There it stands in front of you, solemn and resolute, towering towards the sky. Welcome to the wall! The wall represents the biggest obstacle on the path to your dream, or the greatest challenge to be overcome during your journey towards a personal goal. It might not appear as a wall to everyone, instead you may imagine yourself at the bottom of a deep pit, or faced with some other equally formidable obstruction to your progress. Regardless of the form taken, it is too often a place of death—the location at which many flickering flames of hope have been extinguished, never to be relit. Make no mistake, getting over or through the wall requires strong stuff.
This barrier may appear anywhere along your adventurous journey and no matter how smoothly you have been making your way forward, it can stop you cold in your tracks. It sizes you up, looks into your soul, and weighs what you carry in your heart. Then with a deep thunderous roar it bellows “You may not pass, give up!” When faced with such an overpowering challenge we can lose our momentum, energy, and confidence in an instant. At that point giving up seems easy, natural even. However, before you throw away all your hard-won gains, take a moment to stare right back at the looming monster ahead, and while you do so, gather your fortitude, steel your resolve, and visualize standing on the other side. As soon as you do that, you are already getting stronger again. You can surmount that wall or you can smash through it. You can find a weakness in a small crack and start breaking it down from there. You may have to take it apart one stone at a time but you are not going to give up.
“Every journey and every adventure begins with a single step along some kind of path. We may not know where they will take us or what trials and rewards they will present us with, but we can be certain that starting out along one of them will open up a myriad of possibilities.”
The paragraph above is from an earlier post that I published in July 2021. It refers to the various roads we traverse throughout our lives. In February of the same year, I wrote a longer piece on the importance of adventuring and the benefits it can bring. The following sentence is from that article:
“Don’t forget that there are trials, hazards, and dangers along any path, which usually scale proportionately with the size of the undertaking.”
The point is that, if you take it upon yourself to follow your inner-calling and set out on a path that feels like it was created by the universe just for you, then at times you are going to have to fight up steep inclines and do battle with monsters—both internal and external. That is the way of the worthwhile journey, the adventure that brings meaning to your existence, and the endeavour that keeps the cosmic wheel spinning in a positive direction. More than you realise depends on your success so do not give up.
It might take months or even years to reach your destination, and once you start your assault the challenge might turn out to be even tougher than you first thought, but as long as you don’t quit you are still on target. It is when we are the most exhausted and disheartened but refuse to quit—somehow managing to keep heading towards our goals—that the human spirit makes its greatest gains. During those dark shadowy days, most of us have no idea of the growth that is taking place inside us. It is only when we reach the top of the wall or break through to the other side that it becomes apparent. Those are the moments when you feel like you can fly. Those are the times when you know that nothing is impossible. You did it, you got there. Look how far you have come. Aren’t you glad you didn’t give up. What is going to stop you now—nothing.
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The photographs featured in this post were either taken by the creator of Escape & Adventure during his continuing wanderings or are images used under a royalty-free or CC0 license. Consent is required from the creator and founder of Escape & Adventure before any of the images for which he owns copyright can be reproduced in any form. All the literary work contained in this post is the intellectual property of the creator of Escape & Adventure. Consent is required before any of the literary work can be reproduced in any form.
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While the world continues to be impacted by the highly contagious COVID-19 virus travel is not advised. Despite our love of escapism and adventure, health and safety must come first. None of the content in this post is intended to contradict the rules and advice put in place by the relevant authorities to protect citizens from contracting and/or spreading COVID-19 or other diseases. Escape & Adventure accepts no liability for sickness, injury, or death resulting from anyone failing to take necessary precautions to protect themselves and others.
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