The Thrill Of The Soul

Sacrifice is only meaningful when it protects lives that directly depend on a lucid choice.

The ascension had to be done under the leadership of a guide accustomed with the dangers of the mountain and with team work. Montgomery Wick was the only able to lead to the accomplish this rescue mission full of responsibility, a very dangerous mission, the fulfillment of which, deserving words of encouragement and support, depended not only upon the will of the six alpinists, but also upon luck. It was not the first time when Montgomery Wick, this tall, vigorous, adventurous man, with a health, which could have challenged any doctor, was assigned with such a difficult mission, but, this time, many people doubted its success. And this is mainly because each of the team members was supposed to climb the mountain with a specific amount of nitroglycerin on his back, which could explode at any time.

Have you watched the movie "Vertical Limit (2000)"? Montgomery Wick manages to get with the rest of his team to the cave, which was covered by the avalanche, where all the survivors were, those they fervently searched for. However, this is the place where a dramatic, full of emotions and heart-breaking scene takes place.

Can you change the direction of a seemingly irreversible decision in the final moment of an overwhelming choice?

Just when they were trying to lift the two survivors with a rope, a piece of glacier fell off the cave's wall, and because the two were hanging on the same rope, they all four have fallen in the depths of the cave. The rope to which they were tied, could bear all four of them, but the ice axes could not resist any longer and had little until falling out from the cradle they were hammered in. It seemed nothing else could save them. The tragedy could happen in any moment. The will to live was strong, but a deadly terror seized their souls. Panic broke out altogether, and nothing could disarm it. All four of them, sunk into a terrible unrest, with their grieving souls, covered with a fierce despair, were dreadfully waiting for the end.

Strong characters can be spotted only at difficult times, only when they are confronted with those sensitive, undesired realities; only when, facing the danger, they need to make some sacrifices, choices dictated both by reason and by soul.

Montgomery Wick, the leader of the team, more animated by only one feeling – the love for his wife, who died on the mountain, and which he found just now, he found her frozen in this mission, he thought for a moment, and with a last struggle, with a last wish to live, he pulls out his penknife. He closes his eyes for a moment, says in his thought a short last prayer - a dying man's prayer, then he re-opens his eyes. And just like a devoted servant who gives his life for his master, thus achieving ultimate happiness, he cuts the rope, thus saving Peter and Annie, the ones being above him on the rope. Even so, unfortunately – or maybe as a divine punishment, Elliot Vaughn, the second survivor, who was actually the one responsible for the death of his wife, falls with him in the deep abyss of the cave.

Does reality have the power to validate the meaning you give to pain when you are thrown into a destiny that is not yours?

The meaning you give to this passage can be that of the unchanged man, so caught up in his own non-values ​​that he drags everything down after him. In another case, it can mean the expansion of the field of consciousness or the spirit of the adventurer who looks death in the eye. Or, on the contrary, it can remain an oppressive weight, a constant pain that drags you down and prevents you from moving forward in life.

One of leadership’s results, whether we refer to our way of relating to a different reality or the art to change ourselves, controlling our reactions and attitudes, or any other form of imposing a particular model of interpreting what we feel and perceive is that it presents us new blends of self-knowledge and their result: consciousness.

Other elements outside the continuum of less pleasant and unexpected experiences, where you cannot assist like a spectator who sees the development of events from the outside without getting involved, can ignite or extinguish that flame of tenacity to become servant of a noble cause, but with high stakes.

What course do the assumed and conscious choices you impose take, when the world around you has ceased to mirror your aspirations?

So, to acquire the art of leadership, we must begin to understand the existence of several possibilities to percept reality than we previously thought existed. Or even more. The same additional stakes, creating an attitude not based on reason, law or rules, but on the instinct of reaction, survival or assertion to a new framework of affirmation (through sacrifice) will be used again and again, with significant repercussions.

More comprehensive "intervention" models are implemented in circumstances where commitments are secured by conscience and one’s own fund of emotions. They elevate the struggle for existence of a new leadership version – based on the height of one’s own moral weight, the height of your own vision of what you are, to avoid falling into a ridiculous derisory.

Can you measure your uprightness only by questioning your own innocence, when the present no longer allows you to ignore the reality that everyone else is disavowing?

Do you turn your back to your spiritual nature when you plunge into a difficulty?

Being in the forefront of people can be both a blessing and a curse. On the one hand, as a leader, exerting a great influence upon people, you can dominate and control them, thus relying on their support and total commitment. That is you can enjoy your status, and the fact that you are surrounded by a team of devoted people, willing to make many efforts just to be able to help you in achieving more easily your goals. On the other hand, if you and your team find yourselves in a critical situation, well, in this case, you must be the one having a strong will in order to fight for every soul on the team.

Can you imagine what would your future bring? Can you put to the test your possibility to devote yourself to others when you climb on steep slopes? Or, you are like the one that takes a task and leaves it when it is approaching the climax of the mission? Could you endure the feelings which surpass people in the critical situations? Do you turn your back to your spiritual nature when you plunge into a difficulty?

The best leaders rule not only with their minds, but also with their souls. If you are leading a mountain group, it is up to your duty to make sure of the success of the mission appointed to you, even if you will be confronted with difficulties apparently impossible to overcome. Ensure the people that no danger threatens them, or otherwise, put them on guard and act jointly with them.

The proof of your own worth is given by the accord struck between seemingly impossible difficulties and the courage to follow your path to the very depths of your soul.

The thrill of the soul is that inner vibration, that feeling of responsibility for the people in your team, which a leader must have it in any case, but especially in critical situations. The moral support can have beneficial effects, and the supreme sacrifice can sometimes save souls, but other times it can be useless.

I wonder how many leaders have this feeling of responsibility for their team. There are just a few ! However, these are the leaders who had not forgotten that, first of all, they are still human.