I SAT NEXT TO HIM ON THE BENCH
“It’s not the
mountain we conquer, but ourselves.”
Edmund Hillary
I
started a little late for work, this morning. I wanted to take a long walk
through the pleasant winter-sun… I love the winter sun. On my way, I met a man
(who’s in his mid-forties). He, too, was sitting on a bench and soaking in the
pleasant rays of the winter sun. As I hadn’t seen him for a very long time, I said,
“Seeing you after a long time… Were you out of town?”
I sat next to
him on the bench.
The man said, “I
was very much in town; in fact, I was inside my house for more than three
months, now.”
He lived on the
3rd floor of a building which
had no lift. “I find difficulty while walking, particularly while climbing the
stairs,” he said, “Today, I, literally, forced myself to step out of the house.”
“How do you feel
about it?” I asked.
“Good… Very Good,”
the man said.
Then, the man
added, “There was a time when I thought ‘Success’ meant accumulating wealth. I
never thought my health as my wealth. Today, being able to walk a short
distance and climb three stories of my building, without running out of my
breath, feels like true success.”
I remembered the famous words of Edmund Hillary: “It’s not the mountain we conquer, but ourselves!”
My
own quest, too, had begun with the same search – to find the place called ‘Success’.
So, like most around me, I thought ‘Success’ was a destination… that, I would be
‘there, one day’. Mercifully, I realized, along this blind pursuit, how
illusionary that idea was!
There wasn’t any
place to arrive… The very journey was an experience of success… The comparisons
and yardsticks began to drop… The number-game ceased to fascinate me, anymore. I
began to realize, that if I was unable to experience success, here and now,
with whatever little that I have achieved, then, no matter how much more I achieve
– how much more I climb – it would only keep me ‘incomplete’ and ‘insecure’.
In Life, there will,
always, be higher mountains to climb and deeper oceans to sail. But, at the end
of this great pursuit, we will only arrive at a place, where Edmund Hillary, had
reached: “It’s not the mountain we conquer, but ourselves.”
GERALD D’CUNHA
Pic’s: 1. pixabay.com 2. wallup.net
Video: Mary Perez
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