Opposites

"Bravery stands midway between cowardice and rashness, one of which is a deficiency, the other an excess of courage." - Plutarch.


Even in a controlled environment, I have proved myself to be a coward. On an ordinary park swing, I am scared to go higher, I cant take the chemical reactions happening and theres another fear of what if I fall down or still worse, what if I fall down with the swing.

Few years ago, I went on a trip to Kulu Manali with my friends and colleagues. The trekking incident could be turned into a case study. We just started climbing some untrekked path. We were all excited to begin with. People in groups had their paces.
When we reached like quarter way, I thought I had this moment where I just avoided what could have been a slip down into the water. After which, I started having my little doubts about how wise is it to move on? My friend who was still a little behind, was scared and said she couldnt go any further and had to retreat. At this point, although reaching the top had its allure, it seemed it was better to just give up and go back. What if I went further, and changed my mind about climbing. What is that fear where we just freeze? There was a tricky spot on Stone Mountain,Atlanta too, where I thought the best thing to do was just stay put. It took a lot of coaxing from others and absolute unfounded trust that I could get out of that spot. Two of our party, reached the top, one of them lost her chappal. Now, in climbing, all strategical thinking is spent in making atleast one person reach the top for the teams merit. But in our case, although the call was just one persons, even the climb down had to be planned properly. It was not as easy as it seemed. We got some of the stones rolling down with a fisherman shouting at us. Even quarter treks are not easy, but they are fun.