’s what am I gonna do first? You know, there’s so many things I wanted to do. So I’m having a lot of fun.
Bob: 9:49
I’m busier now in retirement than I ever was even when I was working. Yeah. Okay, so this is really fun. And you dropped by, I got this random call from you on a Saturday morning, I think, and you dropped by my house in Del Mar. What was that, a couple months ago? Three months ago? Yeah, a couple months ago, yeah. And it was like we had never missed a beat. Yeah. If I hadn’t seen you. Isn’t that crazy?
Alan Kassan: 10:09
I love I love that there’s a bond that’s created, and you can step right back into that moment. Yeah. I mean, we after college, we did spend a little bit of time together. Our families, we we went to your place in Wilson with kids. And you were in San Diego, you were in San Diego together. And we were in San Diego together for a while. So we we but then you know, things happen, life happens, and we didn’t see each other for a long time. Yeah. And every time one of my sons lives in San Diego now, and every time I went down there, and my brother has now moved down there, I Bobby’s down here somewhere. I gotta find him. And I found myself at Dog Beach, I knew you were close, and boom. Boom.
Bob: 10:39
That was so fun, and it was great to catch up. And it was like, yeah, like you know, we just saw each other the day before. But one of the things we talked about, and you’ve touched on this a little bit, is that you know, retirement’s not just an ending, it’s actually kind of a beginning in a lot of ways. Oh, for sure. Right? And so, what did the transition feel like for you? Like when you made that decision, it sounded like you sound like you hit the ground running in retirement, which I absolutely love. But what were those first few months like?Alan Kassan: 11:04
Yeah, it it was pretty easy for me because I I had a list of things I wanted to do.
Bob: 11:09
I love it, yeah. I had a list.
Alan Kassan: 11:10
Or like I mean, I there’s so many things I love doing. I, you know, I I I like fly fishing, I love mountain bike riding, I I I bought a telescope, so I’m getting into astronomy with my grandkids. I want them to enjoy nature, so I figured a good way to do that might be to rock collect. And I bought a rock polisher, so I’m now they find rocks and we’re gonna make you jewelry, you’re gonna give you jewelry. So we find rocks and we make them really shiny, and they go, wow, that turned into something really cool. So, and and eventually I hope to get them looking up in the sky. Yeah, traveling, you know, in the US, I like traveling abroad if I had the opportunity to do that. There’s other things I can’t even think of right now. So, yeah, there was a lot of things, but in terms of the transition, I think the if there was a hard part, it was stepping away from something that I really loved, yeah, that was really gratifying. The the practice of law that I was involved in was something where you there was a true sense of helping people. I mean, it was in in many cases we were changing people’s lives because they depended on these life insurance benefits or these disability benefits, and without them, life would be impossible in some cases. So it was just really fulfilling, gratifying practice. And and stepping away from that, I kind of missed that. And I think I miss I love writing and researching, and I I miss that a little bit, although I still do that. And with the advent of AI, I’m having a lot of fun just playing with it. That’s awesome. And and researching a lot of things involved with my photography, which we’re gonna get into in a few minutes. So so I there was a transition, moving away from those things into the you know, finding a beat, you know, uh a cadence with my the activities that I wanted to get more involved with. Uh, but I’m there. And uh and I think I’m doing it and I’m getting better at it.
Bob: 12:55
Yeah, you know, our careers are part of our identity and our structure and our routine. And when you lose that overnight, it becomes this you know, almost like a loss of well, you know, that’s that’s true.Alan Kassan: 13:07
I think a lot of people have a really hard time with that because that is who you are. That’s how people know you. People knew me as a lawyer, they don’t think of me as a photographer, is what I kind of call myself now.Bob: 13:17
Yeah.Alan Kassan: 13:18
And and and being a lawyer, you know, that’s a pretty important thing to some people. So, but I did it long enough, you know, 40 plus years, and it’s like I don’t need that anymore. I want to just, like I said before, live and enjoy my family and enjoy the outdoors and hook up with old, connect with reconnect with old friends. That’s what it’s all about. And that’s also really fulfilling. Yeah, for sure.
Bob: 13:39
Okay, so in that transition, what role did your family, grandkids, the outdoors? I know you you and I share this love for the Sierra Nevada. You have a lot of interest, and what I guess did those things and places that call to your heart, you know, what did they play in making your decision? To retire? Yeah.
Alan Kassan: 14:00
Well, they made the whole difference. It was it was my desire. First and foremost, my desire was to spend more time with my kids and their families, my grandkids, and their their wives, because uh, you know, we’re all working and and we all have schedules, and so it was it was kind of hard. It’s at the holidays and events and birthdays and things. And we we do a pretty good job getting together.
Bob: 14:22
Oh, you guys are amazing. I mean, you’re like Uber grandparents too.
Alan Kassan: 14:25
Yeah, and so so I wanted to spend more time with the grandkids. So I I just want I want to make an impression on their lives, and and mainly when I say that, make an impression, I I want them to appreciate and be able to enjoy the things that I’ve come to learn are worth appreciating and enjoying, like being in places like this. And I I’ve read, you know, I’ve been reading a lot about about artistic expression and as it relates to photography, and how less and less young people in society are spending time outdoors. They’re they’re more urban and they’re less inclined to venture out. I mean it’s not true for all. There’s a lot of YouTubers and Instagrammers that are out there doing crazy things, but for the most part part of it’s on from the bedroom, right? For kids for teenagers. Yeah, yeah. For the most part, kids aren’t getting out there, and and I want my grandkids to be able to uh enjoy and appreciate the things that I’ve been able to enjoy a good part of my life. So that was important. And and then from there, the next big one was my photography. I I’ve I’ve been a photographer since high school, which is where I learned about photography, fell in love with it. But after high school was college, and after college was work, and after college and work were family and kids, so I kind of had to step away from the photography a little bit, always in the background, always doing a little bit, but not to the to the extent and as as seriously as I I’ve now been able to do. And so back when the kids got older, uh around 2010, 11, 12, sometime around there, I started doing it more seriously. And and now, and I okay, I started doing it more seriously, but not as seriously as I really wanted to do it. Uh not traveling as as much and exploring as much and and being off grid as much. So I was really looking forward to that, and that that helped. That’s incredible.
Bob: 16:19
You know, I I talk about this a lot on the show, and just to people that I meet all the time, and that’s that, you know, during my working life, I lost little pieces of myself along my journey, along my trail. Yeah, you know, not because I wanted to, but because it just kind of happened. We’re working our butts off, we’re you know, supporting a family, we’re putting kids through college, whatever the case may be, trying to hold our companies together. And for like some of these things like photography for you and other things for me, they just sort of get set aside for a while. So rediscovering those in retirement, I think, is one of the biggest joys that I’ve found since making the decision.
Alan Kassan: 16:53
No, I agree wholeheartedly.
Bob: 16:54
Okay, so I have to ask now, because I know you’re here, you just you just photographed in Yosemite, and you seem to have a passion mainly for photographing nature. Am I am I right about that?
Alan Kassan: 17:05
Yeah, it the outdoors.
Bob: 17:07
Okay. Yeah. All right, because I see some of your pictures and they’re incredible. We’re gonna talk about where you can find them in a little bit here. But, you know, Sierra Sky, stars, you know, and I just think to myself, now that’s a dream. And then I find out you’ve got a sprinter van, you know, and you jump in your van and you take off and you pull off on these random roads and camp overnight and take a shot, you know, the Milky Way in the middle of the night when there’s no, I mean, it’s just incredible stuff. So look, how did you design it and your sprinter van for chasing your passion for photography? Is there anything special about the van? What you know, tell us tell us what’s inside your van. Well, okay. I’ve never seen inside. Okay, well, it’s that’s that’s gonna change the knife, by the way. Yeah, yeah.
Alan Kassan: 17:45
Okay, well, it’s it’s uh it’s it’s a relatively short story. I I you know, I mentioned that I picked up photography 10, 15 years ago, and when I had the opportunity to venture off, take time off, I would come up to Yosemite, go out to Death Valley, sometimes out to Utah, and sometimes I found myself sleeping in the car, which was not very comfortable. So maybe 18, 19, 20, 20, somewhere around there, I started thinking, I’m gonna get one of these vans one of these days. So I started thinking about it and researching it. My wife would say I was obsessed, she’d be right. And uh and when I when I stopped working, I can’t remember if it was right before or right after I stopped working, I started discussing building a van with custom van builders. And uh I quickly learned that there are a million things you can do.
Bob: 18:37
Oh yeah, a million options, and it can get really pricey.
Alan Kassan: 18:40
Well, it’s pricey no matter what you do. True, true. No matter what you do. So so I I it the the deal breaker for me wasn’t s as much the pricing, but was the delay. It’s good. I learned because of the year, right? Six to twelve months. Yeah. And so then I started looking to see if I could find a van from the pre-built, so there’s some pre-built companies, and see if I could find a van that met most of the criteria that I had set. And and you don’t really even know what your criteria are because you’ve never done it before. Yeah. So you’re not sure that you even if you build a van to your specs at that moment, you might spend a month in the van and go, oh crap, I didn’t think of this, I didn’t do that. Yeah, kind of your first house. So I so I for that reason and and and for the main reason that I could pick the van up the next day if I found one that I I liked, I decided to look at the pre-books. Then I was looking all over the country really for a van that fit the specifications that I needed. I I I narrowed down the company that I wanted pretty much, and then I found one fairly close to home, Thousand Oaks, and talked to the guy, and it was available, and I went and I picked it up. So cool. I’m so jealous. I mean, I’m gonna get one one of these. So, what’s on the inside? You see, those really quickly. It’s okay, it’s uh it’s got everything I need to be off grid for a good period of time. I’ve I have There’s a little mini shower in there. There’s a microwave. There’s a beautiful bed, stove, or stove top, uh, industrial stuff. It is kind of a camper van. There’s a refrigerator. Camper van. There’s a there’s a cassette toilet. I mean, you got everything you need. And the the the best thing about it is I have, I think it’s over eight kilowatts of lithium battery power and uh a high-speed alternator that charges the battery. So that that battery pack will keep the air conditioning, the heating, the stove, it’ll keep it all going for three or four or five days off-grid. And if I need to recharge, I just idle the motor for an hour and it’s back up. So it it I can be off-grid for a good time.
Bob: 20:39
Okay, I’m sold. I want to go on one of your trips sometime soon. By the way, we were kind of joking when I saw Alan today. He goes, Well, you’re gonna talk about my van. Just I just want to make clear that I don’t live out of my van. So he doesn’t live in a van down by the river. Just gonna make that clear. So when you’re out on the road then, and you’re gonna pick a place, do you just like randomly decide this is the place, or do you have a plan in mind? I mean, do you like let’s get get me into that mindset a little bit?
Alan Kassan: 21:07
Well, you that’s actually a really good question. It’s funny because so last week, I spent last week in Yosemite with two friends that I reconnected with, from one from elementary school, one from middle school, both photographers, and we spent the week in Yosemite, and we kind of had a pretty good menu of places we wanted to visit, things we wanted to see. So what happens is you you you know where you’re going, but on the way, you find things that you’re interested in.
Bob: 21:35
The creative mind takes over.
Alan Kassan: 21:37
Yeah, and you’re so so you know it’s it’s a 10-minute walk, but you don’t get there for an hour because you stop to take a picture of different things along the way. So, yeah, that’s what happened in Yosemite. They had to take off and go home, and then I slowly made my way from Yosemite over the Tyoga Pass to the east side here at Mammoth. And in that instance, I really didn’t have a specific location. I probably stopped 20 times on the on the 395 where I passed a pond or a creek or trees or something that looked interesting, and spent 10, 15 minutes, a half an hour, maybe an hour, just taking pictures, fortuitously found something that was interesting. Like a perfect example is there’s a there’s a little pond near a place called May Lake. I was gonna go to May Lake and and sleep up there, although it’s probably not legal, and but the road was closed, so I couldn’t I couldn’t do that. But I found a place to stay, and then the next morning I got up and I walked around May Pond, and even though there was no snow on the road, it snowed a couple days earlier. I walked around the pond and I found some ice on the edge of the pond, and I took this picture, which I gave it the name, Pond’s Edge, I think is what I called it. And it’s really cool. You have the water, you have some ice, and you have some some color of from the from the I guess it’s the grass in the in the pond. It’s just a really neat picture. It’s a simple picture that I never would have come upon had I not stopped.
Bob: 23:05
You know what I love about it too is you’re out there, you know, both, you know, soul, mind, right? Yeah, and body. You’re you’re getting both, and the two are so intertwined.
Alan Kassan: 23:13
It’s it’s you know that that’s a big thing now, um mindfulness. And and I think that mindfulness, I I don’t know a lot about mindfulness, but I think I I understand that it’s it’s trying to really calm your mind and focus on simple things. And photography does that because I find it’s a form of meditation for me. I said that you find a thing and you just look at it from every angle and you examine it, and you and you you take pictures and look at them, and it’s just it’s just a neat, peaceful, calming enterprise. And it’s it’s it’s exhilarating at the same time because when you take the picture and you look at it on your computer and it looks really good, it’s exciting. Wow, look what I created out of this little this little ice creation on the side of a pond. So yeah.
Bob: 24:00
Well, it’s funny because I think you remember this. I was a beekeeper for a while. Oh, yeah. That was like my Zen space. I’d go out in the backyard and I’d pull out my girls, you know, they’re all right. You know, and it’s just like, oh my god, it was so meditative and interesting. And that just got it got to be too hard. By the way, do you have any of the honey left at once? You know, Bobby’s bees, right? That’s pretty funny. Okay, so real quickly, any secret spots, any favorite camping spots along the way where you like to go? Or I guess, yeah, I guess you’re camping.
Alan Kassan: 24:25
Well, okay, so yeah, that’s an interesting question because camping is a different enterprise. When you go to camp, uh, you know, I’ve camped with my kids and my brothers. You want to find a campground that’s fun to hang out. You can cook, you can build a fire and do things. Can it just be the side of the road or something? Well, well, you can’t, yeah, but I’m talking about camping. Camping, yeah, camp. I’m not really camping. I’m I’m finding a place to sleep because I don’t spend any time where I camp. I I It’s your crash pad. It’s a crash pad. I find a place where I can park the van because there’s some place I want to hike to, whether it’s a mile or 10 miles away. The van’s just there, and I can come back, I can sleep, I can eat, I can cook, I can bathroom, I can do whatever I need. It’s a crash pad. So it’s not only camping, it’s it’s just my home base for that moment wherever I am. Right.Bob: 25:10
That’s so that’s so amazing.Alan Kassan: 25:11
But I will say, but I will say so favorite places. So quick story. Oh, yeah, we’ve that’s what’s the question. Yeah, I might have mentioned this to you. So I went up to the ancient Bristlecombe Pine Forest. Have you been there? I love it there, yes, yes. So I’d been to the main grove. I forget the name of the main grove, but I wanted to go to, I think it’s called the Patriarch Grove, which is about 25 miles. Methusa, right? Methusa is in the main grove.Bob: 25:35
Okay.Alan Kassan: 25:35
But the I now I can’t remember the name. There’s another tree. Yeah. Or there was. But it’s about 25 miles on a dirt, uh, a rocky dirt road. I’d never been there. So I figured I got my van, I’m gonna go up there and you know, whatever. So I take the van and I first I do the four-mile trail in the lower grove, and then I drive up and at like 23 miles, 23 miles, and a snowbank just covered the road, and there’s no way for me to get around it. I get out of the van, I look around, I’m surrounded by snow and trees and mountains, and I can see the Sierras. I’m going, this is Nirvana right here. I don’t have to go anymore. Yeah, I love it. I was so excited, so I and I I just I’ll sleep right here on the road because you know there’s nowhere to go. I was so excited, I videotaped it, I I and I have internet in my van, so I I videotape it and or call my kids and and and video showed them the video where I was. It was awesome.
Bob: 26:32
Oh man, that’s so great. So I’m gonna skip around here a little bit. I want to talk about your art, okay? So let’s let’s get into that. Okay, get off the road, out of the van a little bit, and get into your art. And I guess for our listeners who dream of doing what you do, or maybe it could be you know picking up painting. We we hear a lot about people that do that. It could be knitting. I, you know, I whatever. For me, it’s living in the outdoors too. It could be riding. What advice would you give about taking that leap and just you know kicking it into gear and starting to follow a passion?
Alan Kassan: 27:03
Yeah, okay. It’s funny you asked that because I’m reading a book right now called Your Brain on Art. And there’s an interesting study. I have a lot left to read, but there’s an interesting study in the book that said something like, they’ve determined, pretty conclusively, because with modern science they can examine your brain while you’re doing things, that people engaging in any kind of an artful enterprise, whether it’s drawing at any skill level, observing art, looking at beautiful photographs or beautiful pictures or sculpture, spending 20 minutes doing that can actually improve brain function and improve your mood and relax you and make you happier. So art is a form of therapy in that sense, and a form of calm and and uh you know calm inducement. So photography obviously is related to art, but but a lot of people are intimidated because they don’t they they don’t feel like they have an artistic side, they can’t draw, they can’t paint, they don’t know how to take pictures. But you don’t even have to do it at a particular skill level. You can do it at any level. So I think you said what’s the advice, and the advice is just do it. You know, grab your iPhone or your whatever smartphone you have is so capable of taking really good pictures. I also blogged about that, the difference between iPhone photography and camera photography, but it’s so capable, it can make anybody look like an amazing photographer, and it’s fun and it’s relaxing, and it’s calm-inducing, and it’s gratifying. You take, I know uh probably people watching this video will have had this experience of having taken a picture and looked at it and go, oh, nobody has, even kids, you know. Oh my god, this is a great picture. It’s it makes you feel really good. It’s it’s exhilarating and and uh it gives you a little bit of self-confidence and it makes you feel good about yourself and about where you were or what you do what you’ve done. So you can you can exercise that muscle by being more intentional about it. Usually it’s random, you’re you’re out with friends or you’re going someplace and you just take a picture. But I would say as a form of advice, be more intentional. Think of something that you want to try to take a picture of or a place you want to go, yeah, and and try to take a picture of it in a way that maybe you haven’t seen. I another thing I’m I’m I’m I often say about my philosophy with this is I like to go places where people have been, but see things that people haven’t seen at those places. I love that. That’s awesome. So I’m always looking for something that people might not have noticed or might not have seen, and that’s what I’m aiming to take pictures of.
Bob: 29:40
That’s so cool. I love that. Okay, your favorite shots. I know we’re laughing about this one too, because it’s like naming your favorite child. Right? Yeah, but come on, spill the beans here. I want to hear your favorite photographs, maybe the story behind it, where you were, and what it felt like in that moment. You took it, and then when you saw the results later. Okay, well, and since I have four children, I’m gonna give you four pictures. One of the pictures is I was saying Joshua Tree. Uh no, I’m kidding, the J thing. No, I’m kidding.
Alan Kassan: 30:10
Uh one of the pictures was in a place called the Palouse in the southeast part of Washington State, and I took it several years, many years ago. It was a rainy, wet, stormy day, and I was with a couple other people, and we came upon this old abandoned farmhouse, and the rain stopped, and it was kind of cloudy with a little bit of broken sun shining through, but still a little bit of drizzle in the air. And I had my my uh camera and my wide-angled lens, and I positioned the camera in just the right position. I did never expect the photograph to come out as great as it did, but it is it’s an it’s it’s I call it the spooky police. It’s this abandoned farmhouse in the stormy weather with this green grass growing, it’s like like children of the corn or the cornfield, whatever you like. It’s a cool picture. I’ll send it to you, and you can put it online. Yeah, I want to I want to I want to get some of your photos for the podcast. Another one that that is one of my favorites is on the coast of Big Sur. Big Sur is one of my happy spots. Oh my god, it’s so it’s amazing. Yeah, I love it there. I’ve been there probably three times this year already, and and it’s a it’s a it’s a a photograph looking down the coast from a particular lookout spot, and you see the the coastline kind of jutting out, and there’s a a little bit of fog or haze in there, and it’s it was in the afternoon, so it’s sort of a blue hour. It’s a really it’s a really cool shot. I’ll send you that one also. All right. And then the other two that come to mind are two very recent ones. I guess I think last month I was at Mono Lake, and I decided I wanted to take a picture. There’s a technique called star trails, and what you do is you you take either a single long exposure or a number of short exposures and sandwich them together while the earth is turning. And you have a device that rotates with the earth? No, no, if it if I had the device that rotates, you would see just the sky. The sky would be normal. But in this case, what happens is the camera is fixed, it’s uh on a tripod, and and the shutter is is watching as the earth turns. Oh, right. As the earth spins. And so you’re you’re you’re you’re aimed toward the north star, and the earth is rotating on its axis, and so the stars create these arcs, these circles around the north the north star. You’ll see it, it’s pretty cool. And I might have seen it. You might have seen it. And the and and you have the the tufas of mono lake in the in the background, or I guess the foreground really, because the sky, it’s it’s in a it’s a night, I mean it’s dark, but I started in the right after sunset to get a little bit of horizon. So it’s a great picture. And the last one is a picture I just took the other morning in Yosemite. We were on our way to I think take a picture of the Three Brothers, which is a mountain formation in Yosemite Valley. And on the way, uh the Merced River flows through Yosemite Valley. We found a really calm spot in the river, and I looked across the river and I just saw I’m always looking for shapes and and lines and symmetry, symmetry, and asymmetry, and whatever contrast and color. So I look across and there’s this perfect reflection of these colorful trees and and bushes in the river, and the river’s pretty calm. So I took a bunch of pictures and I I processed one the other night, and I it was fantastic. And I I put it on my Instagram. Can’t wait to see it. I’ll send you that one too. Yeah, so those four.
Bob: 33:36
Was that three or four? Was that three, four? I think that was four. Okay, cool. All right.
Alan Kassan: 33:40
That was four.
Bob: 33:40
Hey, listen, I just love talking to you, man. I mean, I I love you so much, and you’re just such a good friend. But I, you know, in the interest of time, we’ve got to kind of wrap it up.
Alan Kassan: 33:47
Yeah, yeah. I guess I told you, I told you I could talk about this. I know.
Bob: 33:50
We’re freezing our ass off here, and it’s gonna the sun’s gonna go down a bit. So I would end with something fun if you’re down for a comment, kind of like a game we’re gonna play. It’s called Speed Ground. Okay, speed ground. Okay, yeah, I’m down. Okay, all right. Sunrise or sunset?
Alan Kassan: 34:03
Also, a hard question. I’m gonna go sunset for pictures, sunrise for call.
Bob: 34:10
Sunset for me, but yeah, okay. Favorite stretch of the Highway 395.
Alan Kassan: 34:14
Oh god, the other hard question. That’s along the Eastern Sierra, by the way. Yeah, I’m gonna say it depends on the on the season and the weather and what’s happening, but I’m gonna say from Bishop to Mammoth or from Lee Viney to Bridgeport.Bob: 34:26
Right on. Desert, coastline, or Alpi. Oh, impossible. All the above. Okay, all right. I just coffee spot in Mammoth. I’m a tea guy. Don’t drink coffee. Oh my god. Yeah, ruined my high. Okay, all right. One piece of camera gear that you cancel without.
Alan Kassan: 34:49
Okay, well, my cameras, of course, but I’d probably say my 14mm right angle lens, my favorite lens. Awesome. It gives me a really good panorama or or picture of the landscape.
Bob: 35:03
Yeah, mine’s my telescopic, but hey, you know, it teaches that. Favorite place to camp when you want total solitude.
Alan Kassan: 35:10
Any place that’s off a road, quiet, it has a view even better, and I like it when it’s flat. Nice, yeah. No mountains. Well, you like mountains, but yeah, I get it. Yeah, yeah, in the mountains, but the site’s flat, so I can have a comfortable night’s sleep. Your dream photo that you still want to capture. That’s pretty easy, actually. There’s a place called the Wave in northern Utah, uh, northern Arizona, right on the border of uh southern Utah. And it’s this amazing formation of earth, of red and or red and and and sandstone earth that that looks like it was melted and bent like taffy. You you it’s all over the internet. And it’s beautiful, but it’s impossible to get there because they issue permits and people from all over the world want to go there to take pictures. And it’s really I’ve tried endlessly to get a permit. I can’t get a permit.
Bob: 36:06
Oh man. But one day I’ll go. One day, okay. Well, that might be the one I come along with. Yeah. Alan, it’s so inspiring to hear your story, and you just didn’t step away, you stepped into something, which is clearly a passion. And I I love that, you know, just how excited you get when you start telling these stories. It’s so fun to listen to, and it truly fills your soul. And, you know, you remind us that retirement’s an open canvas. There’s a lot of art to explore, whatever your passion is, get out there and find it. Never too late to follow curiosity. I mean, you’re one of the most curious people I’ve ever met, and I just love that about you. And take that wherever it leads. It could be a dirt road in the tears, right? You pull off and you find your joy. But for our listeners, here’s what I’m taking away today. Retire to something tangible and exciting. Have a plan when you go in. Don’t just let it happen to you, but you make it happen. Create a life that lets you wake up where the trail begins. Purpose often hides behind things that make us feel the most alive, right? So listen, if you love this conversation, check out Alan’s photography at his website and Instagram. Why don’t you tell us?
Alan Kassan: 37:10
Oh, okay. My my my website is a K Lightplay, L-I-G-H-T-P-L-A-Y.com, a K Lightplay. And my Instagram is the same, just AK Lightplay. Wonderful.
Bob: 37:21
All right, all right, people.
Alan Kassan: 37:23
Thanks for having me, buddy. Yeah, for sure.
Bob: 37:24
Thanks for tuning in, mindsetters. Until next time, keep your eyes on the horizon, your heart in the present, and your spirit roaming. And remember when soul meets body. Thank you very much. What a great episode. Look how pretty it is here. That was awesome today. A quick plug to please pay it forward by sharing this episode with a friend. And if you like what you heard, please subscribe to get access to all of our future episodes. And always remember that in retirement, soul meets body.ping into retirement or already there, here’s my input: don’t drift, design. Wake up early, feed your mind every day, quiet your thoughts, keep learning, keep connecting. Because your best self doesn’t retire, it evolves. All right, mindsetters, that’s your five-minute Friday for this week. I’ll see you next time. Maybe that will be bright and early at 5 a.m. Who knows? But until then, keep growing, keep smiling, and keep that retired mindset strong because in retirement, soul meets body. Thanks for joining us today. The Retired Mindset, Five Minute Friday. Short episodes in five minutes or less.d I’ll see you next week. Thanks for joining us today. The Retired Mindset, Five Minute Friday. Short episodes in five minutes or less.