Eagle County native Finn Mott’s new project, ‘Glint,’ is an effort to help ‘overcome calamity’

Finn Mott knew something was wrong when he heard his mother’s voice darken during a telephone call.

Mott, then in eighth grade, was getting ready for a spring break trip. He’d been seeing doctors for migraines and other ailments, but that phone call was different. When his mother hung up, she told him to pack a bag for a trip to Denver.

That trip was to Children’s Hospital, where Mott began treatment for brain and spinal cancer. He spent the next two weeks undergoing test after test after test, being diagnosed and going through surgeries.

Cancer treatment lasted through much of Mott’s time at Eagle Valley High School, from which he graduated in 2020.

Mott’s is now 23 and cancer-free. He hesitates to say he’s “cured,” because one never knows if cancer is truly gone.

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And he’s been busy.

Mott’s back in the valley for the summer. He’s working on completing a Master of Fine Arts degree from the New School in New York. Before that, though, he studied on a full-ride scholarship at Colorado College in Colorado Springs, with coursework including business, economics and society. He’s also done undergraduate work in New Zealand and taught English to kindergarten students in Tanzania and Morocco.

‘Overcoming calamity’

He’s a published poet, a stand-up comedian and is now working on an entrepreneurial venture that combines all those interests with a book called “Glint,” which, he said, “helps individuals overcome instances of calamity, specifically trauma, illness (and) grief through creative and expressive means.”

The book — kind of a notebook, actually — was designed and written with the collaboration of psychologists, art therapists, hospitals, patients and others.

The book has prompts for users to explore how they deal with disease and their emotions. The Glint program also includes workshops for users.

“It gives the space for people to process the intangible parts of (their) hardship,” he said.

He’s been leading workshops at the Shaw Cancer Center in Edwards. Those are going pretty well. Scott Berg, a concierge at Jack’s Place, the “caring house” where Shaw patients can stay while they’re receiving treatment, said the last class was a big hit.

“The class is only supposed to be an hour, and people stayed close to two hours,” Berg said.

Berg said he’s been impressed by Mott’s spirit and his book.

“It’s taking your story and turning it into a positive,” Berg said.

Turning hardship into a positive has been familiar territory for Mott. As a child of divorced parents, he moved 18 times as a youth, and cancer, of course, is something no kid should have to deal with.

Now, though, Mott says while cancer treatment was the “hardest time of my life,” it was also, in many ways, “the greatest time of my life.”

In many ways, he says, cancer treatment showed him a lot of truths.

For instance, “You find out who your true friends are.” Those who stuck around through his diagnosis and treatment were those who truly cared. And, he added, he was forced to be vulnerable.

“I learned that vulnerability is really your greatest superpower and ally. And it’s kind of become my brand as I’ve gotten older,” he said.

That brand became Glint, and the mission is to help others, partly through a nonprofit.

Part of the Glint workshops includes creative writing and journaling and part includes comedy. There’s an Aug. 1 show set at Jack’s Place.

The idea for Glint, at least as a start, is a business-to-business model.

Partnerships in the works

“We have a lot of partnerships in the works,” he said. “Ideally, this will be something that can have multiple roots and legs in different parts of the country and the world.”

And while he doesn’t say it, there’s a kind of urgency to what Mott’s doing. While he’s cancer-free now, he still takes medication twice a day and visits doctors every four months.

“These are things that are going to be constant for the rest of my life,” he said.

So getting Glint moving is important. So is getting other projects off the ground and moving.

“I’ve had this responsibility to do things in my life,” he said. “And I call that responsibility a purpose.”