|
last year, i missed the opportunity to participate in the challenge of climbing the stairs of the cn tower, and i was absolutely not about to pass on the chance to do it this year. on wednesday, a friend of mine in edmonton was considering taking a highly sought after job that would mean taking a step down a rung of the “job title ladder”, but a huge climb upwards and outwards in terms of professional breadth and career development. i think that the obviousness of my choice told me a lot about myself that i’ve probably known, but not thought about for some time, whereas her utter confusion and uncertainty spoke volumes about her. this continuum of commitment presents itself to us every single moment of every single day, but it somehow never gets easier to deal with.
climbing stairs sounds simple – you lift one leg forward and upwards and place it on a step. then, you push your weight down on the first leg, shifting your weight forward, and you use the momentum of your weight transfer to swing your second leg (if a second leg is available) forwards and upwards past the first leg to the step above it. and then you repeat the process in mirror fashion. the entire process often takes less than a second and requires virtually no effort or thought for the vast majority of human beings. therefore, the choice to perform this action 1,776 times is undiluted by complexities of consequence or alternative.
choosing to leave a job, or a home, or a lover, seem completely different activities entirely. after you take the first step, it often becomes very difficult to see the consequences beyond the second or third step. i think that is why so many decisions create so much stress and fear in so many of us. the risk that the second step will present impossible challenges or hardship that we cannot possibly be prepared to face scares us all. and the third step – well, there’s clearly an “escalating” probability that that step will be altogether so dangerous and complicated that no one no matter how capable or competent would ever have the means to deal with it. far better to stay on the landing and look up at what only “could be”.
race time came and our team assembled. seven great people and me, all choosing to maniacally perform a feat which taken as a whole is so abnormal, so depleting, and strangely, so lacking in achievement (reckoned here by the futility of taking absolutely the least convenient, most strenuous, and least desirable path up a tower, only to take the fastest, most expedient, least exhausting means down to the original starting point) for the sake of what? challenge and achievement for its own sake? financial contribution to a cause that might never be won? to have a fun time and get some exercise? self knowledge? every participant had their own reason for participating and i have to believe that each and every one of these reasons is an excellent one, because we all committed to this approach of taking the next step forward, no matter how difficult or tiring the last 999 steps were, and knowing full well that the next 777 of them would be harder still.
my friend and i spoke for half an hour on our cell phones as she drove to her new home in edmonton’s sprawling suburbia and i wandered aimlessly around the base of the tower that i was to climb the next evening. we discussed literally dozens of possible branches to which her imminent decision could lead, the possible outcomes that were clear and certain, and many of the ones that were not. over the course of the conversation, it struck me that it didn’t matter which turn she took – to take the job or to stay at her present one – the (admittedly metaphorical) consequence would be the same: there would be another different step waiting for her immediately afterwards. and so it is with so many of the choices we make and even with the ones that are thrust upon us. we move a leg forward and upwards, shift our weight, and repeat in mirror fashion. step one is necessarily different than step two, and even though step two might look different than step two(a), step three awaits with equal certainty, and in any case, the participant’s response must be the same. move forward and upwards, shift, repeat.
i pride myself on my health and fitness, my above-averageness, and the joy that my lack of infirmity brings me on a daily basis. i was proud of my achievement of 21:16, even though i had planned to finish much quicker. i was also proud of my friends who finished faster than me, in my friend jim’s case, considerably faster than me, because i also admire his abilities and his appreciation for life and his own abilities. i was proud of the people who finished after me, because i knew just how hard a challenge this was, how easy it would be to give up and fold and quit the challenge half-way. and i was even proud of the people who had to stop and give up, because they had made the decision to try – to take that first step.
my friend decided not to take the new job, citing many excellent reasons. i was a little disappointed at her for not trying the new challenge, but i was also proud of her decision to commit to what for her had been a complicated and difficult choice. step 2 and step 2(a) for her were not so very different after all. i was no more or less proud when 30 minutes later, she reversed her decision and then decided to take her new job, because like i said, step 2(a) and step 2 were not so very different.
so, i think that is the nature of all choices. while they can never actually be unmade, every time we make a choice for this or that thing, we immediately open ourselves to the next and different step – the next decision to make . even if the decision looks a lot like taking a step backward, it’s really a completely different step. we are every day and every hour and every second moving forward and upwards, even if sometimes, as they do in the seemingly endlessly vertical tunnel that is the base of the cn tower, all the steps look the same. every step brings a slightly (on in some cases, radically) different challenge and might make us more and more weary and cause us more and more hesitation and reluctance, to the very point where we just don’t remember why we took that first step in the beginning – where we just want to get on that elevator and stop climbing. you lose your breath, your chest tightens, sweat streams into your eyes and to the corner of your lip, your legs turn to stone, the coursing blood in your temples drum out conscious thought, and even your hands go numb – you choke on the effort that it has taken to come only this far and you wretch at the distance yet to be travelled, knowing how depleted and disheveled you are after only this much of the journey. the way that i’ve chosen to stay focused is to remember how simple the whole thing really is. keep moving that leg forward one step at a time. until the elevator ride.
thursday was a good day.
- g
|