News from Mr Grady
8th June 2023
Hello everyone,
I hope you had a restful and peaceful half term break.
I had the fantastic duty over the half term break of congratulating an old friend on their incredible achievement of actually climbing and reaching the top of Mount Everest.
In my naivety, I had assumed that “summitting” was pretty much a given, as long as one was relatively fit, and that lots of people did this every year. How wrong I was. There were only around 470 licences issued this year, and there is only a short two to three-week window in the whole year, where the weather is favourable enough to actually make it to the top. Only one in four people broadly over the years actually succeed in making it to the actual top. So, to have done so, and made it back safely (unfortunately 13 people have died this year attempting to get to the top,) is really quite something. Having spoken to my friend, I feel a sense of achievement myself in simply knowing someone who has managed this tremendous feat!
What impressed me even more than the feat itself, was the dedicated and focussed approach my friend has taken in preparing for this challenge.
His goal was to reach the top, and so he looked carefully at what has ensured previous climbers to be successful, and looked at what they did in preparation, in terms of training, both physical and mental, and how effective that training could be. He carefully considered what the barriers had been to people being successful, and ensured his preparation included reading and research, so that although the professional support he had was in place, that he also had a sufficient working knowledge himself, and could make informed decisions.
Most importantly, he had to be mentally prepared for the euphoric moment of reaching the top, which lasts a couple of minutes, followed by the knowledge that, having spent 4-5 hours getting there on that day, there was then a 5-6 hour descent back to “camp 4” before several more days of descent, so actually the mental challenge of “I’m at the top of the world – I now have days of descent, without the euphoria” was prepared for.
Every year, lots of people it seems, think they can pay the fees for the licence, pay a support company, but do no training themselves and assume that because there’s a support team that will do it. Their own effort isn’t even a factor. You can imagine how dangerous this is, to have people dangerously unfit to look after several thousand metres up and in temperatures well-below freezing.
In talking to my friend, he simply said “well you’ve got to put in the effort, and the support teams are really able to do their job.” This is such a simple but effective concept isn’t it, in all of the challenges or work we face. Yes, there are people around us whose job it is to help, to support to mentor and to coach, but if you are not matching their efforts every step of the way, if you think that they’re doing the work, so you don’t have to, then you’ll never reach the goals you set, or the goals you hope to achieve.
Climbing your own particular Everest, whatever it is will always be a challenge, but when you match your efforts to those around you who want the very best for you, then you’ll be summitting with pride!
Stay well and safe everyone,
With all best wishes,
Mr Grady
