Inspiration and expectations

For my first blog of 2017, I thought I'd share some words from a TV series I watched recently, finally, after recording it some months ago. The series was a dramatisation of the life of Sir Edmund Hillary, the first man to climb Everest, who then gave so much back to the people of Nepal by building schools and hospitals. He lost his wife and daughter in a plane crash in Nepal, and grieved deeply. I don't know if the words his character said were his own, or were dreamed up by the screenwriter, and I can't remember them perfectly, but they touched me nonetheless.

"I have been a lucky man," he said, as he came out of his grief and started looking to the future again. "I've achieved my dreams, and we don't expect* that to happen to many men (sic)."

Stretching for our dreams is a good thing, of course, as Sir Ed would 100% agree. But assuming we will achieve them, or on a lesser scale, simply assuming we will always get what we want, can set us up for difficulty and failure. Recovery when we feel cheated or denied is difficult. But I think that appreciating what we have, even after awful grief and loss, helps us move on.


* or something along those lines