Life is a Mountain Path: A mountain must always be respected, but can never be conquered.

Sunday, January 6, 2013

A mountain must always be respected, but can never be conquered.

I hike the trail up Mt. Ida.

It starts from over two miles above sea level,

At the continental divide.

It is listed as a “moderate” hike,

I soon find out that there is no such thing as moderate…

I start hiking and my breath is taken away,

Not by the view, but by the thin air.

There is a long trudge ahead of us,

Up to an elevation close to 2 and ½ miles above the sea.

As we clear the trees after the first half mile,

It is open tundra.

The only thing that seems to be up here is a thin blanket of grass,

And lots of boulders.

Then we see a marmot sunning itself on a rock,

And some pikas running in and out of their caves among the boulders.

The trail becomes harder to follow, and slopes upward more rapidly.

There are snow fields up here, and it is a chilly wind that blows from the peak.

It is a psychological battle to keep on going, because we can always see the top.

However, it never seems to get nearer…

Finally, we close in on the top of the mountain.

As we get closer dark clouds start to form.

The rain comes first, then the hail starts…

We are so close now!

Probably about 150 ft. below the top.

Then we see a lightning strike…

It is not safe to be out in the open with nothing but a few boulders to hide behind.

We turn back around.

The wind picks up, and starts to blow the storm clouds towards us…

I risk a quick glance back every once in a while,

But I have to keep my eyes in front of me dare I lose my footing.

It would be a long slide down the mountain.

My hiking partner loses his water bottle and it rolls down several hundred feet…

We keep going.

Normally it seems to take longer to reach the top of a mountain.

Today with the storm clouds behind us it seems to take longer going down.

We get below the tree line again.

Now in relative safety, we are only about a half mile from the car.

The trees open up and we emerge beside the continental divide sign where our journey began.

I look back up at the top of the mountain up in the clouds.

It was a great view for the few minutes that we got to spend near the top.

I think to myself, “A mountain must be respected. It is possible to climb a mountain, but impossible to conquer one…”

~Nick Whittemore (2012)

Mountain Paths

"We all have our experiences in the desert, at some point in our lives." - Me

"All good things are wild and free." - Henry David Thoreau

"I'd made it this far and refused to give up because all my life I had always finished the race." - Louis Zamperini

"The frigid wind whipping through my shirt, the methodic pounding of my feet against the well worn path, the faint rapid beating of my heart that keeps time ticking.. Neither the hills before me nor the sharp pain in my side discourage me. They make me feel as if I am whole again. The beast within longs to escape, running along side me, coursing through my vains. The scenery blurring as I fly by. Everything is flowing, breathing deeply never short of breath.. Warm feelings fill my soul, snow falling, crunching lightly beneath my feet, that last burst of energy expended just in time.." - Excerpt from, Winter Jogging by Nick Whittemore (2007)

"A mountain must always be respected, and will never be conquered." - Me

"I am a rebel, one who has not listened. We all are rebels. In this way we are all the same." - Me

"Well I walk upon the river like it's easier than land." - The Tallest Man on Earth

"When I was a boy the old chiefs used to say, as soon as you climb a high mountain, the highest you can find, do not stop halfway and look back. Climb till you reach the top. There you can breathe deep and look into all the valleys. Then you can say, 'I have seen.'" - From an old Nez Perce chief

"The man who moves a mountain begins by carrying away small stones." - Confucius

"In wildness is the preservation of the world" - Henry David Thoreau

"Each one of us, in our own way, has got to do something to save their soul, you know.. whatever that is.." - Yvon Chouinard

“How you climb a mountain is more important than reaching the top.” ― Yvon Chouinard

"What is the meaning of the few brief instants in human history when people have stood atop Everest? The answer depends on the motivation of the person standing there. Those prepared to truly see and listen will find something different, and greater than what they were seeking. They will find that the spirit and blessings of the mountains can be found, ultimately, within all of us. And for those who have faith, Miyolangsangma, the omniscient and bountiful goddess of Everest, has another message: you will be protected." - Jamling Tenzing Norgay in the book, Touching my Father's Soul.

"The difference between what we do and what we are capable of doing would suffice to solve most of the world's problems." - Gandhi

"When men climb mountains together, the rope between them is more than a physical aid to the ascent, it is a symbol of the spirit of enterprise. It is a symbol of men banded together in a common effort of will and strength against their own true enemies: inertia, cowardice, greed, ignorance, and all weaknesses of spirit." - Charles Houston

"I left my heart to the wild hunt a-comin', I live until the call, And I plan to be forgotten when I'm gone, ..." - The Tallest Man on Earth

"As human beings, our greatness lies not so much in being able to remake the world - that is the myth of the atomic age - as in being able to remake ourselves." - Mahattma Ghandi

"We leave as we came and, god willing, as we shall return, with peace, and hope for all mankind." Eugene Cernan

"It is not the mountain that we conquer but ourselves." - Edmund Hillary

"If you want to do something you have to imagine it. If you don't imagine it, it will never happen" - Professor Muhammad Yunus's closing remarks @ Social Business Day 2013

"....If you cannot understand that there is something in man which responds to the challenge of this mountain and goes out to meet it, that the struggle is the struggle of life itself upward and forever upward, then you won't see why we go. What we get from this adventure is just sheer joy. And joy is, after all, the end of life. We do not live to eat and make money. We eat and make money to be able to live. That is what life means and what life is for." - George Mallory, Climbing Everest: The Complete Writings of George Mallory

"Everything that is really great and inspiring is created by the individual who can labor in freedom." Albert Einstein

"My mind is in a state of constant rebellion. I believe that will always be so." - George Mallory

"To lead people walk behind them." - Lao Tzu

"There are two ways to live: you can live as if nothing is a miracle, or you can live as if everything is a miracle." Albert Einstein

"At the center of your being you have the answer; you know who you are and you know what you want." Lao Tzu

"Oh but rumor has it that I wasn't born, I just walked in one frosty morn. Into the vision of some vacant mind." - The Tallest Man on Earth

"There are many pathways to the top of a mountain" - Me

"For the stone from the top for the geologists, the knowledge of the limits of endurance for the doctors, but above all for the spirit of adventure to keep alive the soul of man." - George Mallory

"Aw but hell I'm just a blind man on the plains, I drink my water when it rains, and live by chance among the lightning strikes." - The Tallest Man on Earth

"Seven Principles of Social Business

1. Business objective will be to overcome poverty, or one of more problems (such as education, health, technology access, and environment) which threaten people and society; not profit maximization

2. Financial and economic sustainability

3. Investors get back their investment amount only. No dividend is given beyond investment money

4. When investment amount is paid back, company profit stays with the company for expansion and improvement

5. Environmentally conscious

6. Workforce gets market wage with better working conditions

7. ...do it with joy" - Muhammad Yunus"

"You get these guys who build a sailboat from scratch. They spend five years doing it. They get it built, and then they don't want to sail it anymore. But what they really wanted was to build a sailboat. That was it." - Yvon Chouinard

Inspiring Books

Returning to Earth

"Returning to earth after being in the mountains - stepping back out of the wardrobe - can be a disorienting experience. Like Peter, Edmund, Susan and Lucy returning from Narnia, you expect everything to have changed. You half-expect the first people you see to grip you by the elbow and ask if you are all right, to say "You've been away for years''. But usually no one notices you've been gone at all. And the experiences you have had are largely incommunicable to those who were not there. Returning to daily life after a trip in the mountains, I have often felt as though I were a stranger re-entering my country after years abroad, not yet adjusted to my return, and bearing experiences beyond speech." - Robert Macfarlane in the book, Mountains of the Mind.