"I wanted to achieve something essential in life, something that is not measured by money or position in society.... The mountains are not stadiums where I satisfy my ambitions to achieve. They are my cathedrals, the houses of my religion.... in the mountains I attempt to understand my life."
" I want to achieve something essential in life, something that cannot be measured by wealth or position in society. I want to respect myself as a man and to earn the respect of my friends and family. Clearly, it was my fate to be an athlete. With the gift of that ability, I must strive to realize my potential as a human being.
Mountains are not stadiums where I satisfy my ambitions to achieve. They are cathedrals, grand and pure, the houses of my religion. I approach them as any human goes to worship. On their altars I strive to perfect myself physically and spiritually. In their presence I attempt to understand my life, to exorcise vanity, greed, and fear. From the vantage of their lofty summits, I view my past, dream of the future, and with unusual acuteness i experience the present moment. That struggle renews my strength and clears my vision. In the mountains, I celebrate creation, for on each journey I am reborn."
*****
Big mountains are a completely different world: snow, ice, rocks, sky, and thin air. You cannot conquer them, only rise to their height for a short time; and for that they demand a great deal. The struggle is not with the enemy, or a competitor like in sports, but with yourself, with the feeling of weakness and inadequacy. That struggle appeals to me. It is why I became a mountaineer.
Every summit is different, each a different life that you have lived.
You arrive at the top having renounced everything that you think you must have to support life and are alone with your soul. That empty vantage point lets you reappraise yourself and every relationship and object that is part of the civilized world with a different perspective.
*****
After spending three months in the mountains deprived of things that under normal circumstances I take for granted, I discover that I have another scale of values. Suddenly something unimportant becomes paramount in my thinking. In Demiyanich's case, Tatiana's borscht had assumed mythic properties in his memory; likely it holds the aura of all his domestic comfort. As he spoke about his treasure, I openly envied him. I did not have that soup to remember and he had not climbed 8000-meter peaks. At that moment in my mind, those two facts became equal. All my mountaintops were leveled to one bowl of Tatiana's borscht.
*****
Mountaineering is a model of the ordinary life of all human beings placed in an extreme environment. We strip away all the polite layers that make it easy to ignore the truth. We work hard, deny ourselves comfort, and face the uncertain future with our skills. What comes of this effort is that we can know ourselves better. That is what we offer the public. Everyone in his or her life must ask the questions "Who am I?" "What am I doing here?" If we are honest and fair, this is what we can report from our adventure that is important. -Oct, 2007 at Mountain Culture at Banff, Canada
*****
I want believe that the roads we choose to follow in life depend less on economic problems, on political battles, on the imperfections of our external world, and more on our internal calling. An inner voice compels us to go into the mountains, to the heights above the clouds, breaking new trails. The fathomless sky and sparkling summits with their grandeur and mystery will always appeal to that part of humanity that loves beauty. This is and will always be their magnetic power. They exist free of the petty vanity and trivial worldly aggrevations that cloud our experience of the present moment and shadow our view of the beautiful and eternal.
*****
When climbing the last meters or even stopping on the summit's snowy ledge, my understanding of the meaning of the achievement has changed. My sense of joy in the accomplishment and my satisfaction with being on the top is overshadowed by the wonder that one could make such as effort for the transitory reasons of human vanity. It is as though, arriving at the top, something has been forgotten or lost, and without that it is impossilbe for me to understand why I am standing there. A great emptiness fills me, and I experience tranquillity, knowing that when I go down, the world will be easier for me.
*****
What drives an individual to climb mountains, to attempt the unnecessary, to risk life? What compels one to habitually abandon familiar comfort for such uncertainty? How can I explain this? Who has gone far away, experiencing the pain of separation, and not known the joy of homecoming? Who has thought life was lost and rejoiced in the opportunity for a second chance? When the sense of wonder is dulled by the petty demands of civilization, I am pulled back to the mountains and their environment of primary contrast: stars of exceptional brilliance, great white snowfields, and the indigo sky melting to black in the death zone. The grandiose mountains and the blue glaciers strip the scals from a faded life and generate the same sense of awe and wonder that the sun's warmth, the greenness of the plants, and the blue water inspired during the first few days of our return to civilization.
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"All religions, all teachings, are synthesized in the Himalyas." - Nicholas Roerich, Shambhala
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"I would like to believe that the roads we choose depend less on economic problems or political battles or the imperfections of our external world, and more on our internal calling, which compels us to go anew into the mountains, to the heights beyond the clouds, making our way to the summits. The sparkling summits and the fathomless sky above our heads, with their grandeur and mysterious beauty, will always draw humanity, which loves all that is beautiful. This was, is and will be the magnetic strength of the mountain, independent of the worldly, trivial vanities and fusses, beyond which, at times, we cannot see the real, the beautiful and the eternal." Anatoli quoted by Lene Gammelgaard in "Climbing High: A Woman's Account of Surviving the Everest Tragedy"
