But I want to be on THAT mountain

A good friend once gave me an analogy when it comes to learning and growing. So, imagine that you are standing on a mountain and it has a really great view. You look out around and see the beautiful sunset and realize how great it is to be on the mountain and how you can see so much more then you could before, when you were at the base of the mountain. But then you notice behind you is a mountain that is pretty close by and it’s even bigger! So you think, “Wow, if the view is so great from up here, I bet the view will be even better up there.”

So you decide that you want to go stand on the bigger mountain. However, the only way to get to this mountain is to climb down the mountain that you are already standing on. So you begin to make your way down the mountain, which often times climbing down a mountain can be harder than climbing up (I am always much more likely to slip). With each step you take down the mountain you sacrifice some of the view that you once had. The more you descend the more beauty you sacrifice until you get to the bottom where you can hardly see anything.

And then you have to climb all the way up the other mountain. You know that it’s going to be better than the previous mountain, which is probably your only motivation to keep climbing. Although you also probably wonder why you ever got off the initial mountain in the first place. The previous view was fine and you would much rather be enjoying your time there than having to trek up this other mountain. But once you get to the top of this mountain you can see even better then before. It’s even more beautiful and you wonder why you wasted so much time on that other mountain. But you couldn’t have gotten to the tip of this mountain without climbing down the other one and then climbing up this one.

Sometimes in order to learn or grow, we must first unlearn what we already knew or break down what was previously there, in order to start something new. Is it possible that the way you have looked at everything before was wrong? You’ll never know unless you begin to take the things that you know, uproot them, and call them into question.

I tell this story because this is relevant in my life…I’ll explain the next time I write.