Meet Morgan Tilton, freelance adventure journalist who's written for 50 publications nationwide about trail running, snowboarding, and basically anything that happens outdoors.
Morgan Tilton had my dream childhood frolicking around the San Juan mountains in Southwest Colorado. After getting a Journalism and Creative Writing degree at Denver University, she started her own LLC, which she’s had for the last five years.
I met Morgan when she spoke to my Feature Writing class my senior year at Colorado State University. My favorite quote from her that day was, “I just don’t believe in things getting boring." She usually has 10-15 stories going at a time, which might sound overwhelming to mere mortals, but she says she's excited by the variety.
What I immediately liked about her is how she has so much excitement for what she’s doing and doesn’t try to cover it up by being overly professional. Plus, she's living my dream adulthood, too!
Morgan enjoying the sunshine while Nordic skiing in the Elk Mountains outside of Aspen, Colorado. PC Stefania Curto
CA: 5280 and Backpacking are the magazines you’ve written for the longest, but which publication is your favorite?
MT: I love writing for Outside and 5280 Magazine for the edge and rhythm: professionalism mixed with linguistic liberty and an authoritative voice. I also feel supported by those editorial and fact check teams. I love writing for REI also, because I'm very encouraged and supported as a team member. The REI voice is a bit more in the writer's hands--not a bad thing, just different and also fun. And, I love writing for Adventure Pro Magazine because it's the only print publication centrally focused on the American Southwest: my roots!
CA: What does your LLC look like? Is it basically a way for you to freelance and get to write off travel costs?
MT: The LLC consists of just me. Initially I decided to get an LLC to have better liability protection and to make filing taxes easier as a business owner. I don’t have a business background, so I’ve been learning as I go, but it’s not too complicated to have your own business as a contract worker, and it’s simple to register as an LLC owner. I do pay someone to do my taxes because I don’t really have the motivation to learn about tax updates. It’s 400 bucks, but it’s also time that I don’t have to spend on taxes.
CA: What were your biggest challenges on the way to where you are now?
MT: To get any creative business of the ground, you have to sacrifice time and pieces of your life, and I sacrificed a lot of time with people. When I started out, I was so nose to the grindstone, very happy saying yes to everything, thinking that would allow me to be more selective later. Now, I still work everyday, even if it’s just writing emails, but I can trust the network I’ve built to still be there if I need to take a breather.
Also, with travel writing, I was on the road a lot, and I didn’t have that consistency with my home community. That was one of the hardest pieces for me. I’m the type of person who loves deep, long-term relationships; some of my most fulfilling relationships are still from middle school. There are a few people from the past six years who I think will be in my life for forever, but some relationships have grown progressively distant. I felt really guilty at the time, but that was just a process I had to go through.
Morgan trail running in the alps above Chamonix, France. PC Kimberly Strom
Another big challenge was taking my personal life on the road while trying to stay grounded. I love traveling, but when you do it for 8 months straight and only have a couple of days or weeks at home, it’s really hard to have a routine of your own. I need to root down at some point, and part of that is learning how to take my life on the road with healthy rituals. But right now I’m in a phase where I’m happy to create a home routine in Crested Butte, and to see where it takes my writing in a different way.
CA: What was the most defining moment of your career?
MT: Last August, I was trying to figure out where 'home' was: Denver was going through a lot of changes, my writing network was mature, and life felt really busy. I decided to move back to Telluride to live with my Dad while I figured it out. I filled up the cab of my truck, and when I drove out of Denver, it sunk in that the next time I came back it wouldn’t be to drive home. I was going to find my home, as an adult, in the Southwest, and to redefine it with a fresh perspective. It was a very exciting, happy experience; it was the kind of experience that made me cry tears of joy. On my way to Telluride, I had an “I made it” moment. I don’t regret a moment in Denver, but I was so happy to be back here. The small town, mountain town lifestyle is so grounding for me, and it's affecting my writing; it’s opening up my creative writing side.
CA: I know you mentioned you actually enjoy pitching story ideas to editors. What about the pitching process do you like?
MT: When I was at 5280, I interned three days a week, and the other two days pitched to editors I knew, and I found that the more ideas I gave, the more they gave back to me to write. Pitching is exciting to me because of the potential; you might need to pitch your idea 20 times, but it’ll land somewhere eventually, sometimes out of pure stubbornness. It’s exciting too because you get to persuade someone why they should work with you, which means that sometimes you’ll need to keep prodding and following up.
CA: You mentioned once that your best self-growth decision was also your best business decision—can you elaborate on that?
MT: The example I brought up was the Escalante river story: something in my gut told me to do the trip, and I was willing to do it even if we never got a placement, because I’d be so happy just doing the trip on a personal level. When we follow our gut and intuition to pursue a journey--which may or may not become a story--there's an inherent risk. But those are the experiences that most often lead to vulnerable, rich, unique, compelling, magnetic storytelling. Those experiences are the gateway to the untold. That's what happened with Escalante River. Because there had never been a feature story written and published about that river to the capacity of which we delivered, the story went viral. So much so that I wrote five pieces about the experience and place.
Morgan stand up paddle boarding on the Escalante River
Being in a creative field, it’s really difficult to separate the parts of ourselves that are creative and personal and professional. They’re intertwined, and I think that when we pursue what we’re most passionate about in our personal life, we can uncover stories that we need to tell as individuals because we’re so passionate about it—like, we would be the best storyteller for that piece because we’re so personally invested. I think it’s almost impossible to separate that in creative journalism, and I also think that the ultimate goal in freelancing is to pursue the story your gut is telling you to pursue, trusting that there’ll be a place and opportunity for it. When you first start freelancing, though, it’s the opposite: you need to focus on the publication and its needs.
Morgan catching some air while backcountry splitboarding in the Elk Mountains above Gothic, Colorado. PC Will Rochfort
CA: Have you ever felt imposter syndrome being young and a woman in your field?
MT: No, I can’t say that I have in my field in the outdoor industry. I grew up in Southwest Colorado, in rural and mountain towns, doing outdoor sports, which are by nature male dominated, so I’ve learned my entire life how to communicate with men and women of all backgrounds. I’m certainly intimidated by certain individuals, but it’s usually not gender based.
On the recreational side, it’s still hard to find a big group of women to recreate with. Trying to find someone who has the same type of interest in a certain sport can be hard—it feels like we’re disparate sometimes. I know we have a long way to go, but we're having certain conversations that are getting us started. I can generalize that on the whole, in the outdoor industry, we have good values and we care about human equality.
CA: What would be your advice to young women wanting to do what you did?
MT: For interviews, I’d go in with excitement and lots of unique ideas. More broadly, I think the greatest piece of advice to young women and young writers is to be courageous, and don’t be afraid to pitch your stories. It’s ok to be turned down for a story idea and keep pitching it to other places. If you are turned down, it’s not a reflection of who you are; there are a lot of components involved with a collaboration for a project, so be resilient.
Morgan taking a mid-day break in the Elk Mountains. PC Stefania Curto
Here are my 3 key takeaways from the interview:
1. Pitch often, maybe even incessantly!
2. Not everyone you become friendly with will become friends for life. This doesn't have to be depressing, though, it can free you from guilt!
3. Trust your instincts! If you think something is fascinating, you're probably the best person to write about it.