I have always loved the quote from John F. Kennedy: When written in Chinese, the word is composed of two characters. One represents danger and the other represents opportunity.Looking back on my life...
Fears and worries - about things that are long passed, or that may never materialize in our future - all weigh us down and slow us up.So where you can, drop the worries.Jesus talked a lot about this,...
Any blisters on your shoulder blades would weep painfully, as the weight of the pack went back on. Then somehow your mind would shut out the pain, for a while. Until, by the end of the march, your sho...
I was lucky - unbelievably lucky - to have reached that elusive summit, which also allowed me to reply to that summit question with a ‘yes’. My best buddy Mick found the question much harder, as a ‘no...
And this is a great time to say ‘No more!’ to living out of fear and other people’s expectations.It is never an easy time to face some of those old negative feelings, but it is always a good time to c...
All you have to do is give it an opportunity to be unleashed.
Trucker and I did quite a bit of busking together on our guitars, doing the rounds at various Bristol hot spots.This included the local old people’s home, where I remember innocently singing the lyric...
That night, the tent that I had been alone in for so long was suddenly heaving with bodies, and piles of rope and kit--with Neil, Geoffrey, and Graham squeezed in beside me.I tried to drink as much bo...
That afternoon, I went to Henry with a suggestion.Michael and Graham were still ill. But I was feeling almost fit again.Why not let Geoffrey and me head up to camp two, so we can be in position just i...
Rozhlížel se kolem po nějakém kameni, kterým by se zabil. Žádný však nenašel. Musel to utrpení vydržet.
On our next return to base camp, and after the best night’s sleep I had had since arriving in Nepal, I decided that I would call home on the satellite phone.At $3 a minute, I had not yet used the phon...
My grandfather always had a little framed picture by his bed that simply said:So every once in a while, take out your backpack and head off for a night under canvas. Even if it’s only for one night, a...
Meanwhile, Trucker and I, through all of this, had been renting that cottage together, on a country estate six miles outside of Bristol. We were paying a tiny rent, as the place was so rundown, with n...
It’s not how much money you have that matters, it’s what you do with it. That’s how to become really rich.Let me give you an example of someone who is ridiculously rich, in every sense of the word. Le...
It was now wintertime, and winter Selection is always considered the tougher course, because of the mountain conditions. I tried not to think about this.Instead of the blistering heat and midges, our...
If you can find a path with no obstacles, it probably doesn’t lead anywhere.The dude who said this was dead right.Life is all about getting up again, dusting yourself down again, learning from the les...
I woke in bed, sweating and breathing heavily. It was the third time I’d had this nightmare: reliving that horrible feeling of falling, out of control, toward the ground.I was now on month two of just...
During my time at Eton, I led regular nighttime adventures, and word spread. I even thought about charging to take people on trips.I remember one where we tried to cross the whole town of Eton in the...
A final note on this, one little secret: when you truly commit yourself to your dream, when you ooze enthusiasm and let your talents shine (however small or fledgling they might be at the start), you...
Think of your favorite sports star. Let me tell you, they spent every waking moment of their teenage years in the gym, pounding pavements or knocking a ball against a wall. You just don’t get good at...