Shouting from my shed

Get the latest news, updates and happenings via my shed-based newsletter.

 

Highly Improbable and Absolutely Useless

“This above all: to thine own self be true” – William Shakespeare

Autumn in Paris

 My decision to try to carve a career out of doing what I love has given me plenty to think about. I act as my own auditor, inspector, counsellor and critic.

I set my own rules and plan my own year. It is the privilege and the curse of the self-employed. I struggle to find a job title for myself that feels right, and I feel uncomfortable saying any of the usual options out loud; Explorer, Expeditionist, Adventurer, Writer, Speaker… None of them quite fit. So I am not even sure what it is that I do.

What I am more certain of is what I am not. My golden rule for myself is that, in whatever I do, I must do it because I want to do it, and do it to a level of quality acceptable to the man in the mirror. If he is satisfied then the rest of the world is likely to have few qualms either. Specifically in the case of this blog entry, the journeys/expeditions/adventures/challenges that I do must be done because I want to do them, and they must be worthwhile.

I read an interview where Ranulph Fiennes talked about the dangers of expeditions becoming “gimmicky”, such as “pogo-sticking to the North Pole”. In other words, the sort of career described below by Peter Fleming, of pointless records set merely to be records, rather than to add value to the world or to your life.

“Adventure in the grand old manner is obsolete, having been exalted to a specialist’s job or degraded to a stunt… Of course there is still plenty of adventures of a sort to be had. You can even make it pay, with a little care; for it is easy to attract public attention to any exploit which is at once highly improbable and absolutely useless. You can lay the foundations of a brief but glorious career on the Music Halls by being The First Girl Mother To Swim Twice Round The Isle Of Man; and anyone who successfully undertakes to drive a well-known make of car along the Great Wall of China in reverse will hardly fail of his reward. And then there are always records to be broken. Here you can make some show of keeping within the best traditions, and set out to take the Illustrious Dead down a peg by repeating their exploits with a difference. Rivers which they ascended in small boats you can ascend in smaller; if they took five months to cross a desert, go and see if you can do it in four. Where they went in litters, you can ride; where they went on mules, you can go on foot: and where they went on foot, you can go (for all I care) on roller-skates. It is a silly business, this statistical eye-wiping. These spurious and calculated feats bear about as much relation to adventure as a giant gooseberry does to agriculture.”

Read Comments

You might also like

10500 Days (and almost as many words) “My thoughts first turned to adventure 10,500 days ago today. The idea of adventure for me at first was simple and uncomplicated. It was the prospect of excitement, fun, and novelty that were pulling me forward, and the push of […]...
Survey results: What direction shall I go next? I recently asked the wonderful readers of my newsletter for a bit of advice on what things I should focus my attention on for the next few months and years. I thought I’d share the results here, partly to show […]...
Embracing the Adventurous Spirit in Life and Leadership In the journey of life, we often find ourselves at crossroads, contemplating the path less traveled versus the familiar road. Drawing parallels from a life dedicated to adventure, we can extract profound lessons that not only motivate us but also […]...
 

Comments

  1. Al Posted

    This article also touches on some of the things I’m talking about:
    http://www.andy-kirkpatrick.com/site/the_big_sell_out1/

    Reply

 
 

Post a Comment

HTML tags you can use: <a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <cite> <code> <del datetime=""> <em> <i> <q cite=""> <s> <strike> <strong>

 

Shouting from my shed

Get the latest news, updates and happenings via my shed-based newsletter.

© Copyright 2012 – 2009 Alastair Humphreys. All rights reserved.

Site design by JSummertonBuilt by Steve Perry Creative