Prisoner Of My Ambitions

I have been reading the Tasker Boardman Omnibus lately and one of the books contained in the Omnibus is written by Peter Boardman and is called The Shining Mountain.  He writes about his attempt to climb this 22,520 ft peak in India.  Changabang was intriguing to Joe Tasker and Peter Boardman because it was not only a mountaineering adventure, but a technical testpiece at high altitude.

One of the faces is very steep and had not yet been climbed and Tasker/Boardman wanted to do it in a small team as opposed to a giant expedition which had been the norm until that time.  They were able to pull it off but not without their trials and tribulations.  At point Boardman writes about a particularly long day when they are scaling a crux section at altitude in the cold...and could can just tell that he was probably suffering a lot more than he was able to describe in his book.  He very succintly wrote 'But I was a prisoner of my own ambition, and persisted up the ropes'.

That phrase resonated with me and the more I thought about it, the more it made sense on multiple levels.  I identified with the phrase and thought of how I have chosen to do events on the bike that make me suffer.  At the end of the day, they are positions in which I voluntarily put myself in and that somehow makes it more manageable.  It also reminds me that there are times when you have to make sacrifices for the greater good or bigger picture...and again we make those choices.

It could also work in reverse...so you are prisoner to the level of your ambitions too.  In that sense people who are unmotivated and don't have ambitions will not be able to move forward and they are held captive by their ambitions.

back to the ambitions of work for now - hmmm....I do feel like a prisoner there too....Deep Thoughts...