Sometimes the toughest route up the mountain gives us the confidence to do anything else we desire.
—
Fan Mountain. Also known as Arthur’s Seat, the route I hiked spanned fifteen miles and contained three peaks, the highest one climbing 2,907 feet above rural Wales. My lungs were four weeks sober and still begging for a cigarette. I’d been travelling for a week and still hadn’t talked to a girl.
◊♦◊
The route is admittedly a common one, and I was by far not the only man on the mountain. But I was the only one climbing the ridge by himself, and that’s important. The mountain is incredibly steep and hard on the knees. I stopped to catch my breath often, each time pausing for longer than before, and each time debating whether I had the capacity to make it to the peak.
When you’re on the mountain by yourself, willing your aching knees over sopping clay and sheep shit, you’ve got nothing to prove.
|
Unwittingly, I also chose the steepest and longest route. This meant I summited each peak twice (and a third time, if you count my dehydrated decision-making that forced me to double back.) The UK Special Forces uses this range as a means of weeding out the weak candidates in their first week of training.
If this sounds boastful, that’s precisely the point. I hiked the mountain alone. No one was there to witness my struggle, my constant, nagging wish to abandon the peak and head down for a smoke and a lager.
◊♦◊
When you’re on the mountain by yourself, willing your aching knees over sopping clay and sheep shit, you’ve got nothing to prove. There’s no one present to witness your failure. It’d be so easy to turn around and head back. You can look at the summit online.
But not only does the mind remember its failures, it remembers its successes even better. Just like some people might go on a hike to build trust in their corporation, I hike alone to build trust in myself.
So if you win on the mountain, you win with the girl. Or with your job. Or with your addiction.
|
The doubt I may feel before approaching a woman for a date is the same doubt I feel when I’m struggling on a crag, or smothered by the woods, or sweating through my shorts above the tree-line. It’s the same part of the brain. You know that girl on the subway that you didn’t talk to, but turned away from? You remember that the same way you remember turning your back on the mountain, or relapsing an addiction.
So if you win on the mountain, you win with the girl. Or with your job. Or with your addiction. You win confidence, and confidence bleeds into every facet of your life. It makes you happy on the inside and attractive on the out.
◊♦◊
Moreover, confidence is hard to find right now. In an age where things are easy, doing the things that give you confidence just seem like too much work. Would you rather climb a mountain or make up an excuse and watch Netflix with your cat instead?
The problem is, your brain can distinguish the difficult from the facile so easily. It knows when you’ve tried your best, and when you’ve simply quit early and gone home to bed. Your soul is a conversation between your mind and body, and those things are very bad at lying.
Despite all this, we lie to ourselves often. Like a husband to his wife — reeking of cigarettes and booze — the brain can sniff out its own deceptions and continue to forgive.
Validation is asking a woman if she still finds you attractive after she dumps you. Confidence is knowing that there’s someone out there for you still.
|
But don’t force it to forgive, force it to the summit instead. Get some self-respect. Don’t take anyone with you either. The confidence you win on the mountain comes so much cleaner when you’re alone. You don’t want a crowd for your accomplishments, that’s not pure of heart. It’s the same with cigarettes: don’t tell anyone you’re quitting, just do it.
I hike alone precisely because there’s no one there to testify for me at the end, only my own pride. If someone else was there, it’d be validation, and that’s not what I’m after.
Validation is asking a woman if she still finds you attractive after she dumps you. Confidence is knowing that there’s someone out there for you still.
And although I still miss the days of posting up with a bent knee outside the bar, a cigarette dangling from my lips like James Dean, I find these quiet accomplishments so much more effective. When I went out tonight, I sat at the bar accomplished and content. I climbed Pen y Fan, god damn it! Now I’m going to go talk to that girl.
Would you like to help us shatter stereotypes about men?
Receive stories from The Good Men Project, delivered to your inbox daily or weekly.
—
Photo: Getty Images