Was discussing this with one of my fellow trekkers on the plane back home - what was the biggest lesson we learned? Without thinking I said that mine was ‘Trust’. And so it was. I had to trust that every day I was going to be OK, that Max, our guide would be leading us where we needed to go, I had to trust that I was going to recover in enough time from the AMS (Acute Mountain Sickness) to take part, and I had to trust all my team that they were going to help get me there.
On the way up to 4,800m and the Sinque Valley pass I felt extremely sick and dizzy, so had to opt for the pony option for an hour. Given that the path was much less than a metre in width and very uneven and steep, it was baking hot, and there was a very sharp drop to the right, the only option was to completely trust the pony that he was going to get me up there. I decided to trust him, and reckoned that he’d done that journey (or one like it) many more times than I had.
There was also the trust in myself - that I could do exactly what I’d set to do - to reach Machu Picchu and to reach my £5,000 target. That’s the biggest and probably the most challenging trust of all - to trust yourself. Do you trust yourself? How often?
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At the risk of sounding pedantic I am going to define “trust” and will do so via examples.
When we use the word “trust” we tend to follow it with the word “in” because trust is like the rope that unites subject (the person doing the trusting) and object (the person or thing being trusted). Now it is a most peculiar thing when people say “trust yourself” because in my opinion they mean either a) what it feels like when the action of trusting is done, or b) identify the subject and object of trust as one and the same.
I think I have a problem agreeing with both of those perceived popular definitions. Why? Because trust is not a feeling, but an action. There are times when I have trusted against my feelings (and I admit it, not very often!). Reading Helen’s last 2 posts what comes accross is precisely that, i.e. they carried on walking even thought they felt tired, knackered, etc. We admired them and say: Well done! because they went on regardless of how they felt (or perhaps precisely because the feelings were hardly pleasant).
Does this mean that trust must be done blindly, without feeling? Not really, but we will do well to remember that those of us “feely types” could wait until the cows come home if we had to have the right feeling in order to do the right thing. By the same account, those of us labelled “insensitive types” may make right (or wrong) decisions and yet feel little joy, sadness or pain as aftermath. Just because we lack something (temporarily or permanently) it does not mean that we cannot act nonetheless, even when such action will often involve trust.
Trust in. In something, Something, someone or Someone.
Each one of those possible 4 answers merits another post on another day…. perhaps.