(male narrator #3) Everywhere you turn, people try to tell you who to be and what to do.

But what about deciding for yourself?

Roadtrip Nation is a movement that empowers people to define their own roads in life.

Every summer, we bring together three people from different backgrounds.

Together, they explore the country, interviewing inspiring individuals from all walks of life.

They hit the road in search of wisdom and guidance, to find what it actually takes to build a life around doing what you love.

This is what they found.

This is Roadtrip Nation.

(girl) What about you?

Let's interview you.

Come on!

(Olivia) What kind of story do you wanna know?

(girl) Um, what's your passion?

How are you gonna find it?

(Olivia) My passion?

(girl) Yeah.

(Olivia) I am spending every waking moment of my life trying to find it.

Like, I wanna know everything about everything.

(Tele'jon) There's like question marks, like I feel like there's so many different possibilities.

How do I live and do what I love at the same time?

(Ed) I found myself in this stage in my life where I need the know-how.

I need to know how I can go about taking my own step in life.

So, um, the roadtrip's comin' up.

Really soon.

Like really, really soon.

(Ed) Alright, so this summer-- (Olivia) They give three of us random people the keys to a bus.

(Ed) We're gonna be driving around for two months around the whole of America.

We're going from San Francisco, we're going down south, we're going all the way across New Orleans, we're going north up to the east, then we're going all the way back across again, stopping for interviews.

So it's kind of like people who we personally found really inspiring.

Oh hi there, is there an Adam Stelzner?

Yeah hi, my name's Ed.

I'm calling all the way from England.

For me, what I want to find out from these people most is, "How did you start off?"

(Olivia) How they got to where they are, what inspires them to be where they are.

We love laughter, we love to have a good time, and we'd love to talk to you and find out what motivates you to do your thing.

(Tele'jon) The huge questions for me is like, "What were all those struggles?

How did you overcome those?"

(Ed) Okay, so I've only met T and Olivia over Skype so far, but they seem awesome.

I'm really hoping, like, we can just sort of gel together and we can each bring different things to the table.

The fact that we're different will make us more strong.

(Tele'jon) We're on the BART.

It's our train in the Bay Area, and we're heading down to San Francisco to go meet up with Olivia and Ed.

Feelin' uh, nervous, anxious, lot of different ways.

So yeah, it all started in Oakland.

I spent a lot of my childhood in Oakland.

And as a kid, it was hard.

It was really like that, um, I could've fell off.

You know, I could've fell off just like tons of other youth fall off in Oakland.

Man, that looks like, that looks like trying to survive.

I've been in those dark places before, too, like at a young age even I just like really feeling like I feel like maybe I should do somethin illegal because right now, I can't eat.

You know?

So what do I need to do to eat?

And like for me, like, my father just wasn't there.

He spent a lot of his life in prison, and then couple years later, he was, he was murdered.

That was just one of those things that was like really just taken away from me.

Who am I?

Um I am a kid from Oakland.

Um, I'm a kid from Oakland and my story's not very different from the other kids in Oakland.

I just I found like another path, I found different opportunities 'Bout to get started.

I'm Tele'jon Quinn.

[clapping] All right, so I just introduced myself to y'all, now I'ma ask y'all to introduce y'allselves to me, right?

So how are y'all feelin' today?

[audience cheers] Like right now, I do my work with BAY-Peace and that's what I love doin', but what can I see myself doing in forever?

Like what can I see myself doing 'til I die?

So that's the biggest question right there.

It's like this summer's just one of those things that I feel like I was lucky enough to find.

This is an opportunity to like enter different spaces, gather different energy, and obtain certain wisdom.

And, you know, a whole new journey's gonna begin that's gonna propel me in another direction.

(Ed) Right.

Uh, so today's the big day.

Tonight I go off to London to get to the airport tomorrow, when I leave for San Francisco.

So I've got my big box of teabags-- can't live without it.

My favorite biscuits, JaffaCakes.

Marmite--if you haven't heard of it, it's brilliant.

Most people hate it, though.

Uh, I'm from Colchester in England.

It's a little town, and I've grown up here all my life.

That's the house back there.

It's kind of old.

It's very old, especially for America I think.

And uh it's about 15th century, so yeah, pretty old.

I live in the middle of kind of nowhere, basically.

So when I was young, when I was growing up here, it's like heaven.

It's an enormous world and it's never-ending.

And then I found as I've grown up, it's got smaller, like, and suddenly quite claustrophobic.

So I'm 21 years old, I live at home with my mum and dad and my three older sisters.

Um, I'm currently working in a call center, and it's not something I'm proud of.

And it's, I need something to drive me out of my comfort zone.

It's very easy, that's what I'm worried about.

I'm gonna stay living in Colchester my whole life, and I just don't wanna do that.

I guess what's stopping me right now is lack of confidence.

Like personally, I've always been a little bit shy and not really confident with what I do.

And if I don't do this now, then I'm worried that I'll just never get out of this system here.

It's kind of weird.

This is actually it now, I'm gonna go.

So uh, fingers crossed it all goes well, and I'll, I'll see you all in San Francisco.

(Olivia) Okay.

My name's Olivia Zanfardino.

Quick history.

My father is an immigrant from Italy, moved to Tennessee.

Being a Jehovah's Witness, we were really stressing like religious education and knowing the Bible and all of this stuff.

I graduated at 16 and entered right into tech school.

The social education that came from that has been invaluable.

My world got opened up and I started finding out I was attracted to women, and that just so did not go over well at all.

Um, it took me a couple years to, um, just get on like decent speaking terms with my family.

That formed a lot of those years and you know, it came with its share of turmoil.

And so I was like in this housebound state, I-I really didn't know what to do with my life.

And I got a one-way ticket to the other side of the country.

I was like, "Screw this.

"I'm gay, I'm coming out.

This is what my life is."

And it was always something in my mind, like, "I wanna experience boot camp."

And I decided to do it one day.

I tested well, so I joined the Air Force.

It was a year before the "Don't Ask Don't Tell" laws changed.

So one side of my life was like you put on your camo and you do your warrior stuff.

And the other side was like this gay PR where you're shaking politicians' hands telling them how proud you are to be gay.

Th-there's something to be said about feeling in line-- like body, mind, and spirit--and man, I was so outta line.

I was so outta line.

And that's when I started volunteering and traveling a lot.

And a lot of my volunteering was really like decompression from a wound-up life.

I wanted to learn more about Buddhism, so I found a place in Colorado and just like spent five months in the mountains, and by then I was like outta time, outta money, and I was like, "I gotta, I gotta stop something."

So I came here, got a job.

Friend of mine wrote a grant for water conservation, and in the past year, I've been working on building these systems, like, at different places throughout the city.

Yeah, tell me about this.

What does it look like, what do you see in there?

(kids) Woah!

Can I see?

(Olivia) Thirties are when you do your career, right?

Thirties are when you do your career.

I'm approaching my thirties, and I'm actually getting serious about my career.

This feels like one of the last great hurrahs before I can get to, you know, that mentality that this is what I'm doing.

I'm looking forward to traveling.

It's gonna be fun.

I mean you have like a young black guy from Oakland and a young white English guy with red hair.

It's really a fine combo.

I'm excited.

Okay, um, this is my video log.

Wow, I'm really looking forward to just getting on the bus and like getting to know the boys.

Oh, and I shaved my head, which, it's not really the first time I've done it-- except this time, in fact, this time, I'm like really embracing the empowerment of it.

I love being bald.

I'll see you on the road.

[upbeat music] (Olivia) Okay, I'm here in San Francisco, and I'm going to meet the guys now.

I see them, that's awesome.

I know those guys back there.

(Ed) She's got her camera out.

Hey, how's it going?

Good to see you.

(Olivia) Aw, that's a nice shot.

There he is.

Tele'jon!

(Tele'jon) Like, meeting Ed and Olivia was just like crazy, you know?

Just like, man, finally.

(Ed) Suddenly I'm hugging these guys, who I've only ever met on Skype, and I'm like, "Woah, okay."

Going with these guys and getting a cab, and I'm like, "Oh, this is happening.

We're off to the RV, we're actually together."

There it is.

Guys, it's massive.

(Olivia) That's exciting, it's so pretty.

[roadtrippers laughing] (Ed) And it is bright green.

(Olivia) Wow.

Wow, I'm hyped.

(Ed) Thank you very much.

(Olivia) Yeah.

[laughing] Welcome home.

(Ed) Oh my god, it's massive.

Come have a look, it's amazing!

(Olivia) Look how clean it is right now!

(Ed) [laughs] Right now.

(Olivia) Yeah.

(Tele'jon) This is dope.

The Alchemist, who brought this?

I love this book.

This book's amazing.

(Olivia) Hey Ed!

(Ed) Are those our keys?

(Olivia) Yeah.

(Ed) Ahh, nice.

So the guys from last year, have sent us some letters.

So we're gonna read them, so let's see.

So this one's from Jacqueline.

"Tele'jon, Olivia, and Ed.

"Welcome to the family.

"Congratulations on this amazing adventure you're "about to embark on.

"Make sure you enjoy it because it's your "moment and your time to shine.

"Yes, it sounds narcissistic, but this time is to learn "about yourself and all the amazing things that are building "inside you, so savor each moment, each flavor, each road, "each conversation, each stop, each difficult turn, "and each mishap.

Safe travels!

From, Jacqueline."

(Tele'jon) [reading Zachariah's letter] "Hey there, champions!

Smiley face.

"You guys are awesome.

"Congrats on being vulnerable and putting yourselves up for "view to a bunch of random strangers.

"These strangers are going to be some of the most "incredible people you ever meet.

"Make sure to embrace a little alone time and "get those journals in.

"The entries where I poured my heart out "when the day was fresh captured my growth and progression.

"These are gems I will keep with me "the rest of my life.

"Oh, and always follow up with the people "you interview that hit home.

"Everyone has their own people that hit deep.

"When it happens to you, make a mentor.

"It's so tangible.

"Also, eat all the pizza you can.

With so much love, Zachariah."

(Olivia) [reading Megan's letter] "Tele'jon, Olivia and Ed.

"If I may give one piece of advice, "I would suggest that you record these moments "in whichever way feels most natural to you.

"Keeping a record of the person you are becoming will "be an invaluable gift to your future self.

"I'm not typically of the opinion that everything happens "for a reason, but I do believe that when the student is ready, "the teacher appears.

"This trip will provide you with many teachers--be ready!

Love and luck, Megan."

(Ed) I'm looking forward now to getting down to the interviews.

(Tele'jon) Everybody has a story, right?

Some of these stories aren't published, some of these stories aren't being told, so these are stories only a handful of people might get.

(Olivia) Everybody's gonna have their space around how they relate to our interviewees.

(Ed) And once that gets done, that's really gonna be it for me.

Okay, so we're gonna be interviewing Jakob Laggner, who got a business out of teaching people about the outdoors and go on expeditions.

That really struck out to me, like actually, this is what I like to do.

So in 2009, I went to the Arctic with a charity section of the Royal Geographic Society.

And yeah, I did five weeks out there, and that just kind of opened my eyes a bit.

Like, there's a lot more out there, and it just made me wanna do so much more, but I don't know how to take that step from finding my passion to then turning it into a career-- to go from that that stage to that stage-- and I think Jakob can teach a lot.

(Jakob) Hey, how's it going?

(Olivia) Olivia.

(Jakob) Olivia?

Nice to meet you.

[iPad beeping] (Ed) Hi.

(Jakob) Hi!

(Tele'jon) Can you talk about like those years like right after high school?

Especially 'cause, you know, that's the place that I'm at.

And then that journey that it took you to get here, you know?

(Jakob) Yeah.

So when I was 18, your age, I was like really getting the like itch for nature.

Really really getting the itch for it.

I recruited my brother and another friend, and we said we're gonna go backpacking.

It was January in Washington state.

Yeah.

We were like, "Okay, it's not gonna be crowded because it's January."

It's because you have winter storms and they blast the- the wilderness coast.

It was a 70-mile trail, and you know, we like did everything wrong.

We packed like 100-pound packs.

And the first night, I just remember us taking our ax and like putting it in a log and being like, "We're ditching our ax."

You know, we brought an ax backpacking.

And our oatmeal.

We were like, "Okay, we have like 18 pounds"-- I mean, I'm not even kidding--"of oatmeal."

My brother was like reading Harry Potter's, you know, first book, which is like this thick, hardcover.

So I mean, carrying all sorts of stuff.

Um, we got really, really wet.

Really, really cold.

Really, really tired.

But something just like woke up in us, like, we love the outdoors, we love adventure.

You know, at that time, we're young and we just needed to live our adventure life.

We went to Mexico and we went to Peru, we went to New Zealand, we went back to Austria.

Woah!

[brother laughing] Going and making these trips happen, to me, that was communing with nature.

It wasn't listening for the song in the wind, you know, it wasn't like that.

It was going through the motions of the experience of-of what you need to do to survive when you're there.

And it filled me.

I mean, it was a really--still is--a fulfilling experience.

(Olivia) So during this time, did you have any concern for career-planning or--?

(Jakob) Yeah!

For sure.

I mean, you know, it's like, "This is really fun and awesome, but like what am I gonna do?

I need to a get a job.

Like, I'm gonna, I'm growing up.

Like, this is happening."

I moved to the Bay Area and I got a job that I hated.

it was basically telemarketing.

I had like this script that I had said 100 times a day-- like literally 100 times a day.

I was just bored out of my mind, and-- (Ed) At this point, how did you feel about having to sort of, in a way, leave behind the trekking side of things?

(Jakob) At first, I was like, "Okay, yeah Jakob.

You know, good job, you're growing up."

You know, like-- Okay, alright, so I was gonna say-- I worked at a call center until recently as well, and I've been through that.

I know what you're talking about, the script and the headset.

You just end up repeating the same thing, and I was wondering how you made that step to say, "Actually, you know, I'm not gonna be doing this anymore.

"I'm gonna go off and do something that I am interested in."

Oh that-that was um I mean, how did you practically-- I ended up bringing my laptop to work.

So I just like started plugging together this website that I called "Treks and Tracks".

I put in like skiing and rockclimbing.

(Olivia) What do you, you were blogging about them?

Or you were just--?

(Jakob) No, I just like-like kinda learned web design and put it together as a business.

(Olivia) Oh!

So you were doing a mock business?

(Jakob) Yeah!

I paid my $2.00 or whatever to keep the website up, but it really was not on the front of my mind.

It was just kind of--once in a while, I'd remember.

I was like, "Oh yeah, I have a website up, huh?"

And all of a sudden, I started getting sign-ups.

They didn't even call me or contact me.

I was like, "Oh my god.

Like, I don't have insurance, I don't have like a permit."

[roadtrippers laughing] (Jakob) Um, so, yeah, I was like, "What do I do?"

So I ended up calling a guy who I still knew from my mountain days, and he took over the camps, and he gave me like 10%, and you know, we did it like the, the legal way.

But it was like, "This can work."

(Ed) And it worked.

(Jakob) Yeah.

[Ed laughing] [upbeat music] (Olivia) At what point did you say, "This is showing the profitability or it's showing the motivation enough?"

At what point did that click?

(Jakob) You know, if I was really interested in profitability, I probably wouldn't have done it.

Where it did become valuable was you know, from the very first time I guided, I was like, "This is so cool.

Like, these people are stoked.

That's really rewarding."

So remember, punch or pull.

Uh huh, your hand's gonna go into the braking plane, which means it's gonna go down.

You know, there's the grain and then there's off the grain.

Nice, Olivia!

A lot of times, people will feel like, "I really wanna do this, but I can't because I don't have the money, I'm tied down here, I have this."

And that can be very valid.

At the same time, There are ways to-to plan.

Well done!

I've literally put spreadsheets together for like a dream.

You plan a little bit, you think about it, and-- or we did--and it worked.

Nice job, Ed!

(Olivia) I'm not letting you down until you tell me what you're gonna do with your life!

[everyone laughing] (Olivia) I gotcha.

(Ed) I've always loved the outdoors, and there's that feeling I get when like I'm on top of a mountain or something.

That's really the best feeling for me, like, kind of inner piece, I guess.

It's always been something you do as a break, weekends.

I've never considered it as a potential career path.

So suddenly, straight away in the first interview, I kind of feel like there's a sort of frame of reference that I can refer to.

He really opened up a lot of doors to me.

I mean, it takes some courage-- a lot of courage in his case--but you can do it.

(Tele'jon) So like, you're 32, and, it's not, it's still kinda young you know?

You're not young, but you know-- [Jakob laughing] (Tele'jon) You still have a lot of years to go.

Um-- I hope so.

[everyone laughing] (Tele'jon) And so like from this whole timeline that you just took us through, do you feel like one day, there's, there's another thing that just might come up where you just, you know, "This was dope, but let's do that"?

(Jakob) In a way, I feel like each experience kind of has has built on the, on the next.

Today, it's just this- this mesh of experiences that has brought me here.

Tha-that's kinda what living your dreams is about.

Like, "Okay my day today is what I really enjoy doing."

(Olivia) And you can say that?

You say, you can say, "I'm living my dreams."

Yeah, definitely.

(Tele'jon) Feels, feels really crazy right now.

'Cause it just started, we have like a long stretch of road to go.

It was just like that long, open road, you know?

And like you don't even see where you're going, but as you progress, you're gonna finally reach a destination, even though you may not know what it is.

Today, we're about to head to L.A.

I've never been to L.A. before.

(leader#1) As human beings, we often get stuck.

We can live a life without truly being present.

(leader #2) Effectively, I was pushed out.

You know, you talk about drop-outs, I was pushed out.

(leader #3) It wasn't just about making people laugh, it wasn't about just sharing my story, but it really was about changing people through laughter and not wagging your finger at people.

(Tele'jon) I'm excited.

I feel full.

(female narrator #4) Roadtrip Nation extends beyond the program you just watched.

It's a movement that empowers students to define their own roads in life.

Here's a quick snapshot of the Roadtrip Nation experience at Big Ideas Fest.

(student #1) My name is Hazel Flores.

I'm 16.

I'm a sophomore, and I go to South City High School.

(student #2) We're in Half Moon Bay, in the Ritz-Carlton Hotel.

And we're here for the Big Ideas Fest.

(student #3) We're gonna meet successful people, and we're gonna get some insight on how they got there.

(student #4) I feel like the question is like "How did you go on?

Like where do you get the inspiration?"

(student #5) How did they know what they know what they wanted to be?

(leader #4) It's about what you do, it's about what you're passionate about.

Try as many things as you can, and find the things that really resonate with you.

Pursue them and give them time.

If you chase after those things that you truly love doing, you'll find a way to make it work.

(student #6) The best careers are the ones that make you feel most energized and inspired every day.

Finding that passion and driving towards it has been my definition of success.

(student #7) The thing that influenced me the most was actually the interviews.

(student #2) I wasn't expecting to be able to talk to everyone so openly.

(student #8) Later in life, I won't be so nervous to just go talk to somebody anymore.

(student #9) Within these three days, I developed as a person.

I didn't think I was gonna do anything with my life.

I was just gonna be a bum on the street or something.

I'm never gonna forget these days, ever.

I'm gonna cry.

(cameraman #1) Well, then we can cut the cameras before it gets too dramatic.

(cameraman #2) I'm zoomin' in.

(student #9) No!

(girl #1) No matter what you do-- (boy #1) Or where you come from-- (boy #2) You've got wisdom to pass down.

(male narrator #3) Help young people find their way by sharing the lessons you've learned.

Take fifteen minutes to tell us what you love to do.

(boy #1) The door is open-- (boy #2) We're all ears.

(girl #1) Become a leader at ShareYourRoad.com ♪