Climb.
Has it ever looked like it’s too high to climb? That mountain, that vast landscape of pain and suffering in front of you, that journey that you know that you have to traverse alone.
Have you ever for one moment sat there in the quiet stillness of your soul, and asked yourself in that gentle voice that you reserve for your darkest moments…
Can I do this?
Because sometimes the journey in front of you seems just too much. Like there is not enough energy in the world to carry over the peak and down onto the other side, and you wish, in one fleeting heartbeat that you could just stay here right now, and just be still forever.
Not quitting, not succeeding, just stopping, and removing yourself from the flow of time so that you can truly, completely, and most of all quietly, rest.
And you can for a moment, but that moment never lasts.
Because someday soon, at some indefinable point on your journey, you’re going to have to do what you were always destined to do.
Probably without a fanfare, and maybe even without a cheerleader or a coach to help, you’re going to stand up, take a deep breath, and point yourself in the direction that you know leads away from that which you are trying to avoid. With one foot slowly, falteringly in front of another, you begin the process that takes you out of the darkness.
You start to climb.
The journey upwards is never easy. Sometimes you walk, sometimes you are pushing yourself to take another step, to raise your foot for another movement. There are rocks underneath you, and boulders that block your way.
Life, in its unceasing cruelty, demands your blood, sweat, tears and pain as the toll for journeying on this particular highway, and it will take every ounce of hope you can muster.
Because sometimes, you’re just climbing in the dark, alone, afraid and miserable.
But you keep climbing, because you know that there is no way that you will ever arrive where you need to be unless you keep going. You fix an image of your destination in your soul, and with every thought you breathe life and power into it.
Each footstep, each trembling muscle, each river of sweat and drop of blood give that image another atom of reality, until it stands in your soul as both the beacon to guide your footsteps, and the energy to harness your soul.
So with another footstep, another trembling tear, you climb your mountain while building your destination in your heart.
And finally, one day, one blessed glorious moment that shines out into the darkness of our universe, you finish your climb, and arrive at the top of where you were always going to be.
With a renewed sense of faith in yourself, you stand there in the actuality of your vision, and understand that the strength you needed was always inside of you, waiting for the day that you were to begin.
The climb was always possible, you just had to reach deep into your soul to turn on the light, begin the process, and move forward with determination and desire.
Your mountain is waiting, waiting for you to begin. Start today, start now, and take faith in the truth inside you. You are ready now, Just begin.
And climb.
— Dr. Alan Barnes
@maddrbmusings