The Mountain Is Me

 

"In fact, the universe does not allow perfection. Without breaks and gaps, there would be no growth. Nature depends on imperfection. Fault lines make mountains, star implosions become supernovas, and the death of one season creates rebirth of the next."

Brianna Wiest wrote this in her book, "The Mountain Is You - Transforming Self-Sabotage Into Self-Mastery." I sunk deeply into her words. Honestly, I sunk deeply into the entire book. I noticed it on the shelf recently while picking up a different book for a colleague as a gift, Wiest's book caught my eye. The title resonated with me. I have been my most difficult "mountain to climb" for as long as I can remember.

We all have proverbial mountains to climb but fail to realize that we represent the tallest, most treacherous ascents. We find every reason not to bother climbing at all because the task is too difficult and puts us in peril. We want to control the variables to reduce risk and increase our chances of success, but we can't prepare for every challenge the climb presents. To prevail on our climb we must learn how to navigate the mountain effectively. We have to choose paths that increase our chance of success while avoiding the unnavigable.

Acknowledging that much of what we experience during our climb is naturally chaotic and unpredictable allows an opportunity to thrive in a disorderly environment. Making the effort releases the burden and anxiety surrounding the need to control things that weren't meant to be controlled. In my life, I have accepted that there is no such thing as perfection, so pursuing it is not a valuable commitment. I strive instead to commit to experiencing things as they come, and as they are. Self-doubt is always lurking, rest assured, which is why reading this book was timely in the way it framed strategic approaches to changing my lens focusing directly on habits of mind that bolster confidence in my ability to navigate challenges.

In all chaos there is a cosmos, in all disorder a secret order. --Carl Jung.

This book is overflowing with insight into the dark world of self-doubt, so much so that I intend to reread it, something I rarely feel motivated to do. The author has a knack for being direct. Her approach to the subject matter is pragmatic and objective. She frames several reflective opportunities to identify habits of mind that aren't generative and how to change perspective so those debilitating habits are intentionally replaced. 

Like many others, I feel anxiety related to expressing myself and the things I do. Cognitively, I know that imperfection is a natural state, but I struggle to reconcile my imperfection. I'm hard on myself, sometimes to the point of obsession with projecting competence, and that's hard to admit. 

This book discusses the reasons and habits that cause us to occasionally get in our own way and how we can stop doing that. It explains that we often have different opposing needs that clash, which makes it hard to change our habits. At worst, it sometimes feels like trying to change is useless. However, if we learn from our bad habits, understand our feelings better, let go of old experiences, and think about who we want to be in the future, we can get past our obstacles. 

A mountain can symbolize the tough challenges we face, but with an adjustment to our perspective, it also can symbolize our efforts to overcome them as we climb to the summit. Overcoming these challenges requires a serious commitment to ourselves in dealing with our past, becoming stronger, and changing how we approach our problems. Ultimately, it’s about mastering ourselves via the paths we choose on the journey up the mountain.