Mountaineering is literally an uphill climb. It's downright intimidating if you spend too long thinking about the weight of a pack, the wear and tear on one's knees, or the magnitude of the task ahead. Hills become mountains. They greet you with each new step--two thousand of them in a mile, twenty thousand in ten. Uneven ground pushes back, challenges, redirects, torments. Once forgiving straps dig into weary shoulders. Sweat beads at first, then flows. The heart bangs like a drum on the walls of your chest, especially on those long, unforgiving ascents. Something as simple and natural as breathing is labored and intense. Your body wills you to concede a thousand times. A second wind, or third, or fourth, grants temporary reprieve, but only just so. Then you summit a ridge, catch the first or last light of day, overlook a sea of sky and color. There, in the stillness, a profound quiet takes hold, and words cannot do justice to the experience. You bear witness to the sublime. Months of hard training and meticulous preparation amount to a resounding NOW. You've earned the moment, and this moment is more than one in the sum total. This moment reverberates, affirms, inspires, alters.
Our modern age is predicated on the notion that Ease is more significant than Earn. We want our fixes quick and painless. Push button pizzas, binary relationships, fitness apps. Our pursuit of convenience is an empty surrogate for the pursuit of inspiration. Life on autopilot. Wake me when we get there, or in the event of an emergency. However, there are no shortcuts to our health, our understanding, our sanity, our well-being. The truly meaningful things in our lives cannot be quantified, and they certainly cannot be rushed. We must fully participate and own our every action. We must do the heavy lifting.
I am unabashedly old fashioned, a proud graduate of the school of hard knocks. I'm that guy that buys what coaches and drill instructors and martial arts senseis sell--all those lessons learned the hard way, with grit and determination, and a fair portion of blood, sweat and tears. Easy things, those that come with minimal effort or intention, never mean that much to me, and certainly never inspired me to be more. I favored those hard-case teachers, the truly demanding ones that accepted only my best. I appreciate the tough boss and the tougher task. I appreciate colleagues that say what they mean, and hold us all accountable. Most of all, I am drawn to experiences that offer potential for personal growth. I imagine that for most successful people, however they define success, the same is true. Success breeds success, and leads us to crave challenge.
In the Corps, our leaders spoke of integrity, self-discipline, attention to detail, service above self, and a commitment to excellence. It's the same in all branches. These are bedrock ideals. They are not exclusive to military service, just more immediate. These ideals also happen to be key to a successful life. No paths of least resistance, no shortest distance between points, certainly no freebies. Anything worth doing is worth doing well, is worth the extra effort, all the sweat equity, the short term disappointments leading to long term satisfaction.
Our millennials often get a bad rap. Older generations: parents, teachers, college professors, employers, label them lazy and narcissistic, even destructive. It has become a trope, the unkempt and disillusioned teen or young adult banging away at their device in social spaces, searching for meaning in the virtual, ephemeral, superficial, and self-indulgent. YOLO. If these characterizations are true, then we, and not them, are to blame, for they are our sons and daughters, heirs to a world we authored.
Values begin at home. We affirm or deny them in schools. Indolence, shortsightedness, egotistical and defeatist tendencies, even fragility, are learned behaviors. The same is true for diligence, foresight, humility, optimism, and resiliency. We must take care to teach our children the latter, or our reality TV world will assuredly teach them the former. We must raise them to care deeply, for themselves, for others, for things that truly matter. We must raise them to work hard.
I know our kids have it in them. I've seen them summit mountains. I watch them lead around campus. They've taken on the challenge of the world's toughest college preparatory program. They've built a science trail, ten tons of rock delivered by hand. They renew our rainforest and challenge us to be ever more sustainable. They spend their weekends building houses for Habitat for Humanity. They spend their summers tutoring disadvantaged elementary students. They spend months organizing events and raising funds for noble causes. Sometimes your children require our help. Other times, they ask us to get out of their way. They are reflections of you and us. Our collective challenge is to figure out how we can help them grow even more; how we can support the development of resiliency in our children, at home and school; how we can challenge them to live up to their true potential?
Our world needs mountaineers, rugged souls who dare and endure and shape a future in spite of the odds or enormity of the undertaking. It needs people who understand that attitude determines altitude. Let's all make sure our children are ready for their climb.