The Attraction Between Mountain People and Cloud People

About 10 years ago, someone shared a useful analogy with me. There are “mountain people” and there are “cloud people,” and these types are often attracted to one another. 

How do you know what kind of person you are?

Are you one documentary away from completely upending your life? Did Blackfish convince you to picket at Sea World and low-key judge families who bring their children to a prison for killer whales? Do you spend tons of time with one friend and then have a completely new bestie a year or two later? Do you intensely commit to a new spiritual practice, personal style, sport, or diet for a few months and then move on? You may be a cloud person—drifting about life’s buffet of philosophies.

One of my best friends, Cedar, is a cloud. I spoke at length about clouds and mountains during a roast at his incredible Rebirth Ceremony, which was held at his commune in Nevada City.  (Cedar is his chosen name.) 

We’d lived together in Berkeley during the early aughts, and I’m continually in awe of how much he evolves between our visits together—the openness with which he embraces new customs, personal aesthetics, music, and communities with his entire being. 

When we first met, he had been one of the only openly gay students at his Bay Area high school. He had frosted tips and a fierce progressive consciousness. We bonded over Cal Football games and later over Pride events in San Francisco, where we both lived in our late 20s. 

Now, he’s a witchy, Nordic-chanting, typewriter-toting, forest man who often wears his mid-length hair in Viking braids. He describes events as “manifesting,” “high- or low vibe,” related to “shadow work,” or making space for “receiving transmissions.” Through the fog of the smudge smoke and sound baths, I can still see the super-woke, boy-crazy, Berkeley trombone-player. He’s one of my favorite people.

The opposite of a cloud is a mountain—someone with a relatively stable, predictable lifestyle and core beliefs. I’m a mountain. I’m impossible to hypnotize. The things I love—hiking, reading, coastal forests, bright colors, and spicy food—have been fixtures of my being for decades. I make incremental changes and hope I become a bit smarter with each passing year, but I would be voted “Least Likely to Join a Cult” in a jury of my peers.

This is in contrast to my partner, Jon—another cloud—who has embraced many intense and abrupt life phases. He’s experimental in all facets of his life, and sometimes it’s rather inconvenient. Right before our wedding, he watched Food, Inc. (or maybe Cowspiracy) and became a vegan for our honeymoon. It was like finding out I’d married a moonie or a flat-earther. Food choice has a huge impact on my life. 

He abandoned his veganism a few months later, but in the years since then, he’s gone through several fanaticisms. He has obsessed over pickleball, Allbirds shoes, Sicilian pizza-making, a Star Wars mobile game, and Gregorian chants. He’s also dabbled in practices and beliefs that weren’t as easy to ignore, including his flirtations with anti-vax nonsense, urine therapy, semen retention, and Sandy Hook denialism. Fortunately, these phases passed.

Sometimes vestiges of past cloud behavior remain, but his primary focus has shifted. This is true of salsa-making, the jam-band Goose, sun-gazing, and Deepak Chopra meditations. 

Right now, Jon is absolutely dedicated to disc golf, often playing for hours daily, honing his technique in the Oregon coastal forests. He’s been perfecting a chili-crisp recipe he calls Kungfetti, which is available at a friend’s pizza restaurant. He’s also trying to remove all plastic from our lives. Like his sudden veganism, the anti-plastic crusade was ignited by a Netflix documentary called The Plastic Detox. He’s been donating tons of his clothes and is trying to get rid of all of our synthetic blankets. Like his other phases, I know the intensity of this period will pass as the documentary drifts further into our rearview mirror.

I admire the experimental spirit of cloud people like Cedar and Jon, even when they stumble down strange paths, usually fed by a wayward algorithm. They’re more open to the world in all of its infinite facets and possibilities, while mountains like me are often more habitual and predictable. I assume women (and especially mothers) often take on a mountain role, while men and fathers are more likely to indulge their cloud-like tendencies. The same is likely true of younger versus older people.

And perhaps people can change the extent to which they’re clouds or mountains. Like most things, the beauty lies in the balance: taking risks or feeling secure, chasing novelty or tucking into the warm blanket of familiarity. Mountain people can have cloud-like tendencies (and vice versa).

Mountains and clouds are attracted to one another for a reason: both experimentation and organized processes are crucial to innovation. Too many cloud people bring chaos, and too many mountain people, boredom. Embrace the differences! Don’t be afraid to become a cloud or a mountain when the situation calls for it. We need both.