A Flight Academy for the Soul —
Compasses, Maps, and Navigation Tools for Life
PILOT. AUTHOR. WAYFINDER.
"Walk on the Way and the Way appears."
—Rumi, 13th century poet and mystic
I was born into an Old Order Mennonite family in Pennsylvania—a world bounded by rules, hierarchy, and separation from modern life. I knew nothing else.
But trauma, secrecy, and a national scandal that reached the pages of The New York Times and The Washington Post became my soul’s unexpected call to adventure.
Patty Bear
A Practical Mystic's Story
I faced a choice that had defined my ancestors for centuries: Stay the same—or grow.
I chose to grow.
And that choice changed everything.
That decision led me far beyond the narrow world I was born into—first to the U.S. Air Force Academy in the early years when women were newly admitted, then to the cockpit as an Air Force pilot, and later as a Boeing 777 captain.
DEFYING GRAVITY
I flew missions in Desert Storm, but I also flew through my own storms—learning, again and again, that growth means risking what is known for what is true. Long before I took the controls of an airplane, I had already begun learning how to fly in life: to confront limitation, to defy gravity, to heed the whisper of the wild soul— that quiet inner compass calling each of us to become who we were born to be and to live the life we were born to live.
I’ve come to see that flying was never the final destination.
It was an apprenticeship—a living metaphor preparing me to articulate and teach a way of navigating life that is both new and ancient.
A way that blends skill and surrender, logic and intuition, structure and mystery.
My work now—through The Flying Club and my books—is about sharing those flight lessons.
THE FLIGHT PATH
FOLLOWING THE CALL
If you grow, you are already on the mystical path.
The flower that blooms, the bird that soars, the person who listens to the whisper within—all are guided by the same intelligence of life.
Following that inner guidance in the practical world is a highly skilled act.
It takes attention, stamina, and courage. Your desires are not wrong.
They are how your soul points you toward your highest expression.
To grow is to fly—to keep answering the call of your wild soul, one horizon at a time.
"Let yourself be silently drawn by the strange pull of what you really love. It will not lead you astray."
—Rumi, 13th century poet and mystic
Want to know how it all began?
From Plain to Plane—tells the true story of how answering one call to adventure became a lifelong navigation toward freedom.
Life’s an adventure—live it!
Patty Bear