'The Benefits of Hiking and Climbing - Becoming a Human Animal

This article was written in a guest article for www.realwomensfitness.com
'Before' 1987 first week at Pilgrims aged 9
When I first went off to the wilderness I was with a small group of kids who all had asthma/eczema, diabetes, epilepsy, cystic fibrosis or some such ailment. I attended a special boarding school for kids who suffered from different illnessess to the point that they would usually be permanently hospitalised. Our first 'wilderness' camping trip took all of these ten and eleven year olds out to a field in the south east of england. It was surrounded by ancient woodland, huge lakes and nothing but countryside. We had to get our water from a natural spring and cook over a fire and sleep in tents. 'After' Summer 1988 aged 10
The benefits of this trip for children who may never have been into the countryside let alone to stay in it for a weekend; were innumerable. A lot us hadn't been able to go to school; were more used to looking at a ceiling from a hospital bed and hearing the sound of traffic rather than bird song.
I remember sitting in a canoe in the middle of a thunder storm with the rain drenching me. I was watching a heron as it caught an eel and then took it's meal to the shore not five feet from my boat. I felt vibrantly alive, the contrast was so great. Not a year before my mother had been convinced I was going to die. I had severe eczema that had worsened to the point of germ warfare carrying itself out energetically between the layers of my skin and driving me literally mad with pain. My Mum had fought to get me a place in this special school and it had saved my life. (Pilgrims School has sadly since closed due to government cuts). Now I was out paddling a canoe by myself, collecting my own water, running among giant trees, and waking up to the gentle sounds of the birds.
The health benefits of being in the outdoors aren't simply about the physical. Improved circulation, excellent cardiovascular fitness and normal elimination that combine to provide that natural 'glow' are the expected benefits of any constant exercise regime.
Hiking and climbing have particular qualities that will make you more flexible, have greater endurance and provide you with the ability to focus on whatever tasks you begin. But most of all, they are the ways you choose to make your life. 'We are what we repeatedly do' Aristotle said and exercise outdoors in nature makes us more than simply 'fit'. I would add to Aristotle's phrase that not only are we what we repeatedly do, but we are where we do it and how we go about doing it. In beautiful places you breathe in that beauty, you press pure oxygen into every part of your body and you experience the freedom of an unobstructed skyline.
In wilderness pursuits, some of that wildness passes into your bones. 'Ingwe, one of the founders of the Wilderness Awareness School born M. Norman Powell in 1914... spent his childhood running barefoot through the plains of Kenya with the young warriors of the neighboring Akamba tribe. Adopted into their tribe, Ingwe learned how to live close to the Earth.' one of his students said of him 'The first thing that you notice when you're in a room with him, it really and truly feels like you're in the presence of a Leopard. Honestly. His eye contact is difficult to meet and you feel like at any moment, if he chose to, he could leap across the room, kill you, and be back in his chair before anyone knew what had happened. The second thing I noticed was that he had better senses than anyone I have ever met. He can see, hear and smell things that I can only dream of. His senses, like his presence, are those of a hunting cat.' When this student asked Ingwe how he could do these things Ingwe answered simply 'Practice'.
So if your goal is to become fitter, you can go to the gym or the pool and become gym fit and pool fit and that is a great and good thing - it will help you to be healthy and have a happy life and it often fits in more easily with a work schedule. But if your goal is perhaps wider than this and you wish to make your muscle, and become what you do and you wish to influence the outcome of this decision to its utmost postitive result, then consider every aspect of your day (s). Think about what exercise you are doing and what kind of person you are becoming by repeatedly doing this type of exercise. If that's who and what you wish to become brilliant! If however your soul isn't inspired on the running machine, and the weights just aren't doing it for you; head for the rocks and the wild country.
Get some proper professional guidance, join a local Adventuring Club and get to know people who are already climbing/hiking on their weekends, take your holiday with a well known Adventure Sports School and kayak around a wild and remote coastline. Learn to work with horses, learn to ski and then travel cross country by your prefered method. An adventure sport is exactly that it means you reach within yourself for qualities you didn't know you had and you only find them because you're outdoors and the weather's closing in and you have to make decisions, or because you have to get a fire going and there's only wet wood available. They may very well be simple decisions like knowing when to put on extra layers and take them off or knowing when to call it quits and rest up, but they give you an edge; they give you a life.
Exercise is a funny thing, it's come about because our lifestyle has changed so drastically that it does not create the opportunities for us to be at our absolute fittest. We may think ourselves lucky as women that many of us don't have to do laundary or bake bread by hand anymore and that we don't have to walk to collect water and wood, but it was these simple things, done everyday that kept us superbly strong and fit and often delivering baby after baby and let's face it that's got to be like climbing Everest again and again!
There's a balance involved and it's one we have to give great care and attention to because everything we do has an effect. As well as making our own lives, we are impacting upon everyone elses and upon the collective future of the planet. This is what makes us so powerful. As women we have the ability to create within us - it is a natural power or energy that not enough of us connect with and the very reason that tribal societies had 'moon times or 'moon lodges', it's not superstition - but respect.
Part of getting in touch with the outdoors through hiking/climbing and other outdoor sports conditions us to be in touch with ourselves and with the energy's that move through all lives. Our ears are opened, our senses alerted and we are keenly switched on to everything around us and within us. In the city where we have to turn off our awarenes most of the time to stay sane amongst the noise and the onslaught of modern life, we have limited circumstances to be 100% alive. Our bodies truly become what we breathe, what we eat and drink and what we do, and our spirits are reflected in those things
Be your potential you, don't settle for second best, or third rate. Let the earth sing through your actions everyday and let the words of your unique song ring out to the people who are really in need of it. For only you can carry some of that fresh air from the wilderness back, in the lightness of your step, and only you can carry back some of that pure water in your blood and in your fresh complexion; back to the places where people have forgotten what it is to be a human animal, in sync with everything around us, between sky and stone.
These are the benefits of hiking and climbing and other outdoor pursuits.

Louise Brookes has set up The Positive Impact Living Life Skills Pages where you can freely learn the skills to live your Ultimate Life go to
http://viewsfrommytent.blogspot.com
Louise has travelled, climbed mountains, picked grapes, waitressed, worked in a store in central London, been an Apprentice of Tibetan Medicine for four years, been homeless with two full time jobs, gone round the S of England with a horse and cart, learnt about herbs and wilderness living from native people in Canada and generally been making an outstanding nuisance of herself during her time on this planet. She is currently living and making a nuisance of herself in France.

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If you have enjoyed reading this site please help me to keep raising the standards by leaving a donation


tags - hiking, climbing, childhood illness, asthma, eczema, recovery, benefits outdoor sport, special school, Pilgrims School, Ashburnham

Some rights reserved louisembrookes@hotmail.com Louise Brookes 29th June 2007
http://positiveimpactliving.blogspot.com

An Attitude of Fierce Resolve

Fierce resolve is something that cannot be beaten. Some people seem to be born with it. They know exactly what they want to do and they then spend their lives single mindedly doing it. Then there are those of us who admire them from the sidelines in wonder. While we are dithering, prevaricating and worrying about worrying - they have sailed around the world, climbed the highest mountain, dug wells in Africa, gone too space and won the Open at Wimbledon. All while we stood before two items in a shop wondering whether to get the one with the higher back or not!

Single-mindedness does not belong solely to the realms of athletes and A-students, it is an attitude that can be cultivated and you could call it magic, for it is the art of moulding reality to take the form of our dreams.

Reality can and does bend at our will. This is where the phrase fierce resolve clarifies itself. When you are firmly decided upon a goal, you cultivate the resolution to achieve. You don't do this half-heartedly. Whether your desire is to be wealthier or healthier, you do it with every ounce of your being in total accord with your destination. If it is wealth you want - you eat, sleep and breathe that feeling of wealthiness that you want to realise - you live off that anticipation, and then you do everything you can to get there. Everything that pops into your mind that seems possible to do, you do, you exhaust it as an avenue of possibility. It either works or it doesn't work. The point is you've done it and ruled it out and learned.

When I say 'fierce' I mean fierce. When you wake up you remind yourself of the presence of your enemy - 'Yourself, your negativity, your doubt, your disbelief, your lassitude' for here they are all present and correct whether you invite them or not, whether you recognise them or not. Any obstacle that arises and obscures your goal is your enemy. Often it is subtle. It is the insistent voice in your head that says 'Someone else has probably done this already' or 'Are you sure this is what you want' or 'You'll never be good enough' and these are the enemies you have to fight, even though sometimes you forget that they are there, and they slip up like samurai - but then a moment of distraction occurs and you remember 'Didn't I want to sail on a Tall Ship' or 'Go to Mexico' or 'Learn Salsa'. Something, something that nags you and is like a gaping hole of unfulfilment gnawing at you. Perhaps you hide in a bag of chips, or a pint of beer; when what you should be doing is fighting. Teeth bared, snarling, claws at the ready to pounce on the next unsuspecting doubt that threatens your precious ambition. And it is precious, it is your life - it is your beautiful goodness. The adventurous spirit in you. That vein of insight that only you have and nobody else on the entire planet can do or be it like you can. They cannot turn that piece of wood like you can - and they haven't those exact words that you so easily use to put ease in someone's heart when they most need it.

It's funny, I have known so many people over the years and all of them delighted me in some way that was their way and their way alone. They had a way of being themselves that I loved and that they weren't even aware of. Oh, but it's a beautiful thing and you all know what I am talking about

So this fierce resolve has to come about, sometimes, only after we've reached rock bottom. We don't have to, but often it's in our psyche to have to go there first before we are able to find the belief we need in ourselves to reach for 'impossible heights' Then it's up to us to remember, at all times of day, the reaches of passion; because sometimes our passion is quiet, buried beneath something perfunctory and we're in a bit of a daze -busy doing but not seeming to get anywhere and time's just passing and we're wondering where our lives have gone. It is in those moments that we snap at someone close to us, or drive up the curb or trip over our toes, because we're not there - we're not in our blood. we could be anyone in that moment, any Jo.

You probably want to be healthy and you probably want to be wealthy but have you thought about being wise. Being wise and not tripping up over your toes. Doing everything you can to get to your goal. Your dream is there, in you, there's a simple picture that you hold somewhere; a way of being, a quiet moment, some warmth, an emotion, something physical, a new car, cheaper insurance or a long cherished dream. Whatever it is don't continue relegating it so that it remains a dream. Live by it as though it is about to happen and do eveything you can to be there. You want to be comfortably out of your comfort zone; don't forget to live this life now in it's best possible way - don't over-exert yourself, but be kind.

I don't know why but now that I have started this journey - there really isn't enough time in the day. I stay up till late, I wake up in the middle of the night with more ideas than I have the time to do them. I get stiff from sitting typing for too long, because of this thing called 'fierce resolve'. It makes me labour without thinking about time or food, and sometimes it's only thirst or the need for the loo that forces me to stop whatever I'm doing to tend ridiculously, to my basic needs. You can become a very unkind 'potential', potential successful business person, potential best selling author, potential world famous actor. Whatever your potential don't let the realisation of it take away from something that is more important than anything else. The only human magic I think, 'kindness'.

I sat and watched the Princess Diana Concert last night along with about everyone whose got a TV on the planet - about 1 billion people. I remembered where I was when she died and how shocked I was, and also surprised about how much loss I felt for someone I didn't even know. She had kindness down to a tee and everyone loved her for being that and being beautiful, and being herself with all the vaguaries and fragility that comes with being a human-not-hiding.

Subconsciously, Princess Diana had formed a hope in my mind, a hope I didn't even know was there until she went, and with her my hope - or so I thought. Someone had been out there doing what I wanted to see being done; she tried to be truthful; which is so hard to be to yourself let alone to the whole world, and she took what power she had and gave it to people who had none saying kindly with her whole being - here use mine. She sincerely hoped it would help and sometimes that is the best we can do. The best we can manage is to hope; to live bravely with our fear that things won't work, and to share what we can that's simple and good.

Last night there were one billion people remembering Princess Diana. There were one billion people who weren't fighting each other, who weren't stealing someones' lands, or possessions or life. There were so many people who were just sitting down watching the TV, sharing, each one with their own dreams, their own culture, each one very different from the next.

I felt a healing in a way, for something you don't expect to need healing for, becuase it wasn't my grief to have, not really. But nevertheless it was there and it was real; experience doesn't lie.Yes, Princess Diana lives on through her sons and they carry that responsiblity with so much integrity, but I wonder if she doesn't now live on in all of us. Princess Diana was a 'beacon light of a hope' in Martin Luther King' words, for something none of us could phrase; only translate into feeling and that after all is a far deeper communiaction

She gave us with her passing her responsibility to share; to use what power we have, what 'resolve' we have and share it with those who do not have either our freedom, or our resources of health or wealth

When I went grape picking last summer I worked with about twenty Moroccans, and upon meeting me they were trying to establish where I was from and I said 'Je suis Anglaise' and immediately one of them said delightedly 'Ah Princess Diana' and peered at me. I was a bit taken aback. Suddenly Diana had become a sort of passport in common understanding between me and these new preople I had just met, whose culture and religion I didn't have much of a clue about. We went on to commiserate with each other about her tragic fate, but I couldn't help feeling a kind of delight that a door had been opened and I had had to do nothing to open it for it had already been done, and strangely enough it was Princess Diana that had done it, nine years after her death, she's still working her magic. Her 'fierce resolve' may perhaps have gone further with her death than it would had she remained here with us. Her 'soul force' is an inspiration, for soul force doesn't die. It is something we all have and we should use it.

I am tired of violence and war. I am tired of political squabbling while vulnerable people are withering under the bullets and knives of men and women who are supposed to be protecting the unprotected not persecuting them. I think this tiredness is shared by many people and it is a statement that our soul force is now willing and able to meet physical force. 'Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness' are human words, they are words for ordinary people; they are precious words that stand as symbols for our peace and our well being. They are words that cross borders and boundaries, races, religions and creeds. Where they are outlawed and citizens of the world suffer unduly because of such neglect, then our human kindness is necessary, and our fierce resolve is necesasary. 'The majestic heights' that Martin Luther King spoke of, of 'meeting physical force with soul force' apply to the whole world. 'Their freedom is inextricably bound to our freedom, we cannot walk alone' does not now apply only to the apartheid of the sixties but to the entire planet in the twenty first century.

I thought about yesterday how I imagined an old granny, upon realising she is in the company of a terrorist, going for him with her handbag. It was a really wonderful simplistic day dream, that made me full of glee becuase I could really see it, which means it's possible. There are so many of us that know how to live together and do so, and then there are those that don't yet know. When a person threatens another person in any way it's so rude. Bombing is rude - it's not just violent, it's a total infringement of privacy and personal space. You might think I'm overlooking the real tradgedy of such methods but I want to focus in on this infringement. Missiles, mortars, screaming fighter planes, bullets and the intention to do harm, are rude, and I have a fierce resolve to say as much.

For us ordinary folk who just want to get on with our lives, to go about our work, grow food, watch TV, have the odd festivity; we have nothing to throw back at bombs that fall from the sky or on our streets. We don't much understand them, we might think that bombing is a necessary evil, we might put up with them stoically or take to the streets in protest. We might get angry, upset and take vows of revenge or start our own jihad - some of us. But we are ordinary people and as such we don't want war, we don't like it and we go to it reluctantly.

In the past ordinary people have been capable of extraordinary feats and I think it's about time ordinary people revealed their superhero not-so-softcentres; and said we are unwilling to put up with being ordinary. We are unwilling to put up with wars over wealth and resources, unwilling to stand idly by and quiet while others are suffering at the hands of those who use their power so rudely. Freedom, many of us have had won for us, some of us have not yet tasted it and some of us are having it taken away as I write. I am indignant over any rude infringement of anyone's freedom on this earth and in my own way I will no longer stand for it, in my own way and for my own dignity and sensitivity I will 'hew out of the mountain of dispair a stone of hope'.It might be in another's country that they must win their own freedom as we have slowly done.

I am disturbed that Japan who gave up war and their own military after the second world war should be selling arms to Darfur now. I disaprove of this. I'm unhappy that the British and US government intervene in one dictatorship and not another.

My words might fall harmlessly on the sand, but my soul force will not. My 'fierce resolve' is that everyone has at least one taste of freedom, a taste that lingers and can be savoured long after I've left the earth. I feel like by writing, I'm like that old granny - there's not a lot that's in my power to do. I haven't got millions of pounds. I can't send armies here there and everywhere or pay politicians to be under my sway, but I can wave my handbag around and give blood curdling yells of disaproval. I'm enjoying a special kind of peace, a costly one I think I have been privileged to know the value of and I'm not about to waste my life letting it amount to nothing.

Life is a beautiful thing and we should all of us get to see that; those who cause suffering and those who are suffering 'Their freedom is inextricably bound to our freedom - we cannot walk alone' Martin Luther King, means just that -it means that 'we are one person' Pueblo Indian

Related Posts
• Depression, an unnecesessary ailment?
• What to do about sore muscles!
• Your Optimum Diet
• Be your healthiest you
• Progress Report 1 - SAS Fit!
• Progress is Process
• Ultimate Fitness
• The 8 ways of living long and strong
• How to live to be 100+ Dan Buettner


If you have enjoyed reading this site please help me to keep raising the standards by leaving a donation



tags - determination, resolve, faith, Martin Luther King 'I have a Dream', Princess Diana Concert, Japan weapons to Darfur, perserverence, non-violence, war, ant-war, the little people