Stay on Offense Climb Mountains

Attacking Adversity

Go Hiking Early

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Frankly I did not want to write about this. I thought I would bury it somewhere deep in these posts. Why? Because it is a secret. It is the secret to a great hike.

Solitude

People are expected at the mall or on busy streets in downtown. Not on top of a mountain. I am writing this a few weeks after several climbers were killed on Mt Everest while waiting in line to summit. That is not right. It should not have happened. When you go hiking up your local mountain you are usually not faced with life and death situations, but that is still no reason to put up with people. The fewer the better.

When you are the first one on top of the mountain, it is quiet. You can hear God whisper. It is just you and nature. No distracting sounds of peoples voices.

Best Photographs

Do you like the picture I took in the Grand Cayon? I took that early too! You also can stand anywhere you want and get the best photographs. Who wants someone standing on top and there is no room for you? Who wants someone else in their photograph? You can choose where to stand and choose what scenery looks best without having to consider the crowd.

I have done commercials for products on top of a mountain. I couldn’t have taken those videos if there were people mulling around.

The Reality

You might ask yourself, “How can it be that bad?” Oh, it is bad. How do I know? It is because I count people coming up the mountain as I am going down. When I get to around twenty I stop counting. Those summits must be crawling with people. And then once I get back down to the trailhead there are no parking spots left. People are parked illegally.

The only way to avoid this nightmare is to get up very early. How early? Early enough so that you begin your hike at least an hour before sunrise. At least. Two hours is ideal. So go hiking early!

Go Hiking and Hug A Tree

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Am I kidding? No, nature is healthy for you. The air is saturated with more oxygen in the forest. You should be thankful for the trees. But do you really need to hug one? Well, don’t actually hit a tree, but I pat one every time I pass. I see this tree as a symbol for all the trees and because I go by it week after week, and because it is so majestic I just have to recognize it some way.

At first I thought I was the only crazy person out here having fond thoughts about trees until I listened to Hal Elrod, author of the Miracle Morning series of books, talk about the trees in his back yard. He went so far as to make faces for the trees and decorate them.

A Little Magic

Baseball players are known for being superstitious and having rituals before games or clothing they wear. It could be a pair of socks or a wrist band that they thought gave them luck. You could say that patting or even hugging a tree as you pass by is like rubbing a lucky stone you have in your pocket. Maybe if I pat that tree I will have a successful hike with no accidents.

Incorporating a little magic in your hike gives it a surreal feeling. It might be my imagination taking hold of me. I wrote a story about magical mountains so that might be part of this habit I have developed.

Trees Are Older

Most trees are much older than myself. This particular one is ancient for sure and there are fewer and fewer people and things that are older than me these days. I respect that. Maybe the tree could impart some wise advice that I am just too young to know. But trees can’t talk you say! Well, I read once that they do talk but just much slower than we do so we can’t hear them. You think? So they are older and they talk slow. Learning something from a tree might take some time, still, I think it is worth the effort. Now go hiking and hug a tree!

Bookish Weapon Number Seven

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In his excellent book, “The Miracle Equation,” Hal Elrod devotes an entire chapter on my favorite idea from his book. That is a lot of space so this post may be a little longer than others. Let’s take a closer look at his chapter four – Becoming Emotionally Invincible.”

“How is that even possible,” I thought, as I read the title to this chapter. Who has that kind of Superman power? According to Elrod, we all do, but he certainly has developed it in a way others have not.

The Miracle Equation, review by Bill Montgomery

The Miracle Equation, review by Bill Montgomery

It’s All Your Fault

The way I see it is, at the core, we are talking about personal responsibility here. Elrod makes a statement that is worth quoting. Actually he makes a lot of them and I will be quoting and quoting and quoting. Here is the first. “Every painful emotion the you have ever felt, are feeling now, and will ever feel in the future was, is, and will be self-created by you and is completely optional.” That last part is tough. Optional? You feel what you feel don’t you?

Hal says that we all “have the power to stop self-creating negative emotions and live free from emotional pain…that is what it means to be become emotionally invincible.”

Rules

Have you read, “The Five Second Rule,” written by Mel Robbins? Good book. You should read it, but it is not the rule we will be discussing here. There are lots of rules. Sometimes it is hard to keep them all straight.

Hal Elrod’s rule is the five minute rule. He says he came up with this rule after a car accident as he lay in his hospital bed. The light bulb moment was that he made a decision to accept his new reality unconditionally and it only took him five minutes to come to this acceptance. Then he remembered the five minute rule his old boss had taught him that states the you can complain for five minutes about something that went wrong, but that’s it.

So the idea is when something happens like breaking your leg. You can bitch and moan for five minutes and then you need to accept the reality of it. Hal’s boss said the when the five minutes were up you needed to say, “Can’t change it” out loud. Isn’t that powerful? How many times has something happened to you that you had no control over changing and you got all upset for hours? Days? Months? This is a wake up call for all of us.

Let It Go

You are gong to have positive and negative emotions your whole life. Any tools you can muster to manage the negative ones helps you. This is a bookish weapon the helps you stay on offense.

Hal says, “..”all emotional pain that we have ever experienced, are experiencing now, or will ever experience in the future is self created by our resistance to our reality.” He goes on to say, “…it is the degree to which we resist our reality-the degree to which we wish or want something that is out of our control to be different-that determines the degree of emotional pain we experience.”

The idea is to let it go. You don’t have to like it, but let it go. Besides, you have probably heard a version of the story about the farmer who had something unfortunate happen to him and is told by his friends that this is so bad. It turns out in the story the it was actually good. Then something else would happen that looked good and it turned out to lead to something bad. Hal says, “You can’t accurately judge an experience as “good” or “bad” in the moment.”

Hal asks how we can tell if something is out of our control and can’t be changed. It is anything that has already happened. So he says to accept life before it happens. Not just what has happened, but what will happen. Now when are you going to start using this?

Bookish Weapon Number Six

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Eric Greitens book, “Resilience,” was one of the very best books I had ever read on the subject when it was published in 2015. Please read it if you are struggling in life. Once again, this book has so many bookish weapons in it choosing just one is difficult. However, there is a concept discussed that when understood gives the reader a powerful weapon.

Resilience, review by Bill Montgomery

Resilience, review by Bill Montgomery

Feelings, Action, Identity

Everyone talks about how they are feeling. I feel sad, angry, hurt, etc. Greitens points out that in our culture we focus on our feelings first. Then those feelings lead to action. We get angry so we yell at someone. We are hurt so we isolate ourselves. That shapes our identity and we become someone that yells at people, gets angry easily or avoids relationships.

Greitens says this is the wrong way to look at it. Putting feelings first gets us in trouble. Feelings are always going to be there. We just need to put them in their proper place.

Identity, Action, Feelings

Instead of focusing on what you are feeling, ask yourself who you want to be. Then you take action based on that. The action will impact the way you feel. “Your emotions can be harnessed and your feelings trained.”

Greitens discusses Plato’s horses and chariot story where the horses represent our emotions so if we allow emotions to take over they run wild.

It Isn’t Easy

What a great bookish weapon this concept is for us. It is not easy, however. Greitens says, “This all takes daily attention. You never win an award for mastering emotions and call it a day.” He goes on to say, “Decide who you want to be. Act that way. In time you will become the person you resolve to be.”

Wise advice! This book is filed with so much and I certainly recommend you read it. My look at one or two ideas from a book is not meant to be a review, but just a quick look.

Go Hiking Every Week

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Most hikers, even avid hikers, don’t climb a mountain every week. At most they might hike once every couple weeks. That isn’t too bad if you are hiking all year long, but let’s consider the advantages of weekly hiking.

Climb More Mountains

This is pretty obvious. If you are going every week you can climb more in less time. There are so many mountains here in the Picnic Northwest that it is hard to exhaust them.

Enter the hypocrite. Even though I go hiking every week from March through September I do not climb different mountains. I have my favorites and keep gong back to those over and over and over again. Especially in March, April and May when I climb Mt Si again and again.

Your Legs Will Thank You

Consistent weekly hiking will build your legs and lungs. If you wait too long between hikes your legs are going to be sore constantly. It builds your endurance. Your ability to exercise for long periods of time so then you are ready for anything, even the Zombie Apocalypse.

This is an appropriate time to advocate for a little self care. Please, after your hike be sure to use a foam roller on your legs as well as stretching them. This may seem common sense but it is not. In fact, an epsom salt bath or ice bath can help early in the season when your legs have not adapted.

It Becomes A Habit

Now I have to admit that when hiking day rolls around I don’t always “feel” like going. Maybe it is raining. Maybe it’s snowing. It is probably cold. However, going weekly establishes a habit. Then of course you need to establish some “rules” for yourself. Mine are always begin the hike before sunrise, go hiking no matter what the weather happens to be, and always time yourself.

Maybe I should qualify that last rule. Yes, always time yourself, because you want to get better and to get better you have to measure your progress. However, there may be a day on the trail when you want to stop and take a picture or you just decide to take it a little easy. That’s ok. I approve! Now, go hiking every week!

Bookish Weapon Number Five

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Including this bookish weapon is presumptuous, because the author, Jordan B. Peterson, of “12 Rules For Life,” is a fan of long discussions rather than the few minutes of a talk show or a few hundred words in a post like this. However, I think that this one bookish weapon is worth the risk. Please read the whole book as well as one of his other books, “Maps of Meaning.”

12 Rules for Life, review by Bill Montgomery

12 Rules for Life, review by Bill Montgomery

Focus On You

The bookish weapon I wish to explore from Peterson’s book is rule number two in this book. It states, “Treat yourself like someone you are responsible for helping.” If that isn’t going on offense I don’t know what is. This section of the book is as long as some books so we are going to focus on one aspect of it.

Peterson points out that, “You are important to other people as well as yourself. You are therefore morally obliged to take care of yourself.”  It would seem that this is obvious but it is not. Most of us do things to ourselves that we would not do to others, because we figure that we belong to ourselves and can do what ever we want with our possession.

Your Best Friend and Who Owns You

Who is your best friend? It better be yourself. You can’t love someone else until you love yourself. If you accept that then what are you going to do about it or stop doing? But if you say I hate myself so I am going to punish me, then consider that you might not really own yourself.

Consider what Peterson says about this:

‘“Vengeance is mine; I will repay, saith the Lord.” According to this philosophy, you do not simply belong to yourself. You are not simply your own possession to torture and mistreat. This is partly because your Being is inexorably tied up with that of others, and your mistreatment of yourself can have astonishing consequences for others.”’

Your Future Self

Peterson has also said that those “others” include your future selves. If you treat yourself in a way that hurts them it doesn’t turn out well long term. He says, “You are a community of people across time.” This idea is so valuable. It has helped me gain a new perspective on my day to day decisions.

So maybe you are someone that really doesn’t like yourself very much. Then consider that it is not just you that is involved. It is other people and your future selves. This will definitely keep you on offense. Keep rule number two in mind as you go about your day.