I was mistaken to think that if I didn’t make a snowboard video then I wouldn’t be happy. In my year off from making a snowboard video I started to realize something. It wasn’t the snowboard videos I loved doing, it was more the whole process of making a video. Working together with cool people to achieve the same goal–filming talent, having a vision in your head one day and turning it into reality the next. Endless traveling and last-minute plans changing, the good days are good and the bad days are horrible. It all is quite an exciting process. In the end you get a product you and the others on your team know you put your hearts and souls into. I feel that together with Ian Beaudoux, Jimmy Halopoff, Atticus Stewart, and Rob Madil, we have the best team in the world. We all have the same backgrounds (dysfunctional childhoods) and can easily relate.

Since I first started working on Torque Mtn Bike Video Magazine, I’ve met some really great people. At first I felt I was out of my element. When you’re out of your element, you start to think about things differently, and in the long run, you grow as a person. Being uncomfortable at times helps expand your mind. The people who’ve been helping me with Torque have been so supportive and positive about the whole thing. We all bring something to the table. We’re all reaching for the same goal and doing things we normally wouldn’t do.

It’s important to have something to love. It’s also important to think about the future and what you want to do when you’re done snowboarding. I don’t ever want to look back at snowboarding with a bitter attitude. Nor do I ever want to think snowboarding owes me something. I’ve learned so much about life through snowboarding, things I never could’ve learned from any school.

Life is weird, after a while your loves start to change. I was talking to an artist friend of mine the other day, who used to be a pretty talented skateboarder. He was telling me how now, when he paints a great picture, he gets the same buzz he used to when he’d land a gnarly trick. Life is about transferring your buzz for things. If you aren’t getting a buzz off the things you used to, then don’t start to hate that thing. Just move on. The most important thing to do is keep an open mind. Don’t limit yourself. Who knows where we will all end up after this snowboard thing. For all we know, Ranquet could be a famous Japanese hermaphrodite porn star in ten years, doing scenes with RuPaul.–Sean Johnson