The only person you are fighting is yourself and your stubbornness to engage in new circumstances.

If you're bumming out, you're not gonna get to the top, so as long as we're up here we might as well make a point of grooving. (Quoting Scott Fischer)

Don't settle down and sit in one place. Move around, be nomadic, make each day a new horizon.

There is something special about a quiet untouched forest that just pulls you into the moment. Something that no parks will ever be able to achieve. Isn't that what we're all searching for in life? To just be happy and content in the moment, to just be there in the "now"?

Achieving the summit of a mountain was tangible, immutable, concrete. The incumbent hazards lent the activity a seriousness of purpose that was sorely missing from the rest of my life. I thrilled in the fresh perspective that came from the tipping the ordinary plane of existence on end.

Although the far territory of the extreme can exert an intoxicating pull on susceptible individuals of all bents, extremism seems to be especially prevalent among those inclined by temperament or upbringing toward religious pursuits. Faith is the very antithesis of reason, injudiciousness a crucial component of spiritual devotion. And when religious fanaticism supplants ratiocination, all bets are suddenly off.

When I start any book, I have no idea what I'm going to do.