Left foot, right foot

On the side of a mountain or staring at a wall

This past weekend, I was sort of panicking. There’s a lot of uncertainty in my life right now, and I’m having a tough time seeing what everything I’m doing is for—where the path I’m walking is going to lead. I have a few mantras that I return to in moments of uncertainty. One made me recall a story from my travels a little over a year ago now.

I had the distinct pleasure of being able to back country hike in Patagonia with my friend Joe. Joe was a pretty experienced outdoorsman by that point in our lives, whereas I was (and am) at heart a city boy with a penchant for saying fuck it and really going for something. Suffice to say, the hike we elected rapidly put Joe and especially me in over our heads. The conditions were adversarial, the location remote, and we each only had the other for support and comfort.

The second day of the hike was rough. There were various points at which we thought we might have to turn back, and we were the only souls who made it out of the campsite that morning. Funnily enough, the awful conditions meant we had this vast expanse of nature basically to ourselves (along with the fauna and flora who inhabited it)… it was very special albeit brutal.

On the third day of the hike, we were traversing our second mountain pass in as many days. The conditions were largely pleasant that day, until we reached the ascent to the pass itself.

The wind began to whip us in the face, and the climb became steep. We could barely lift our feet off the ground without getting knocked over by the wind. In order to move forward, we had to wait for the wind to abate enough to take the next step.

The climb went painfully slow, and my mind went to some dark places. At various points throughout this hike the wind had been so strong that Joe and I could no longer speak to each other audibly without taking shelter. I’d say that this was one of those moments.

Joe is a very fast hiker. And neither of us wanted to be in this wind longer than we had to. He started rapidly outpacing me. I remember thinking that he must be part mountain goat.

Each time I looked up instead of focusing on my next step, Joe was further away from me. Eventually, I couldn’t see him anymore. He had made it over the lip of the ascent, and was sheltering from the wind behind a large rock (out of my view). I felt truly alone.

As the wind was buffeting me, I saw the distance that I had to close in order to make it over the lip, and I contemplated the wind that waited for us on the other side of the mountain pass (where we would have to descend 2500 feet in about 1.5 miles).

A beautiful thought crossed my mind.

“Just give up.”

Sit down on the side of the mountain and wait. It was so simple, how hadn’t I thought of it?

In retrospect, one thought convinced me to continue. If I gave up, I would have to wait on the side of that mountain in the wind until I died of thirst… which didn’t seem like a great way to go.

Joe had been telling me a lot about his PCT hike. He has a lot of interesting stories and wild experiences from that time in his life. A few of them involved moments of extreme doubt, from what I understood. One mantra that stuck with Joe, and that he shared with me is, “Left foot, right foot.”

I.e. sure there’s a ton of shit still left to do, but how do I do it? By taking the next step. First your left foot, then your right foot.

That mantra, “left foot, right foot,” came to my head on the side of the mountain. The only way I was going to reach Joe was by taking the next step, without worrying about anything that would come after.

I felt like I was moving faster, but it wasn’t my pace that had changed. I was no longer preoccupied by anything beyond my immediate next step, and I trusted that the path and my body would lead me to where I need to go.

Eventually, I made it to the top. I staggered over to Joe and pretty much collapsed next to him behind a large rock.

He and I both looked worse for wear. Our faces were covered in snot, dust and sweat. I recall us laughing about the absurdity of our situation, but we couldn’t really talk because the wind was too loud.

Joe let me take a breather before we started walking again. The wind continued to buffet us as we trudged across the flat of the pass. Joe was walking about fifteen feet ahead of me, and suddenly his entire gait changed. He began to walk normally, as if the wind was no longer there .

I was shocked, until I took a few more steps and caught up with him.

It was as if we had stepped through a portal. The geography of the pass and its surrounding glaciers made it such that where we’d felt 40-50 mph winds on one side of it, on the other side there wasn’t much more than an occasional gust.

The sun peaked out, and we saw the azure blue of Lago Viedma from half a mile above. I felt so grateful for my friend, and for the fact that we could share this together—all of it.

I realize that this story is way too apocryphal. It kind of makes me want to puke writing it; I feel like I’m playing the wise man.

Sometimes we take the next step and the next step and never end up with the beautiful view, the gratitude nor the perspective. That’s not really the point though, I guess.

When the wind is incomprehensibly strong, and we feel sick and tired and like giving up, nothing beyond the next step matters. It doesn’t serve us.

I recognize that when things feel really crazy, it can be difficult to center oneself around an abstraction like “just take the next step.” How are you supposed to know that on the other side of that mountain pass there’s clear blue sky, and not just more wind and hail and misery?

You’re not supposed to know, but you’re never going to find out without taking the next step, and the next one, and the next one… QED.

Inshallah I get that view of the lake.