I attempted Mt. Shasta yesterday. It was my first time doing real mountaineering: leaving camp at 2 am, ice axing up a 50-degree snowfield, navigating over a crevasse, and reaching an elevation of 14000 feet. We had to turn around about half a mile below the summit because the route looked kind of sketchy and I didn’t have the energy to traverse more snow and scree with little room for error. I couldn’t tell exactly from our position, but it looked like the scree field continued downward at 45 degrees for at least a thousand feet—a slip would likely result in a fatal tumble. At that altitude, and given how much I had already exerted myself, I wasn’t sure that I could climb it without error, so we turned back.
Jul 19, 2023·edited Jul 19, 2023Liked by Siddharth
Your writing seems to have improved leaps and bounds in but a few weeks!
"I don’t yet know what the alternative is." have you asked yourself what is the cause of fear? Remove the cause and fear ceases. Not all at once. Gradually, then completely. Then even under the unceasing hail of Death, you are fearless, unshakable, free at last.
Fear has a specific causal structure that can be unwound systematically, with right awareness, right concentration, right effort and other factors.
Your writing seems to have improved leaps and bounds in but a few weeks!
"I don’t yet know what the alternative is." have you asked yourself what is the cause of fear? Remove the cause and fear ceases. Not all at once. Gradually, then completely. Then even under the unceasing hail of Death, you are fearless, unshakable, free at last.
Fear has a specific causal structure that can be unwound systematically, with right awareness, right concentration, right effort and other factors.