Mountains to Climb

I truly enjoy climbing mountains. Besides the physical workout, there are other payoffs. One is to experience the incredible progress that can be made simply by putting one foot in front of the other. Kilimanjaro is my favorite mountain for many reasons, but today, for three things: it helped me conquer some deep-seated fears, it showed me new ways to create support communities for myself, and it got me in touch with a higher level of accomplishment, with a new feeling of self-fulfillment.

But, in many ways, Kilimanjaro was easy. Its value is the perspective it has given me for my other mountains. Many years ago, I faced a mountain and decided I couldn’t climb it. My marriage was in trouble, our adopted son was hard to handle, and I let him go to live with my brother and sister-in-law, who became loving parents to him. I was too needy myself at that time to take on that mountain. I regret not taking up the challenge.

Today I am avoiding a mountain. I need to speak more honestly with a couple of people who are close to me. I am putting off the climb, hoping I won’t have to take it. The relationships, however, won’t be true without it. I am looking for courage, and yet I know, the courage is in me.

I am also currently climbing a mountain where there are a few little voices of self-doubt, and a good bit of forward progress, and absolutely no idea how far off the summit is. Recently, I took the bold step of firing a major client. As a consultant, I need clients. In the past, I let work go when I had other work. This client’s work had become incompatible with my professional values. The work was unhealthy. So now I’m looking for another way to increase my income. It takes energy to make cold calls and to follow up. I am, however, confident I will find what I want. And part of that confidence comes from having stood at the top of Kilimanjaro.

There is nothing to do on the summit of a mountain made of rock and ice. Cold and breathless, I enjoyed my state of mind — similar to meditation. Even though I didn’t focus on anything, the summit was a place of insight . The view was: Here I am. I made it. Did I ever think I wouldn’t. What little voice was that. Uhuru peak had power for me, it reminded me of the choices we human beings are blessed with – to take difficult paths – to pursue challenging goals. Mountains of many different kinds provide paths for us to develop more fully.

Mountain as metaphor is well illustrated in a book about an accomplished woman hiker, named Margo Chisholm. Chisholm was 40 when she started climbing mountains. At that point she made major life changes because she admitted her addictions to food, alcohol and cocaine. During one of her most abusive times, she was taking 90 laxatives a day. Chisholm says she climbed mountains as a way to find her soul. Comments from her book speak in a universal voice about our experiences climbing many kinds of mountains.

Chisholm says:
“How did I ever get here from being Miggie, that little girl in Greenwich, Connecticut? I’m forty-four years old. I sometimes think I should be over my past, and yet in so many ways I’m just going deeper and deeper into it. Climbing these mountains and finding myself – that’s what my journey seems to be about.”

“I felt as if I was being pulled (up) by a force much greater than myself.”

“Each experience helped me discover more and more about my new foundation. The anger, fears and sadness, reflex reactions to the past, were sometimes so strong I knew they were markers, emotional signs that said, ‘Don’t go this way: Danger.’ (Yet) It seemed as if I didn’t have a choice; I had to explore all of my inner territory to find out what was really true and what was not.”

“Quietly yet powerfully from way down inside my heart, a lid was being blown off a box of incredible dreams that had been sealed tightly for years. I had a sense of truly unlimited possibilities. Something had changed. I knew I’d never be the same again.”

From TO THE SUMMIT, A Woman’s Journey into the Mountains to Find Her Soul, by Margo Chisholm

I asked a few people what mountains they’ve climbed or are still climbing in their lives. They said:

Learning a new skill and starting a new career, dealing with an aging live-in parent, coping as a single parent, and finishing a long-delayed degree.

I am in awe of the mountains people climb, especially those by people close to me. My adopted son, Ben, changed countries, cultures and languages and family at age 5. My Mother who raised my two handicapped brothers, most of that time without her husband, without a college education, working as a school cook. She was challenged by exhaustion most of the time but that never stopped her.

I appreciate women like Rosa Parks and Elizabeth Cady Stanton for the mountains they climbed—and those that many women and men undertook and that I benefit from—for being willing to take on difficult challenges that they knew could last many years, not knowing if they’d ever be finished or see any resolution during their lifetimes.

My experiences with dying persons have shown me that people who embrace difficult challenges throughout their lives tend to have peaceful deaths. They’ve had many opportunities to admit and deal with their fears, they know the value of supportive friends and families and hospice workers, and they’ve experienced letting go, giving up control.

Why do I advocate taking on difficult challenges? Well, challenges are all around us. We can’t eliminate them. We can ignore them – sometimes with prices to pay – or suffer through them. But I am advocating not just recognizing them but naming and embracing our challenges as opportunities for developing ....... to help affirm ourselves and honor our lives.

As we feel overwhelmed by our challenges, and as we breathe through tension and fatigue, we have opportunities to use our difficulties to become wiser, and more compassionate. Though our paths are all different, our lifelong journeys are all in the same direction—towards wholeness. A wholeness that develops each of us to our fullest.

So, what holds us back? Inertia, and fear, – all kinds of fears – fear of emotional and physical pain, a fear that we won’t reach our goal. Some mountains look impossible—will the benefits ever outweigh the pain? -- say, of reconciling with an estranged family member or friend.

Fear and inertia combined block our avenues for personal and spiritual growth. Just as cold and lonely spots on mountains bring out different fears by exposing us to the elements, our difficulties reveal fears that have been holding us back. Yet it’s hard to push through learned hesitations or old hurts.

How can we deal with this fear? Acknowledging it is the first step. We can also benefit from shared experiences. When people told me about their personal mountain climbs.....there were common threads – realizing they couldn’t control everything they were undertaking, accepting they were in situations where they didn’t know what was going to happen, where they felt vulnerable, and having to seek out new and different support systems.

People also told me that their challenges helped them see parts of themselves that they had previously not known or they had managed to ignore. Someone realized that his life was too reliant on long-held misconceptions—in this case, trying to please a parent. Another said she discovered she’d been listening too much to inner voices of negativity and self-doubt. One person told me she saw herself in an entirely new way, as a complete individual for the first time.

I don’t know the attribution for the saying, “With the summit in our eyes, we love to walk along the plain.” But I know that some mountains—of both kinds—are much easier for me to climb than others. And I also know that that’s more a reflection of my attitude toward the climb than the mountain’s height or difficulty. Plus, my comfort with any kind of mountain is related to how I’m taking care of myself —physically, emotionally and spiritually.

Moreover, reaching the summit isn’t the reason for taking on a challenge. Commitment to the journey alone changes us. Even mountaineers agree.

(P 21 from TO THE SUMMIT, Joseph Poindexter) American physician and mountain climber Charles Houston said, “On great mountains, all purpose is concentrated on the single job at hand, yet the summit is but a token of success, and the attempt is worthy in itself.”

Margo Chisholm also writes about her mountain of addiction never being fully climbed. After ten years she says she still craves the things that are deadly for her, and she occasionally slips back. There isn’t a pinnacle in this kind of climb, but there is tremendous accomplishment in every day of moving forward.

What are your mountains? What are you undertaking that isn’t finished? What climbs are still ahead?

The mountains here in Silver Spring and the metro area invite us to open up our relationships with ourselves and with others.

Witness the wisdom and compassion of this beautiful sanctuary—a pinnacle reached and shared by members of this congregation. Fears were met and dealt with and a stronger community developed in building it.

Our major challenges contain the power to renew us—to help us be more fully alive. Commitment and perseverance expand us and connect us with our higher selves. As we become familiar with our fears, we gain personal insights. As we learn to rely on others for support, they become dear to us and more dear to us—and in new ways. As we gain deeper understandings of ourselves, we love more fully. As we move forward, self-fulfillment says: I know who I am. I know what’s important.

And it is important to say when the journey hurts and when it’s scary. We may not know how much further we have to go. But we can be sure that as we confront fears and limitations, our mountains will tell us what’s true for us.

We deserve opportunities that challenge us. As Kabir says, Inside each of us is the greatest teacher. All we need to do is listen. Regardless of the challenge, as we climb our mountains, we are rewarded—incredible progress can be made by putting one foot in front of the other.