 My Mt.. Everest is a metaphor for including in your life fun, recreational activities that challenge your fear and strengthen your courage. It's a sure way to develop your "courage muscle." First, Your Mt.. Everest. Then, the world.
Newsletters: 2009 2008 2007 September 2006 December My Mount
Everest: March, 2006 Eudora Welty
It takes a lot of Mt.
Everests (whatever Mt. Everest is for you) to
develop the courage to confront the really big
decisions in your life. As a coach of career
transitions using my non-linear approach, I am very
sensitive to the difference between not always
choosing a linear path to decision-making and being
just plain scattered. I've done both; there is a
difference. Non-linear decision-making is the
result of the freedom to allow yourself to be lead
by your creativity, spirit, research, intuition
(any and all, in any combination). But when it
comes to specific tasks, 'linear' leads the way.
Paying bills, answering e-mails are pretty direct
activities. You lead yourself, one step straight in
front of the other. That's where focus is
king. Linear does the heavy
lifting, gets the job done, but non-linear helps us
decide which jobs to linearly get done. Freely
choosing non-linear tangents has the surprises and
fun for us. It's what makes our life interesting.
It challenges our preconceptions. I was speaking to a friend
of mine last month. We hadn't talked in a while so
we caught up a bit (Reader's Digest style) on our
lives. I told Roxana about my 'e-letter,' and Rox
told me about her marriage. She mentioned that her
recent marriage has brought different feelings,
that she hadn't anticipated. I asked her to
elucidate. She expressed it so clearly; and I found
it candid and interesting. I'm sure you will
too: You asked for my thoughts
about how I feel about marriage. Has it changed my
view of my relationship? It has. I've been married about a
year and a half, and was living with my guy for
about 3 years before that. I wasn't particularly
motivated to marry. It didn't seem necessary, and I
had a sort of knee-jerk anti-establishment view
about the institution: why do I need the State to
validate my love-relationship? Why do I want to
participate in an institution that is closed to my
gay friends? Etc. Jesse, my husband, really
wanted it, though. And after a while I realized
that my objections were not as deep as his desire
to go forward. We got married in my
sister's backyard. Jackie Goldberg officiated, and
was fantastic, by the way. It was a lovely
day. I wasn't expecting any
major change to follow, though. And I was really
wrong about that. Agreeing to marry involved a big
leap of faith for me. My political reservations
were, at least in part, masking a deeper fear about
what it would mean to really accept that someone
wanted to love me, for life. Now that we are married,
our relationship is much deeper. I feel a real
sense of safety and security. We can fight without
it being the end of the world. I know he's not
going anywhere. I feel that I can be more
vulnerable. I like needing him, and I like that we
belong to each other. We're nicer to each other
than we were before. It's altogether great, and
altogether unexpected. Marriage isn't for everyone,
but it definitely suits me. Roxana Tynan Some of our best thinking,
the thinking that most influences the direction of
our lives is the result of gathering information in
the sweeping glances of the primitive gatherers of
food and not the narrow focused attention of the
hunter. But that's another analogy for another
issue. Please let me know if you
would like to contribute to My Mt. Everest
e-letter: About Merle M. Singer: |