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In a World in which so many struggle to find purpose amidst the complexity of modern life, long distance hiking offers an escape to a simpler existence - one in which the goals are challenging, yet clearly defined, the obstacles numerous, but always surmountable through individual effort, and one's worries few and tractable. It is an existence that is at once both wholly contrived and perfectly natural.
The goals are arbitrary - set by none other than the individual himself - and that same individual is largely free from pressure to conform to prescribed right and wrong as to how he sets about achieving these. In this simplified existence, progress and well being can be defined by a few simple variables - these alone giving a measure of the quality of one's actions. It is an environment in which the effects of one's moral code are clear to see.
The ideas and values held for a lifetime are thrown into stark relief by the experience, and are replaced, discarded, reaffirmed or added to as the journey progresses. More often than not the validity of these adjustments holds true when we return to our 'normal' lives. The person who achieves his goals and does so in a manner true to his own innate sense of 'right' can only return a stronger and more self-reliant individual.
New York-New Jersey |
The Sixteenth Edition of the ATC's Appalachian Trail Guide to New York-New Jersey is now available. Photographs from Ben and Billy's hike of the Appalachian Trail are featured in the official guide to this section of the Appalachian Trail. Two photos are credited in the Guide:
High Point Monument (page 181)
Sunrise Mountain (page 189)
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