I’m Fielding Arnold, Founder of Third Mast

I’m a former maritime captain, Outward Bound instructor and backcountry guide turned coach by way of the startup world. I help purpose-driven founders and leaders navigate change in uncertain times by (re)connecting to their internal wisdom, values, and strengths.

I have decades of experience guiding others into wild places: the mountains, oceans, and inside themselves. These experiences have shown me that we are all capable of more (and different, in a beautiful way) than we’ve been limited to believe.

I love supporting ambitious, purpose-driven founders and leaders as they navigate change in uncertain times - through 1-on-1 coaching, group coaching and custom designed team experiences. I work in an integral way, believing we all do our best work when we can bring our whole, human selves to our professional roles. This is the foundation for the Third Mast philosophy of living, working and leading.

I bring over 20 years in professional leadership and people development supporting leaders in the business world. I’m certified as an Integral Coach (ICF, PCC), have an MBA, and have taught and facilitated Executive Education and entrepreneurship programs at top ten universities as well as coached, led, taught, captained, trained, facilitated, or supported hundreds of clients and students over my career. 

Past clients include individuals and teams from Auth0, Department of Labor, Duke University, Gilead Sciences, Leadership Triangle, LinkedIn, Novozymes, Palantir, Reddit, Tines, Twitch, Twitter, University of North Carolina, US Navy and WebFlow, WillowTree, Workday, and many more.

A bit of my Story

As a kid, I had dreams of charting my own path in life, yet I was holding someone else’s map. It told me I had to be accommodating, take care of others before I took care of myself, be a good, easy kid, and that my worth depended upon the approval and admiration of those around me. I often felt like I was pretending, trying to fit in, and I felt lost.

As an adult, I led a life that looked like I knew the way. I led sailing expeditions for Outward Bound, traversed places so remote in Patagonia there weren’t maps, and spent a year of nights in my sleeping bag in the wilds, both the mountains and the seas. I crossed the Pacific in a 42-foot sailboat, bartering bras for fresh fruit upon the first landfall. I filled out a passport and then another. Friends and the generation above told me they envied my adventurous life, yet what I craved most was a sense of home.   

In the winter of 2009, exhausted, depressed, burnt out, and on the verge of dropping out of graduate school, I stumbled upon a yoga retreat while backpacking in Peru. Three days in, after constantly slipping, at times puking and crying, my body erupted with laughter, unlike anything I had experienced before. It was a crack of light in the vast wilderness I felt mired in. “this,” I remember thinking. “I want more of this.”  

And for the next decade “this,” a connection to my body and its deep wisdom, became the compass I followed back to myself. 

I’ve now been rooted for fifteen years, and, through career changes and becoming a mother, I have learned to write my own map and blaze my own path as I go, finding my way step by step. The journey has changed my life and work.

I now support purpose-driven founders and leaders navigating change - of work, within the world, that comes with shifting professional roles or founding and growing companies, navigating big life changes, and finding their way as a professional and a parent - in an uncertain world by helping them to put down the maps they’ve been following, reconnect to their internal compass, write their own maps and experience their way into possibilities and growth they never thought possible as they chart, blaze and brave their way.

The guiding principle of my work is that when you hone your internal compass you can chart your way through any change, no matter the uncertainty of the landscape you are traveling.

My work is influenced and inspired by the thinking, writing, and research of Brene Brown, Julia Cameron, Jim Collins, Carol Dweck, Wendy Palmer, Simon Sinek, and many more. It’s also influenced in big and small ways by all those I’ve worked for, alongside, or had the privilege of learning from, teaching, or leading along the way.

I call Durham, NC home along with my partner in life and love and our two, fierce, brave young daughters who remind me every day that bravery isn’t not being scared—it’s being afraid and doing it anyway.

I believe that you have the map.

I believe that the reason you may feel lost is you’re holding someone else’s.

I believe that the only compass you need is within you - you just need to learn how to access it.

I believe once you learn how to do this, you can Navigate change in uncertain times with greater confidence and ease … Making anything possible.