Among my wife’s quirks, one of my favorite is that she is obsessed with watching films about mountain climbing. If there is a movie about scaling Everest, a documentary about climbing K-2, free climbing, extreme climbing… we’ve seen it. And, here’s where my full adoration comes in: she likes to watch them right before sleeping.
Usually, she is asleep five minutes into the film but she ALWAYS awakes at the moment the climbers summit. She is fully awake for the triumph [she also opens her eyes if there is a tragedy. I tease her that the only reason she likes watching the films is to see climbers fall off mountains. For this sentiment I get punched].
Reinhold Messner speaks about climbing as an inner journey. An expansion of spirit and self. Making it through is about grasping a greater sense of self. The accomplishment, standing on the summit, is not a goal as much as finding a personal edge and stepping over it. And, as I’ve learned in my midnight viewing of climbing films, the real challenge, the greatest danger, is in the descent. More climbers perish on the way down than on the way up. Making it through is more about the return than it is about the mountain top.
It’s the hero’s journey. It is the course we all climb in this life. There is a call to adventure. For some it is a mountain. Somewhere along the way we can all expect an abyss, a reduction to dust, the void, the belly of the whale. Whatever the variation, it is always transformational. And then comes the journey home.
In the films, there is the moment when the climbers see the base camp, a different kind of thrill than the summit. People bang pots in celebration. Exhilaration infuses exhaustion. The realization floods the transformed climber: I made it through. Kerri’s eyes, blink open for just a moment. She whispers, “See. I knew it.”
MADE IT THROUGH on the album THIS PART OF THE JOURNEY is available on iTunes & CDBaby
read Kerri’s blog post about MADE IT THROUGH
made it through/this part of the journey ©️ 2000 kerri sherwood
Filed under: Edges, Emergence, KS Friday, Story, Transcendence, Uncategorized | Tagged: adventure, base camp, belly of the whale, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, hero's journey, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerri sherwood on itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, made it through, mountain climbing, mountains, summiting, the abyss, the call, the return, this part of the journey |
The Direction of Intention 
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