MUSINGS FROM MIDLIFE
My Stories
The Courage to Stop
"What we don't need in the midst of struggle is shame for being human." Brene Brown
Cycling some 45kms to climb the infamous Mt Baw Baw I'm 4kms from the top. I stop. I’m having a mental breakdown training for Three Peaks Challenge. I did both Three Peaks and climbed Mt Baw Baw last year.
Crying, well a few primal sobs, the words tumble out of my mouth. I’m not doing Peaks. On my own, the others up before me, there is no one to hear except that ruthless mountain.
Last year, training was going well.
The Journey
One day you finally knew what you had to do, and began, though the voices around you kept shouting their bad advice — though the whole house began to tremble and you felt the old tug at your ankles. “Mend my life!” each voice cried. But you did not stop. You knew what you had to do, though the wind pried with its stiff fingers at the very foundations, though their melancholy was terrible. It was already late enough, and a wild night, and the road full of fallen branches and stones. But little by little as you left their voices behind, the stars began to burn through the sheets of clouds, and there was a new voice which you slowly recognised as your own, that kept you company as you strode deeper and deeper into the world, determined to do the only thing you could do — determined to save the only life you could save.